Category: Diversification

A reply to justice, jobs and the military industrial complex.

Ex oil worker Neil Rothnie reflects on the post we published three days ago Climate Justice, Climate Jobs and the Military Industrial Complex. We welcome further responses.

I suppose I just thought that campaigning amongst armament workers and on behalf of armament workers would be likely to be difficult in terms of how we might begin to “actually” impact global heating.  I know that if we weren’t building all this military shit and jetting it all over the world and destroying humans and other productive forces with it, then we would avoid putting a lot of carbon into the atmosphere.  It’s just that I’ve never considered that it was an issue that you might be able to intervene in quite the same way as I think we might be able to when it comes to oil and gas production.

The issue of oil and gas is looming ever larger in the consciousness of the climate movement.  It’s way, way higher than it was when I discovered XR in 2019. When I took part in the London Rebellion it was hard to get a sensible conversation about oil and gas and the North Sea was a very nebulous “concept” for many. Look at the movement today with Stop Cambo.   If reporting on mainstream media is anything to go by it’s beginning to exercise thoughts in layers way beyond just the activists and the scientists now.  Interestingly the only people who dare not mention oil & gas is the COP.  I don’t know if any of this is true about the military complex.

But I can see that from the perspective of jobs, and that’s how the discussion was framed, there’s pretty much no difference in making “demands” about just transitioning armaments workers and oil workers into renewables and other sustainable work. 

But I can’t see how it would ever be likely to be more than just a “demand” in the case of armaments workers.  In the case of oil workers I have, as you know, an idea that a mass intervention amongst oil workers is a crucial first step if we’re ever going to get to the point where we try to choke off oil and gas production – the absolute first and crucial necessity of a movement that has any hope of abating climate change in the face of this system.  There has to be a time and it has to come very soon when the licence society gives the industry to produce fossil fuels is withdrawn.  Who is going to force that issue?

I don’t know if a part of all this that as oil is is all I’ve ever known/done, oil is all I can ever really see.  The opposite was surely very widely the truth for the bulk of the population until very recently.  I think that’s changing.

But I’m beginning to realise that what I see as the impossibility of armaments workers turning their weapons into ploughshares, is what others see as impossible when the issue of confronting/challenging the oil and gas workers.   I can see why people think it’s a very long shot to imagine that they’ll either participate in the ending of oil and gas production.  But I think that least they can be neutralised, picketed at the heliports and stopped from producing the oil.  For how long?  And anyway!  They need to be informed of the science and we can’t rely on the media to do that.

These two issues, fossil fuel and the armaments/military complex, seem to be of different orders (qualitatively and quantitatively) in the context of tackling climate change.  Fossil fuel production seems to me to be primary.  Once the fossil fuels are out of the ground, they are pollution – they will be burned/processed.   Being used to build and deploy military hardware is just (just?) the path the pollution takes to get into the atmosphere. Or do we think that realistically we can take on the military complex and somehow stop it, and therefore stop the demand for fossil fuel?  

They (?) take fossil fuels out of the ground and then make fortunes on it.  They need to keep taking it out of the ground to keep making fortunes – to keep feeding the beast.  So they are endlessly imaginative in finding new and more extravagant and destructive ways of using it.  It looks like a real madness. to me.  The thing is that they can’t turn this hellish roundabout off themselves.  But turned off it will have to be if life is to survive, inasmuch as I understand the science.

Capitalism is the problem.  But to a great extent isn’t the oil industry pretty much the same thing as capitalism (?) . . the same thing as climate change? The military complex surely is just (just again?) how they regulate capitalism – keep the imperialistic plunder going and ensure that the trade routes remain open to keep that wealth flowing north, and in the process provide an ever-renewing market for the oil.  I never did get my head round the concept of a permanent arms economy – it was an idea touted by a political tendency I was taught was beyond the pale.  But I guess I’m stumbling along in the same neck of the woods here.

Obviously, the military complex is a huge issue for humanity, but I just don’t see how you tackle it head on with any hope of affecting climate change.  On the other hand, if you end oil you end capitalism (don’t ask me to prove that – I was hoping someone else would though) and then you have at least a fighting chance (is that a pun) of ending the military complex. The other way round it’s even clearer.  You don’t stop oil and life on earth is in danger.  However, you frame it you need to stop oil.

