The party says the plans it set out at its annual conference in Liverpool in September would deliver a zero-carbon power system by 2030 and save £93 billion on energy bills by the end of the decade.

Of that, £15.8 billion would come from onshore wind – savings that would be lost as a result of the Conservatives’ 2015 effective ban on new onshore wind production.

Onshore wind is considered to be one of the cheapest and quickest sources of renewable energy, but it is often hugely unpopular in the communities where wind farms are located – leading David Cameron to halt government subsidies.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said: “Tackling the climate crisis and the energy price crisis is the great challenge of our time, but Rishi Sunak just does not get it.

“Twelve years of the Conservatives has left our energy system exposed, bills rocketing, while failing to tackle the climate emergency.

“My Labour government will tackle the climate crisis by grasping the opportunities it presents. We need this scale of ambition to meet the scale of the task.”

Labour said that maintaining the ban now meant keeping energy bills high, diminishing energy security with higher gas imports and higher greenhouse gas emissions.

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Ministers have no idea how many beaches in England shut due to sewage

(Or the economic cost – Owl)

Water companies told the EA they dumped raw sewage into rivers and seas 372,544 times last year, for 2.6m hours. The real figure is believed to be much higher though, due to underreporting. …

Data shows that currently no river passes tests for both ecological and chemical health as a result of a cocktail of pollution from sewage, agricultural runoff and industry.

Helena Horton www.theguardian.com

The government has no idea how many beaches in England have been shut due to sewage pollution this year, ministers have admitted.

This summer, scores of beaches across the country were forced to close in high season after raw sewage was dumped into the sea near the coast. Surfers Against Sewage found that in August alone, at least 90 beaches across the country had been sullied by sewage.

Just last week, the Cornish beauty spot St Agnes saw its blue waters polluted to a murky brown colour after waste was spilled into the sea.

The Conservative government has claimed water quality is a “top priority” and that current sewage pollution levels are unacceptable, but despite this, Defra minister Trudy Harrison admitted that beach closures are not even being monitored. In a parliamentary answer this week, she said: “Neither [Defra] nor the Environment Agency holds information on the number of beach closures due to sewage pollution in England.”

A second question tabled by Labour’s shadow environment secretary Jim McMahon also disclosed that the government has not conducted any impact assessments into how allowing sewage pollution affects tourism and coastal businesses financially.

McMahon told the Observer: “Whilst the Tories continue their game of prime minister pass-the-parcel, Labour has a clear plan to protect our coastal communities from filthy raw sewage, by forcing water firms to clean up their act.

“Families across the country should be able to enjoy where they live, work or holiday, and businesses should not have to worry about the Tory sewage scandal hitting their trade.

“A Labour government will use the levers of power to hold reckless water bosses to account and toughen regulations to prevent them from gaming the system.”

Amy Slack, head of campaigns and policy at Surfers Against Sewage, added: “This news comes as no surprise as it’s entirely in keeping with the government’s laissez-faire approach to sewage pollution. Until those in power show they are serious about cracking down on the profiteering polluters of the water industry, sewage will continue to be dumped into the UK’s rivers and seas, at huge cost to public and environmental health. Now that the lid has been lifted on the sewage scandal, people across the country are rising up and demanding an end to sewage pollution.”

In the summer, Labour revealed that on average water companies in England and Wales are pumping raw sewage into our natural environment every two-and-a-half minutes, with areas such as beaches, playing fields and bathing waters affected over a six-year period.

Earlier this year McMahon said a future Labour government would implement measures to force water companies to progressively end sewage dumping.

Sewage is spilled regularly into England’s rivers and other waterways. Water companies told the EA they dumped raw sewage into rivers and seas 372,544 times last year, for 2.6m hours. The real figure is believed to be much higher though, due to underreporting. This is partly due to inadequate infrastructure, which means that when it rains sewage systems are mixed with storm overflows, which are then spilled without being treated into rivers, the ocean and even lakes.

Data shows that currently no river passes tests for both ecological and chemical health as a result of a cocktail of pollution from sewage, agricultural runoff and industry.

Defra’s annual report last week revealed no progress had been made in the past year on improving river water quality, with just 16% of rivers deemed to be in a good ecological state, the same as in 2016. The lack of progress means the government is unlikely to meet the legal threshold of 75% of rivers achieving good status by 2027 under the water framework directive (WFD).

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Homeless crisis grows as holiday lets boom

“So-called second homes and Airbnbs aren’t home to anyone”

“Local communities need new powers to keep homes in residential use and limit numbers of second homes.”

From today’s Western Morning News

A VILLAGE in Devon is being seen as a worrying example of the impact a huge growth in holiday rentals has on the homeless crisis affecting many parts of Britain.

Braunton, reputedly England’s biggest village, has seen a growth in holiday lets in recent years, driven in part by the expansion of Airbnb.

As fears grow that more property owners could move into the holiday business next season, one Braunton local is warning that her community is being squeezed to death by the changes.

Emma Hookway has lived in Braunton since she was 16. But she and her six-year-old son lost their rented home when her landlady’s daughter moved back in. She has now launched a local housing crisis campaign.

She said a two-bedroom bungalow in Braunton now cost around £1,200 a month. Many properties have been taken out of the reach of locals and are now offered to holidaymakers. In nearby Croyde and Woolacombe one in four properties are on Airbnb. In St Ives the figures is one in five In Newquay it is one in six.

Will McMahon, Director of Action on Empty Homes told the Daily Telegraph more homes were needed to meet local needs. “So-called second homes and Airbnbs aren’t home to anyone,” he added. “Local communities need new powers to keep homes in residential use and limit numbers of second homes.”