Climate justice, climate jobs and the military industrial complex

This is the slightly expanded text of a contribution that Pete Cannell (speaking for Scot.E3) made to a meeting organised by the global climate jobs network at the COP26 people’s summit.

Scotland is well placed to make a rapid transition to a zero-carbon economy.  It is well endowed with natural resources for wind, wave, tidal and hydro power generation.  Hydro power was developed in the 1950’s and sixties, more recently there has been some further development of local, small-scale hydro.  Offshore and onshore wind power has developed rapidly, wave and tidal has seen very little investment.  But Scotland also has a relatively strong representation of engineering skills among its workforces.  These workers have skills in electrical, marine engineering, fabrication and so on – skills that are needed for the transition to a zero-carbon economy that needs to begin right now.

Most of these workers are currently employed in either the Oil and Gas sector or ‘Defence’.  Sectors which are significantly larger as a proportion of the Scottish economy than they are of the UK as a whole. 

The current state of play with climate jobs is disastrous.  The policy of leaving transition to the market has resulted in declining numbers of jobs in renewables.  We’ve written about the closure of facilities at BiFab and Machrihanish elsewhere on this site.  At the same time there have been massive job losses in the North Sea and a long-term decline in engineering jobs in the defence sector.  While there has been a massive increase in offshore wind generation the private sector has driven down wages and conditions, used low paid workers from around the world, shifted production to sites thousands of miles away and focused on profit maximisation rather than just transition.

There’s a lot more we could say about oil and gas but in the context of the other talks at this meeting we want to focus now on the arms trade.  Britain is one of the biggest arms manufacturers in the world and Scotland has a disproportionately large share of this activity.  It has been excellent that during this mobilisation around COP26 there has been a lot of discussion of the huge carbon emissions of the military.  

Defence Imagery CC BY-NC 2.0

In Scot.E3 we’ve argued for the need to go further – the military industrial complex in Scotland (and globally) acts as a barrier to transition.  It thrives on public subsidy – far more than that provided for renewables.  This is a characteristic it shares with the oil and gas sector. It distorts the economy, it’s secretive and hugely corrupt, dominates research agendas and monopolises skills and resources that should be directed to saving the planet.

We look forward to a day when the commitment and imagination of young people currently in school can be deployed to develop the kind of sustainable and socially just society that we are fighting for.  But time is short, and we need to start the transition now with the skills and knowledge that are already available. To achieve climate justice and win the climate jobs we need it’s going to be necessary to force a radical shift of resources away from the defence sector as well as from oil and gas.

Made in Scotland

The Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) together with Peace and Justice have published an excellent report ‘Made in Scotland’ which highlights how Scottish arms manufacturers have fuelled the war in Yemen.

Scot.E3 argues that workers in the arms industry should be redeployed to provide the engineering skills that are necessary for building a new sustainable, zero carbon< Scottish Economy. For more on this see Briefing 5.

Click to access Made-In-Scotland-Briefing.pdf

Excerpt:

UK-made warplanes, bombs and missiles have fuelled the conflict in Yemen which has created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with 24 million people, 80% of Yemen’s population, requiring humanitarian assistance as of January 2019. Saudi Arabia and the UAE lead the coalition, alongside Egypt, Bahrain, Kuwait and Morocco. Coalition forces have targeted hospitals, clinics and vaccinations centres across Yemen, and after nearly six years of conflict, the country’s healthcare infrastructure has “almost collapsed.”

Polls over recent years have found the Scottish public are significantly opposed to Saudi arms exports. Just 11% of Scots said arms sales to Saudi Arabia were acceptable in a 2019 Opinium poll. In 2018, a ComRes poll gave similar results, with only 14% of Scots supporting continued arms sales to the Kingdom.

Despite this public opposition, weapons and military goods made in Scotland, from Dumfries and Galloway, Fife, Midlothian, Glasgow and Lanarkshire, are all in operation with the Saudi-led coalition forces. At least 16 arms companies operating in Scotland have applied for military export licences to Saudi-led coalition members or worked directly with military forces since 2008.