Tourism leaders say second homes bring vital earnings to coastal communities.

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6 Nov 2022

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Conservative gaslighting can’t hide the prowling wolf of recession

The “invasion” of immigrants does not mask our real woes: climate change and a tanking economy

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Sunak accepted £60k from donors linked to offshore tax havens for leadership bid

“Integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level”

There is no suggestion the Prime Minister did anything wrong in accepting the donations, which were in line with the ministerial code. But it will raise fresh questions over his political judgement

(He accepted at least £60,000 from seven companies and individuals with links to the Cayman Islands, Luxembourg, Jersey, Bermuda and the British Virgin Islands, records show.)

Extract from www.mirror.co.uk

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Nurses vote to strike in first ever national action as cost of living bites

The state we’re in! – Owl

The biggest nursing strike in NHS history will take place before Christmas in a dispute about pay that is raging across the health service.

Joe Middleton www.independent.co.uk

It would be the first national strike in the history of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), which is campaigning for a pay rise of 5 per cent above inflation, as reported by The Observer.

A union source told the newspaper: “This will see the majority of services taken out, and picket lines across the country.”

Although counting is still under way, it is understood that RCN officials believe enough members have voted for winter industrial action which is set to take place within a few weeks, possibly before Christmas.

The exact nature of the strike action is yet to be determined, but it will probably see patients face disruption to operations and appointments while already facing record NHS waiting lists.

Nurses topped a YouGov poll this year of professions who make the biggest contribution to society and made significant sacrifices during the Covid pandemic.

It comes amid difficult economic circumstances with sky-high inflation not seen since the 1980s and a warning just days ago from the Bank of England that the UK faces being plunged into its longest recession in 100 years.

The RCN ballot was carried out at an employer rather than a national level, meaning the thresholds required for strike action to be lawful in each country will be used to determine at which workplaces strike action could be held.

RCN general secretary Pat Cullen said: “I want to thank members for taking the time to vote in this historic ballot. There has never been a more crucial time to fight for safe staffing and fair pay.

“Our NHS is on the precipice due to chronic staff shortages. Our profession is being pushed to the edge, with patient safety paying the price.

“None of us wants to take industrial action but we’ve been forced into this position after a decade of real-terms pay cuts. We can’t stand by and watch our colleagues and patients suffer anymore. Enough is enough.”

The RCN said there are record nursing vacancies and in the last year 25,000 nursing staff around the UK left the Nursing and Midwifery Council register.

It said recent analysis showed an experienced nurse‘s salary has fallen by 20 per cent in real terms since 2010, saying the goodwill and expertise of nursing staff is being “exploited” by the government.

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The nasty party – It looks “very shit” Gavin Williamson

“Integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level”. – Rishi Sunak

We’ve had “Leaky” Sue, Chatty “liz” and now “Bully” Gavin

Gavin Williamson sent expletive-laden messages to chief whip

Gavin Williamson, the cabinet office minister, warned the Conservative chief whip that “there is a price for everything” in a string of angry messages being investigated by the party, it has emerged.

Michael Savage www.theguardian.com

Williamson, who attends cabinet after being handed a senior position by the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, is accused of sending abusive messages to Wendy Morton, who served as chief whip during Liz Truss’s premiership. He sent a series of messages complaining that he had not been invited to the Queen’s funeral.

Jake Berry, until recently the Conservative party chairman, has now claimed that he told Sunak about the complaint made against Williamson before he was appointed to his current ministerial job. Sunak has previously stated that his government would be characterised by “integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level”.

According to the messages published by the Sunday Times, Williamson accused Morton of exploiting the Queen’s death for political purposes. He told her that it was “very poor and sends a very clear message” that members of the privy council, including him, who were not “favoured” by Truss, were being deliberately excluded.

When Morton insisted it was “not the case” that political opponents were being excluded, Williamson replied that it looked “very shit”.

He added: “Also don’t forget I know how this works so don’t puss [sic] me about.” Williamson served as chief whip himself under Theresa May’s premiership.

“It’s very clear how you are going to treat a number of us which is very stupid and you are showing fuck all interest in pulling things together,” the messages read. “Don’t bother asking anything from me.”

Another read: “Well let’s see how many more times you fuck us all over. There is a price for everything.”

Morton is said to have cited the messages from Williamson in an email to the party on the day before Sunak was elected leader. She is also said to have informed the cabinet office and accused Williamson of “bullying and intimidation”.

Berry said in a statement to the Sunday Times: “In compliance with protocol, in my capacity as party chairman, I informed both the new prime minister and his incoming chief of staff about the complaint on the same day.”

Williamson stated last night: “I, of course, regret getting frustrated about the way colleagues and I felt we were being treated. I am happy to speak with Wendy and I hope to work positively with her in the future as I have in the past.”

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More on the “Tory Premium” – the price we pay for the crashed economy

Without new infrastructure, the outlook for the coming decade is poor

“The wholesale scrapping of these schemes suggests either that the Treasury is even more concerned about overall debt levels than was assumed, or that the chancellor has taken a further look at the numbers and decided that, in the long recession to come, the projects no longer make financial sense. That is, if anything, even more depressing.”

Editorial www.independent.co.uk

Poor old Bradford. Poor old “Build Back Better”, Boris Johnson’s rallying call for a fair deal for the North. Poor old Britain.

The rumours and spin emanating from the Treasury sound increasingly grim. There is a threat to Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR), which promised to revive the huge potential of great cities such as Bradford, Doncaster and Hull; to the northern/eastern extension of HS2; and to the planned nuclear power station in Suffolk, Sizewell C (though this is denied by No 10). And those are just the headline-grabbing mega-projects. Countless improvement schemes involving roads, power lines, renewable energy and insulation – and very possibly new school and hospital buildings – may well be delayed as Jeremy Hunt goes hunting for savings.

The whole budget of the levelling up department, already puny when set against the task of regenerating the UK north of Watford and west of the Cotswolds, is likely to be denuded still further, with passive minister Michael Gove putting a brave face on his department’s humiliating failure to deliver the promises of 2019.

Already the new business secretary, Grant Shapps, has confirmed the downgrading of the NPR link, and the drum beat of cuts to public investment is indeed intensifying. It is especially concerning because private investment, in particular private inward investment, has been historically weak ever since the Brexit vote in 2016 – once again all roads, and rail links, lead to that disastrous moment. Investment, public and private, is the key to implementing new technologies, reducing costs generally, and raising productivity – and thus wages and living standards in the long run.

Liz Truss’s drive for growth was ill-conceived to the point of stupidity, but she had a point. Growth does indeed solve the problem of debt, and releases resources for better public services as well as private consumption – years, if not decades, down the line – just as the 18th-century canals, the 19th-century railways and the mid-20th-century motorways did.

Without such infrastructure to open up fresh territories for investment and growth, the outlook for the coming decade is poor. If adequate nuclear power to supply baseload electricity isn’t secured, then the years ahead will be more literally cold and dark as well.

The conundrum is that all the parties, and even those fickle international investors known collectively as “the markets”, accept that “borrowing to invest” is perfectly acceptable, and is treated quite differently from, say, feckless unfunded tax cuts.

The wholesale scrapping of these schemes suggests either that the Treasury is even more concerned about overall debt levels than was assumed, or that the chancellor has taken a further look at the numbers and decided that, in the long recession to come, the projects no longer make financial sense. That is, if anything, even more depressing.

So the UK has gone from a boosterish and broadly tax-cutting agenda under Mr Johnson and Ms Truss to a return to the kind of austerity suffered in the unlamented Cameron-Osborne era.

There may be no alternative – to borrow another old slogan – but the fact remains that cutting investment in this way will add to the many existing drags on growth imposed by post-Covid distortions, the war in Ukraine, the energy crisis, and the creeping alienation of China from global trade – but also by Brexit, which, though disguised by those other very real crises, is working its own malign way through the British economy, from Bradford to Somerset.

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Boris Johnson accepts another £10,000 in accommodation from Tory donor

Boris Johnson has accepted another £10,000 of accommodation from the Bamford family, taking their contributions to his lifestyle to almost £50,000 since he resigned as Conservative leader.

Rowena Mason www.theguardian.com

The former prime minister registered the additional gift from Lady Carole Bamford, for “concessionary use of accommodation for me and my family in October”.

She had previously contributed £10,000 for the Johnson family’s accommodation in September, plus an additional £3,500 for different accommodation that month.

Johnson accepted the gifts despite part-owning three other homes, in Oxfordshire, London and Somerset. The Bamford family also contributed more than £23,800 towards the Johnsons’ wedding celebrations over the summer.

In July, Bamford hosted Boris and Carrie Johnson as they celebrated their wedding, which had taken place during lockdown, in the grounds of his 18th-century mansion, Daylesford House in the Cotswolds.

Johnson had abandoned plans, after his resignation as prime minister, to hold the celebration at the PM’s official country residence, Chequers, in Buckinghamshire. The “festival-esque” celebration is said to have included a steel band, rum punch, Abba songs and a conga.

Lord Anthony Bamford, a pro-Brexit Conservative peer who is chair of JCB, the construction equipment manufacturer, has been a generous Tory donor for decades. The billionaire entrepreneur supported Johnson’s successful leadership bid in 2019, and has given more than £10m in donations and gifts to the party since 2001.

Johnson has begun making his own money on the side after leaving office, with a £130,000 speech to the Council of Insurance Agents and Brokers in Colorado, during which he joked about sharing the French president, Emmanuel Macron’s “fancy” wine with Angela Merkel, the former German chancellor. He is also due to give a speech at a cryptocurrency conference in December.

The latest register of MPs’ interests data, published this week, shows Liz Truss declaring £16,500-worth of transport during her leadership campaign from a company called Big Ben Films, after previously taking £8,000 from Bamford. She was given more than £500,000 in total for her campaign that led to her short-lived time as prime minister.

It also reveals that Sajid Javid, the former chancellor, has established a company as a vehicle for his income, saying its revenue would be used to “pay employees, maintain my ongoing involvement in public life and support my charitable work”, as well as paying him £20,000 a month for speaking engagements.

The company received £36,000 from Javid’s former employer, Deutsche Bank, for a speech to its clients in October.

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The Tory Premium: Britain faces longest recession on record

As one correspondent has said:

A new UK record, and it is 100% thanks to the Tories.

Should we all go out in the street and give them a weekly clap to show our appreciation?

Background – the grim view from Threadneedle Street

Without taking into account the chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s likely squeeze on government spending in his budget on 17 November, which could worsen the outlook for economic growth, the Monetary Policy Committee said the economy was already contracting and would continue to shrink for eight consecutive quarters to the summer of 2024 if interest rates continued to rise as financial markets expected.

The Bank expects inflation, which hit 10.1% in September, to peak at 11% by the end of 2022, and then to fall “probably quite sharply” from the middle of 2023.

Consumer spending and business confidence are expected to be hit, leading to a two-year recession that will be longer, if not deeper, than the slump in the 1930s.