In the Scottish Parliament, the Government has faced criticism over grants and support given to arms companies by its business support body Scottish Enterprise. Scottish Enterprise provides ten of the companies mentioned with free account management services, yet held meetings around diversification from arms sales with only four of them over the past 12 months.

‘The Plan’

At last night’s meeting held jointly with Edinburgh CND we showed the 30 minute version of Steve Sprung’s film about the Lucas Plan. We strongly recommend watching the full version and you can find out more about the film at the dedicated website. You can also follow up on current developments via the new Lucas Plan website. If you weren’t able to make the meeting you can watch the 30 minute version here https://vimeo.com/305253552

From arms to renewables

At the 2018 Scot.E3 conference we were fortunate to have a contribution from Andrew Feinstein from Corruption Watch and author of ‘The Shadow World – Inside the Global Arms Trade’.  Andrew made the case that ending the arms economy should be an integral part of a broader strategy of tackling the climate crisis.  In the course of the year this topic has been raised again at meetings that we’ve held or participated in.  Some people have argued that whatever your opinion on the arms trade – taking arms divestment on board at the same time as taking measures to decarbonize is a distraction.  Others have supported Andrew’s view and in the course of this debate the outline of a more developed and strategic view has emerged.  We hope that this can be developed further in the course of the 2019 conference.

This autumn a number of peace organisations have joined up with Extinction Rebellion to organise around XR Peace.  The London October rebellion included a number of actions highlighting the links between war and the environment.  XR Peace has focused on the massive carbon footprint of the military, the environmental devastation cause by war and social and economic upheavals as a result of climate change as a cause of conflict.

In the discussions that we have been involved in throughout the year other reasons for including arms and ‘defence’ divestment in our strategy have emerged.  The first is very pragmatic.  There is a pressing need to switch from energy systems that produce green house gases (carbon emissions) to zero carbon technologies.  These technologies exist and it perfectly possible to implement them.  But to make the transition at the speed that is required requires the skills and labour of a large number of engineers, electricians and other specialists.  Most of these jobs will have to be done by people already in the workforce.  Some of them work in oil and gas and as these carbon-based sources of energy are phased out they can be redeployed in the new renewable industries.  But there are not enough people in oil and gas – we also need the skills of those currently employed in the military industrial complex.  Shifting from arms to renewables is morally right but it’s also an economic imperative if we want to prevent catastrophic climate change.

DSC03194

Image: Pete Cannell CC0

There are of course other economic reasons too.  Levels of investment and state support for the arms trade and for the military are huge.  Our economies are distorted by the privileged position that the major arms companies (along with the big energy corporations) occupy.  These privileges go hand in glove with eye watering levels of corruption and huge levels of corporate lobbying with a revolving door through which politicians and executives continually move and switch roles.  It’s these relationships which actively oppose realistic attempts to take action over climate and as a movement we need to demand that state support and investment ends, lobbying stops and arrangements are put in place for a rapid shift to sustainable and ethical employment for those who work in these industries.   These demands have a particular resonance in Scotland where the Trident nuclear system and arms manufacturing have had a disproportionate impact on our economy.

Trident_boat

Image: Wikimedia Commons

STUC Fringe Meeting

The Scottish Trades Union Congress meets at the Caird Hall in Dundee from 15th – 17th April.  Scot.E3 is contributing to one of the fringe meetings:

Developing Sustainable and Socially Useful Jobs in Today’s Economy 
Wednesday April 17 at 1230pm
Committee Room 2 City Chambers
Pete Roche – research officer  – Nuclear Free Local Authorities
Speaker from Scot.E3
Meeting organised by Scottish CND

wind-energy-488534_1280

Defence diversification and just transition

More from the #justtransitions conference: Andrew Feinstein director of Corruption watch speaking on the arms trade, diversification and just transitions @EdinburghCAAT #scote3

Why we need a just transition

There is no doubt that we are already facing the effects of climate change. Sea levels are rising; glaciers and ice caps are melting faster than anyone envisaged. Around the world the frequency and strength of extreme storms is creating misery for the coastal poor while the rich move to higher ground.