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EDDC holds first “in person” meeting to restore “proper democracy”. Only 3 of 21 Tories turn up.

The cabinet meeting, held at 6.00pm on Wednesday 2 November In the council chamber of Blackdown House, is the first to be held in the chamber since Covid forced meetings to go online.

Under a Conservative inspired motion that only by restoring “in-person” meetings can they be “properly” democratic, EDDC agreed, on 19 October, to resume meetings in Blackdown House. (See what is democracy supposed to be?)

Simon Jupp MP has been banging on for weeks in his press columns about how essential this is.

As you can read below only 3 out of the 21 Tory Councillors made the effort to take part in this historic return to “proper democracy”.

Dear Tories, if you must insist on “proper democracy” at least have the decency to turn up!- Owl

Calls for face-to-face district council meetings to resume in East Devon have raised climate change concerns over the impact on the environment.

Local Democracy Reporter eastdevonnews.co.uk

The move by East Devon District Council (EDDC) to restart face-to-face meetings rather than hold them online has been labelled “ironic” at a time when the authority says it is committed to cutting carbon emissions, writes local democracy reporter Philip Churm.

The comments came in a meeting of EDDC cabinet on Wednesday, November 2, as the council agreed to endorse the Devon carbon plan and refresh its own climate change strategy.

In July 2019 EDDC declared a climate change and biodiversity emergency while also working with Devon County Council to address the issues.

Devon’s carbon plan is regarded as the roadmap for how the whole county will reach net-zero emissions by 2050, at the latest.

While delivering a report about endorsing Devon’s carbon plan EDDC officer John Golding, who is the strategic lead for housing, health and environment, said: “I’m pleased to say that the Devon carbon plan was published a few weeks ago after several years of working towards what I think is an ambitious and realistic net zero plan for the entire county.”

Independent councillor for Seaton, Jack Rowland, praised the work done by Mr Golding. He said he fully supported the plan but suggested there may be some hypocrisy.

He referred to an eight-point interim action plan outlined in the report.

“There’s a heading there called ‘energy consumption is minimal’ as a target and under that is a bullet point,” he said. “The first one says ‘we drive less’ and under a heading called ‘community action for a net-zero Devon’ the first bullet point says ‘we think innovatively.’

“The irony is not lost on me as to why we’re here this evening, sat in this room, for two reasons. One; we were obviously carrying out meetings remotely via Zoom, which worked perfectly well, which actually reduced every councillor’s travel to this building. And the second point is we were thinking innovatively in terms of how long we were carrying on having our meetings remotely via Zoom.

“We did receive criticism that we were the only council left in the country that was still carrying out meetings that way. I actually see that as a badge of honour that we should have been portraying even more.”

Leader of the council, and independent member for Coly Valley, Paul Arnott said: “I just want to set Cllr Rowland’s mind at ease on the point he has just made because, fortunately, since only three out of 21 – or one-seventh of the Conservative party – are here tonight, there’s less pollution created than might otherwise be feared.”

The cabinet unanimously agreed to endorse the Devon carbon plan and refresh its climate change strategy to align and show how it will contribute to delivering the plan.

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UPDATE: MP condemns decision to house asylum seekers in Ilfracombe Hotel

It has now been confirmed that the Home Office, despite assurances to the contrary, has bussed in more than 50 asylum seekers to be housed in an Ilfracombe Hotel.

[Government in such a mess over asylum seekers it no longer consults local authorities, or even communicates with Tory MPs. – Owl]

Joseph Bulmer www.northdevongazette.co.uk

The decision by the Home Office was made without consulting North Devon Council or Ilfracombe Town Council despite both bodies and North Devon MP Selaine Saxby raising concerns about Ilfracombe’s suitability.

Reports received by the Gazette suggest that 55 people were bussed into Ilfracombe late last night (November 2) and have been housed at the Dilhusa Grand Hotel.

It’s also been reported that security guards have been posted at the door to the hotel, who have been referring the public to the Home Office.

Gazette editor Joe Bulmer attempted to contact the hotel for clarification on the rumours but was told ‘no comment’ before being hung up on.

In October North Devon MP Selaine Saxby and North Devon Council both raised concerns about an apparent plan to house asylum seekers at the Grand Dilkhusa Hotel in Ilfracombe.

After a conversation with ‘a home office minister’ Ms Saxby issued a statement stating the hotel would not be used for this purpose. The Home Office appears to have U-turned on that decision.

Leader of North Devon Council, Councillor David Worden has issued a statement regarding reports on the current use of the Dilkhusa Grand Hotel in Ilfracombe.

Councillor Worden said: “Last month, North Devon Council received formal notification from the Home Office of the potential use of the Dilkhusa Grand Hotel, Ilfracombe as a contingency hotel to accommodate asylum seekers.

“We wrote to the Home Office and Clearsprings Ready Homes, the Home Office accommodation provider, raising significant concerns over the process and the suitability of Ilfracombe for this type of accommodation. North Devon MP, Selaine Saxby, raised similar concerns with Ministers and the Home Office directly and asked for an urgent and detailed consultation with North Devon Council.

“At a multi-agency forum on Friday 7 October, we and other agencies repeated concerns that Ilfracombe is an unsuitable location for use as asylum accommodation due to its remoteness and the likely impact of the loss of an operating hotel on the local economy. Following this, on Thursday 13 October, we were advised that a decision had been made not to progress the hotel as asylum contingency accommodation.

“It has come to our notice that the Dilkhusa has now been commissioned and there are currently 55 people in the hotel who have arrived in the UK seeking asylum. We were not consulted or formally notified about this change in direction from the Home Office, nor do we have a full understanding at this stage of their intentions for the hotel’s future use.

“Both we, Devon County Council and Selaine Saxby MP are urgently seeking to gain a full understanding of the situation from the Home Office and Clearsprings, and we will review any appropriate actions we can take in light of the information we receive.

“We recognise our responsibility to help people seeking safety in the UK and look forward to re-engaging with the Home Office and Clearsprings.”

North Devon MP Selaine Saxby has issued a statement condemning the Home Office’s U-turn on the issue, she said: “I have been made aware overnight that it appears that the Dilkhusa has been used to house asylum seekers, this is in direct contradiction to the written advice from the Home Office received less than two weeks ago that the site was not suitable.

“I continue to make enquiries at the Home Office and work alongside North Devon Council, who were also unaware of the change of plans. I consider the manner in which this decision appears to have been taken to be wholly unsatisfactory and I will continue to press for the Home Office to get to grips with this situation, and to work with councils to find solutions, not allow hotels to take decisions which are based on their own financial benefit, rather than considering the local community, economy and even the well being of those seeking asylum.”

A Home Office spokesperson refused to confirm or deny using the Ilfracombe hotel to house asylum seekers: “The number of people arriving in the UK who require accommodation has reached record levels and has put our asylum system under incredible strain.

“The use of hotels to house asylum seekers is unacceptable – there are currently more than 37,000 asylum seekers in hotels costing the UK taxpayer £5.6million a day. The use of hotels is a short-term solution and we are working hard with local authorities to find appropriate accommodation.

“The Home Office does not comment on operational arrangements for individual sites used for asylum accommodation.

“We engage with local authorities as early as possible whenever sites are used for asylum accommodation and work to ensure arrangements are safe for hotel residents and local people.

“We continue to ensure the accommodation provided is safe, secure, leaves no one destitute and is appropriate for an individual’s needs.

“Hotels are a short-term solution to the global migration crisis and we are working hard to find appropriate dispersed accommodation for migrants, asylum seekers and Afghan refugees as soon as possible. We would urge local authorities to do all they can to help house people permanently.

“The total hotel cost is £6.8millon. The cost of accommodating asylum seekers in hotels is £5.6million a day. The cost of accommodating Afghans in bridging hotels is £1.2million a day.”

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Budleigh Salterton lifeless for 5m years and it might happen again

The cliffs at Budleigh Salterton capture the moment at which life on Earth almost came to an end

Fossil fuel burning once caused a mass extinction – now we’re risking another

George Monbiot www.theguardian.com

Budleigh Salterton, on the south coast of Devon, sits above the most frightening cliffs on Earth. They are not particularly high. Though you don’t want to stand beneath them, they are not especially prone to collapse. The horror takes another form. It is contained in the story they tell. For they capture the moment at which life on Earth almost came to an end.

The sediments preserved in these cliffs were laid down in the early Triassic period, just after the greatest mass extinction in the history of multicellular life that brought the Permian period to an end 252m years ago. Around 90% of species died, and fish and four-footed animals were more or less exterminated between 30 degrees north of the equator and 40 degrees south.

Most remarkably, while biological abundance (if not diversity) tends to recover from mass extinctions within a few hundred thousand years, our planet remained in this near-lifeless state for the following 5m years. In studying these cliffs, you see the precipice on which we teeter.

Cop27: the climate carnage we’ve faced this year – video

The lowest stratum at the western end of the beach is a bed of rounded pebbles. These are the stones washed off Triassic mountains by flash floods and deposited in great dumps by temporary rivers. Because the forests and savannahs that might have covered the mountains had died, there was nothing to hold the soil and subsoil together, so erosion is likely to have accelerated greatly.

At the top of the pebble bed is a stony desert surface. The pebbles here have been sculpted by the wind into sharp angles and varnished with shiny oxides, suggesting the surface was unchanged for a long time. Above it are towering red Triassic sand dunes. Through a quirk of erosion, these soft deposits have been sculpted into hollows that look uncannily like fanged and screaming skulls.

We now know that there were two main pulses of extinction. The first, which began 252.1m years ago, mostly affected life on land. It coincided with a series of massive volcanic eruptions in the region now known as the Siberian Traps. The second, more devastating phase, started about 200,000 years later. It almost completed the extinction of terrestrial life, as well as wiping out the great majority of species in the sea.

Though we cannot yet be sure, the first phase might have been triggered by acid rain, ozone depletion and metal pollution caused by volcanic chemicals. As rainforests and other ecosystems were wiped out, more toxic compounds were released from exposed soils and rocks, creating an escalating cycle of collapse.

The second phase appears to have been driven by global heating. By 251.9m years ago, so much solidified rock had accumulated on the surface of the Siberian Traps that the lava could no longer escape. Instead, it was forced to spread underground, along horizontal fissures, into rocks that were rich in coal and other hydrocarbons. The heat from the magma (underground lava) cooked the hydrocarbons, releasing vast amounts of carbon dioxide and methane. In other words, though there were no humans on the planet, this disaster seems to have been caused by fossil fuel burning.

Temperatures are believed to have climbed by between 8C and 10C, though much of the second phase of extinction might have been caused by an initial rise of between 3C and 5C. The extra carbon dioxide also dissolved into the oceans, raising their acidity to the point at which many species could no longer survive. The temperature rise appears to have brought ocean currents to a halt, through the same mechanism that now threatens the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, which drives the Gulf Stream. As wildfires raged across the planet, incinerating the vegetation protecting its surface, ash and soil would have poured into the sea, triggering eutrophication (an excess of nutrients). In combination with the high temperatures and stalled circulation, this starved the remaining life forms of oxygen.