Speakers at the Edinburgh Just Transitions conference will argue that our response to climate change has to be political. The recent UN report, and almost all large-scale policy initiatives, has been based on an assumption that market forces will drive a transition to a low carbon economy. There is a market response. Massive increases in wind and solar are a case in point. However, if current policies are continued, there is no chance that carbon reduction targets for 2030 and 2050 will be achieved either locally in Scotland or globally.

We have the technological knowledge to make a rapid transition to a sustainable economy. What’s missing is political will. We’ll argue that the politics of transition is as critical as the technology. On the one hand there is the status quo in a state reliance on the market. A top down approach that protects the rich and powerful – builds walls and fences and curtails civil liberties. On the other hand there is what is increasingly described as a Just Transition. This would involve programmes of publicly funded investment creating new jobs, protecting the livelihoods of those who will move from oil, gas and defence industries to new jobs and dramatically improving the living conditions of the bulk of the population through better insulated homes and improved public transport.

To achieve a Just Transition the response has to be international but action is required in every local context. In Scotland we start with significant advantages that could make us a beacon for the world. Across manufacturing, defence and construction there is a rich base of engineering skills. We have access to a wealth of natural resources wind, wave, tidal and hydro. Scottish Universities are at the forefront of developing wave and tidal technology.   The Scottish Government’s response is hugely better than Westminster’s. The proposed national energy company and green investment bank are essential for a Just Transition. However, the current plans show a poverty of ambition that falls far short of the radical steps that are required.

Only right wing ideologues now deny climate change. But beyond a relatively small layer of activists most people feel disconnected and powerless. This is reinforced by appeals to personal and lifestyle choices that are inaccessible to many. Surely the challenge is to link the necessary steps to the immediacy of working class lives. Workers in defence, construction and hydrocarbons are key. Their skills are needed to build the new and democratic economy. Yet at present they work in sectors that have seen a huge increase in agency workers and worsening pay and conditions. Despite excellent resolutions on climate change at the STUC, unions in these sectors continue to put jobs, any jobs, first. But this strategy is bankrupt morally, practically and politically. And increasingly workers in the industry recognise this. However, they need to believe that there is an alternative.

At the conference we’ll hear from authors of the Million Climate Jobs plan for transition, from the Campaign Against the Arms Trade, from climate activists and critically from workers in defence and construction. We will also hear from welfare campaigners fighting for social justice as represented by fuel poverty. Through the day discussion will focus on developing ideas that translate the issues and challenges that we face, and the steps that we know have to be taken, into a draft manifesto for action. We hope to circulate this far and wide to provoke debate, discussion and develop more ideas. Core to this will have to be a sense of developing collective organisation and social solidarity that will be essential in making the transition but will also shape our future and how we and those who come after us live in the world.

This article first published on Common Space 13/11/18

Solidarity with shipyard workers in North Devon

Reposted from REEL News

Huge demonstration in Bideford, North Devon this weekend, to stop the only merchant shipyard in the country from closing. All 200 workers are facing redundancy a few days before Christmas, and the knock-on effect for the local economy will be huge. And this shows the lunacy of modern capitalism – the Government urgently needs non-military ships built for the Royal Navy, but instead of giving the work to the highly skilled workforce at Appledore shipyard and keeping the shipyard open, they’re putting it internationally to competitive tender to get the lowest price.

On top of that, the Tories know they need to take drastic steps to move to renewable energy to stop catastrophic climate change – so why aren’t they immediately giving Appledore a contract to build all the offshore wind turbines and other infrastructure we’re going to desperately need, and instead pushing ahead with a dangerous fracking operation that is already causing tremors and will push up our carbon emissions?

This is also one of the few places left with a proper apprenticeship scheme, training up the highly skilled workers of the future – but the Tories and engineering multinational Babcock International want to just chuck all this in the bin in their race to the bottom.
This is a major dispute kicking off with national importance – get behind the Appledore workers and demand the shipyard stays open. You can start by signing the petition at https://www.change.org/p/save-appledore-shipyard before they and it in to Parliament tomorrow.