A paper released as a pre-print in September might explain why recovery took so long. Because so many of the world’s rich ecosystems had been replaced by desert, plants struggled to re-establish themselves. Their total weight on Earth fell by about two thirds. Throughout these 5m years, no coal deposits formed, as there wasn’t sufficient plant production to make peat bogs. In other words, the natural processes that remove CO2 from the atmosphere and turn it into wood and soil or bury it as fossil carbon stalled. For 5m years, the world was trapped in this hothouse state. In the cliffs at the eastern end of the bay, you can see when conditions began, at last, to change, as the fossilised roots of semi-desert plants twist down through the ancient sand dunes.

The story the cliffs tell is of planetary tipping points: Earth systems pushed past their critical thresholds, beyond which they collapsed into a new equilibrium state, that could not be readily reversed. It was a world hostile to almost all large life forms: the monsters of the Permian were replaced nearly everywhere by dwarf fauna.

Could it happen again? Two parallel and contradictory processes are in play. At climate summits, governments produce feeble voluntary commitments to limit the production of greenhouse gases. At the same time, almost every state with significant fossil reserves – including the UK – intends to extract as much as they can. A report by Carbon Tracker shows that if all the world’s reserves of fossil fields were extracted, their combustion would exceed the carbon budget governments have agreed sevenfold. While less carbon is contained in these reserves than the amount produced during the Permian-Triassic extinction, the compressed timescale could render this release just as deadly to life on Earth. The increase in atmospheric CO2 at the end of the Permian took about 75,000 years, but many of our fossil fuel reserves could be consumed in decades. Already, we seem to be approaching a series of possible tipping points, some of which could trigger cascading collapse.

Everything now hangs on which process prevails: the sometimes well-meaning, but always feeble, attempts to limit the burning of fossil carbon, or the ruthless determination – often on the part of the same governments – to extract (and therefore burn) as much of it as possible, granting the profits of legacy industries precedence over life on Earth. At the climate summit this month in Egypt, a nation in which protests are banned and the interests of the people must at all times cede to the interests of power, we will see how close to the cliff edge the world’s governments intend to take us.

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East Devon Watch

Posted on

4 Nov 2022

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Misc

‘Landmark’ Devon ruling could spark surge in affordable homes – N Devon

Council owned land in Bideford, Great Torrington and Northam are being considered for affordable or mixed housing developments after a “landmark” council decision.

[Independents form the largest grouping in Torridge, a District Council with no overall political control – owl]

Alex Davis www.devonlive.com

Torridge District Councillors voted overwhelmingly to support at a Full Council Meeting on Monday (October 31) after an evaluation of all council owned property by architectural consultants in July. In total, councillors voted to progress 11 of the 12 sites evaluated, which included a mixture of council owned garage units, vacant land, car parks, and offices spread across multiple parishes.

The full council decision does not mean that housing will be developed for each of the sites, with the studies only highlighting council land suitable for development. Before any planning applications are submitted, more detailed proposals and a business case will be presented to the full council. Proposals will also be drafted in consultation with elected ward members to allow residents to have their say on any upcoming applications.

The list of sites approved for further progression included:

Pynes Lane Garages, Bideford
Springfield Car Park, Chanters Road, Bideford
End of Ethelwynne Brown Close, Bideford
Land at Cliveden Road, Bideford East
Land at Cleave Wood, Bideford East

Bone Hill Car Park, Northam
Jackets Lane, Northam
Windmill Lane Offices and Car Park, Northam
Garages, Tuckers Park, Bradworthy
Land at The Crescent, Langtree
Part of South Street Car Park, Great Torrington

The development of affordable housing in Torridge aims to tackle the ongoing housing crisis in the region, with a lack in affordable housing “pricing out” residents from their communities. In November 2021, Devon County Council said the lack of affordable housing was leaving many key worker vacancies unfilled, with suitable candidates unable to find a home in a nearby area.

Councillor Ken James – Leader of Torridge District Council said: “This was an important exercise to look at sites owned by the council and to bring forward those that were suitable for housing, which Councillors have previously agreed is a key strategic priority. The reports were commissioned to include a strongly weighted balance in favour of affordable or social housing and this will be our goal in decisions regarding the final agreement of designs for each site.

“I appreciate that in some instances this has asked for a sacrifice of the current or partial use of some sites but this was carefully weighed in respect of the urgent need for housing in each area. I thank councillors for their support in bringing the chosen sites a step closer to delivery.”

Councillor Rachel Clarke – Lead Member for Housing Options and Homelessness said: “This is significant step towards delivering on our pledge to do everything we can as a council to alleviate the housing crisis affecting our residents in Torridge. The availability of affordable units seems to shrink with each passing quarter while prices have only increased. Anything we can do to reverse this trend is important and collectively we have taken a thoughtful approach to making a better use of some of our assets. I look forward to the final proposals being drawn up shortly and to see the plans implemented. In the meantime, we will also continue to look for other ways in which we can address this ongoing issue”

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

4 Nov 2022

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Misc

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen Set To Be Suspended From Parliament For Five Days

“Mr Bridgen has demonstrated a very cavalier attitude to the House’s rules on registration and declaration of interests, including repeatedly saying that he did not check his own entry in the register.”

www.politicshome.com

The Commons standards committee has recommended that Conservative MP Andrew Bridgen be suspended for five sitting days over his “careless and cavalier attitude” towards rules on lobbying.

The damning report found that Bridgen had failed to declare his relevant interests in the companies Mere Plantations “during eight emails to ministers and in five meetings with ministers or public officials”, despite having “received registrable financial benefits” from the company.

“Mr Bridgen has breached the rules of the House on registration, declaration and paid lobbying on multiple occasions and in multiple ways,” the report found.

“Each of these breaches could have led us to recommend a suspension from the service of the House.

According to the report, Bridgen was approached by a constituent acting on behalf of Mere Plantations, which provides reforestation services.

The company paid for a trip for Bridgen to Ghana, and gave a £5,000 donation to his local Conservative Party association.

He also accepted an offer to act as an adviser for the company with a salary of £12,000 a year, but the role was later updated in the register as an unpaid position.

The committee found that Bridgen breached paragraph 14 of the Code of Conduct by failing to correctly register his interests in Mere Plantations, holding meetings with ministers on their behalf, and failing to declare his interests in emails to ministers and officials.

According to the report, Bridgen “accepts that his register entry was inaccurate” and insists it is “self-evident that he had not in fact accepted payment” from the company for the adviser role.

He argued that “his interests did not meet the test of relevance and did not therefore need to be declared”, and that his approaches by the company were not relevant as they constituted constituency work.

But the commissioner said his handling of the status of his adviser role with the company constituted “a mishandling of the conflict of interest of which he was aware”.

They also said his failure to declare his interests in multiple emails to ministers and officials was “a significant litany of errors”.

“The fact that Mr Bridgen had received a donation and a funded visit from Mere Plantations, and had a contract to be an adviser, was clearly relevant to his approaches on their behalf. He should have drawn those interests to Ministers’ and officials’ attention,” the report read.

Bridgen was also criticised for making “wholly unsubstantiated and false allegations” against the standards commissioner Kathryn Stone OBE by claiming she was set to be offered a peerage by Boris Johnson.

In an email to the committee on 8 September 2022, he said he was “distressed to hear on a number of occasions an unsubstantiated rumour” that Stone was in line for a peerage, and asked them to provide “reassurance” that the rumours were untrue.

The committee said the email “appears to be an attempt to place wholly inappropriate pressure on the Commissioner” and called it “completely unacceptable behaviour”.

It has been recommended that he be suspended from the House for five days. MPs will be given a chance to vote on the findings before confirming his suspension.

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

4 Nov 2022

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Misc

Grubby truth about failure to clean up nation’s rivers

“England’s rivers and inland waters are as polluted as they were five years ago.”

“Defra officials claimed they had made “a significant effort in preventing further deterioration”.”

“A sewage spill has occurred every two and a half minutes in England and Wales since 2016, according to Environment Agency figures obtained by Labour.”

Adam Vaughan, Environment Editor www.thetimes.co.uk

England’s rivers and inland waters are as polluted as they were five years ago, according to a government report, with campaigners calling the lack of improvement a “shocking” indictment of environmental policy.

Officials have admitted that no progress has been made on a key water pollution pledge to ensure three quarters of rivers and other bodies of water are close to their natural state.

Ministers promised four years ago to raise the share meeting a “good” ecological status to 75 per cent by 2027.

Yet the annual report from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), which was published last week, found that the figure remained at 16 per cent in 2021, unchanged since 2017.

Ecological status is a metric assigned using various water flow, habitat and biological quality tests. Most water bodies in England, 63 per cent, are ranked “moderate”.

In defending the lack of progress, Defra officials claimed they had made “a significant effort in preventing further deterioration” and that the figures showed the “high degree of challenge in meeting water targets.”

Labour said the standstill showed the government “can’t be trusted to clean up our water system”. The Environment Agency said water companies were to blame for a “shocking” environmental performance in 2021. The Conservatives and Labour both used their party conferences to promise tougher action to clean up rivers.

A Defra spokeswoman said: “We are going further and faster than any other government to protect and enhance the health of our rivers and seas.”

The Wye’s tributary, the River Ithon in Powys

A sewage spill has occurred every two and a half minutes in England and Wales since 2016, according to Environment Agency figures obtained by Labour.

Overburdened sewage works and pollution from agriculture are the main reasons that meeting a crucial target for improving the health of rivers has proved intractable.

The government’s goal is for 75 per cent of water bodies in England to have achieved good ecological status by 2027. But with almost half the time to reach that target having passed, the figure was 16 per cent last year, the same as in 2017.

Feargal Sharkey, the former Undertones singer and now a campaigner against the pollution of rivers, said the lack of progress was unacceptable. He said: “The utterly chaotic, collapsing government we have surrounding us continues damaging the environment.”

At the Labour Party conference, Sharkey criticised the failure to clean up rivers. He described the standstill on lifting the ecological status of rivers to “good” as a “shocking indictment” of government policies.

The campaigner noted that the 75 per cent by 2027 goal, part of the government’s 25-year environment plan, is weaker than the 100 per cent by 2027 target the UK had under the Water Framework Directive when a member of the EU. “It’s clear the government has no ambition,” said Sharkey.

The Conservatives and Labour used their party conferences to make bold promises to improve the state of rivers. Ranil Jayawardena, the former Tory environment secretary, said he would raise civil fines from a maximum of £250,000 to £250 million.

Jim McMahon, the shadow environment secretary, has promised to impose mandatory monitoring of all sewage outlets and give the Environment Agency greater power and resources for enforcement.

He told The Times: “A Labour government will use the levers of power to hold reckless water bosses to account and implement measures to clean up our water system.”

A decline in water pollution monitoring is partly to blame for the failure to improve the ecological status of waterways. The Rivers Trust said that the number of ammonia monitoring sites had halved from about 8,000 in 2013 to 4,000 last year.

“It’s no surprise we’re not seeing an improvement. We can’t expect the patient to recover if we’ve walked out and turned the lights out in the ward,” said Christine Colvin, director for advocacy and engagement at the charity. Weak enforcement is another reason for the lack of progress, Colvin added.

Sir James Bevan, head of the environment agency, told the House of Lords last month that government funding cuts over the past decade had affected the agency’s ability to regulate water pollution. He said a “lack of boots on the ground” had meant not enough officials had been able to check sewage spills in person. Research appears to support his concerns. The average number of prosecutions brought against water companies dropped by 15.4 per cent between 2000 and 2010, and 2011 and last year, according to analysis reported this week.

Lord Benyon, the environment minister, said yesterday that the government would “continue to work with regulators on environmental and their other commitments”, after Ofwat fined 11 water companies last month.

Rankings released this week reveal how the different water companies are faring on their environmental performance. When looking at areas of private land and gardens flooded with sewage, the Consumer Council for Water found that Anglian Water, Severn Water and Thames Water performed best, while Northumbrian Water and Southern Water were the worst.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: “Our Storm Overflows Reduction Plan has brought in the strictest targets on sewage pollution and requires water companies to deliver their largest ever infrastructure investment — £56 billion capital investment over 25 years.”

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

3 Nov 2022

Posted under

Misc

Posted in response to Paul F: Hancock and the Bull testicles

His comment reads:

I don’t normally watch I’m A Celebrity, but I am going to have to find a way to be notified when there is a vote for the Bushtucker trials just so that I can exercise my Great British democratic voting rights and demonstrate my complete confidence in … oops, sorry that was a typo … I meant contempt for the Tories and Matt Hancock in particular.

I urge everyone else to join me in this important and essential fight for democracy and justice. So let’s all get voting – indeed lets ensure that this vote gets a massive best-ever turnout by several 100% – and make this a decisive landslide victory for Matt Hancock, because every vote for him being punished in the Bushtucker Trials is a vote of no confidence in the Tories.

The Daily Star (in the wake of its lettuce success) launches a campaign on its front page to get the part-time MP selected to do every one of the vile trials in the game show. A tantalizing prospect indeed.

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

3 Nov 2022

Posted under

Misc

National Trust to plant 1,200 hectares of flower-filled grassland in Devon

A network of flower-filled grasslands sweeping from the fringes of sandy beaches to moorland edges is being created by the National Trust in the south-west of England.

The network will eventually stretch across 70 miles from close to the border with Cornwall in the west to the slopes of Exmoor in the east.

Steven Morris www.theguardian.com

Designed to boost flora and fauna – and be a balm for human visitors – the new grassland is due to cover more than 1,200 hectares (3,000 acres) of land in north Devon by 2030.

The first of the sites have been sown by the trust this autumn and flowers should begin popping up in the spring. These will later be used as “donor sites” with seeds taken from them to plant up more spots over the years, a cost-effective way of scaling up the scheme.

Kidney vetch is one of the species that will be sown this autumn. Photograph: Clive Whitbourn/National Trust Images

Ben McCarthy, the head of nature conservation and restoration ecology at the trust, said the loss of flower-rich grasslands had led to life and colour being drained from the UK’s countryside.

He said: “Flower-rich hay meadows and pastures are a hugely important habitat that remain under constant threat from pressures including agricultural intensification and inappropriate management. These colourful and species rich habitats are critical to conserving many of our threatened plants as well as the wildlife that rely on them.”

The new habitats should draw in a wide range of wildlife including voles, bats, birds of prey and butterflies and the trust says they are also a good way of helping combat the climate emergency.

Meadow brown butterflies on oxeye daisy at Snowshill Manor, Gloucestershire. Photograph: Kate Groome/National Trust Images

McCarthy said: “Making changes to the land we manage ourselves and working with our tenant farmers to restore these wildlife rich grasslands secures better soil health, helps lock in soil carbon and improves water quality in our rivers as well as supporting wildlife such as pollinators.”

One of the first sites is at Arlington Court, near Barnstaple, where wildflower seeds such as birds-foot trefoil and knapweed have been sown in areas of the sprawling parkland.

On the coast at Woolacombe, species such as kidney vetch, viper’s-bugloss and salad burnet have been sown because they will do well in dunes and on clifftops.

The network will eventually stretch across 70 miles from close to the border with Cornwall in the west to the slopes of Exmoor in the east.

Joshua Day, project co-ordinator at the trust in north Devon, said it would not be a continuous strip but rather a series of pockets of grassland. “It might be a patch of grassland on the edge of a village or, on a grander scale, fields full of flowers.”

Cowslip flowers, once common in the UK, are vital for pollinators like bumblebees. Photograph: Justin Minns/National Trust Images

The first 200 acres have been sown with 31 types of seed – 1.3 tonnes-worth – ranging from yellow rattle, which is known as a meadow maker as it creates good conditions for other wildflowers to grow, to oxeye daisy, good for invertebrates and human mental wellbeing as they make such an attractive sight.

These spots will become donor sites for the remainder of the project over the next eight years. Donor sites take up to three years after sowing to reach maturity before they can be harvested.

Day said: “We’ll leave the grasslands to really establish themselves for a couple of years and harvest the first seed in 2025. Every hectare we harvest from a donor site will provide us with seed to sow two more hectares.”

It is estimated that using donor sites and phasing the project could save the conservation charity more than £3m.

The charity Plantlife says that 97% of species-rich grassland has been lost in the last century.

Day said: “Once-common species such as eyebrights and cowslips have become ever rarer and this has had a disastrous impact on the species that are reliant on these flower-rich habitats like bumblebees and other pollinators.”

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