Meeting – Employment, Energy and Environment

The Urgency of Now – Climate Jobs and Just Transition

The Cop26 Coalition is holding a global gathering from the 12th – 16th November. Register here.

Scot.E3’s contribution to the gathering is ‘The Urgency of Now – Climate Jobs and Just Transition’ which takes place at 6pm on the 15th November.

The Covid-19 pandemic has intensified calls for a global Green New Deal – an urgent transformation of the global economy with massive investment to tackle climate change and address inequality. But what does a just transition look like for oil workers facing immediate redundancies because of low oil prices and privatisation? And with much wider unemployment expected, how do we take the initiative to create momentum for climate jobs on a local level, creating solutions rooted in communities and a real alternative?

This workshop draws on recent research with offshore oil and gas workers in Scotland. While many are looking for better job security, they are not being given a clear path to transfer their skills to renewable energy. The oil industry in Brazil also faces insecurity due to privatisation. Meanwhile, campaigns for free public transport in Glasgow and for a mass home retrofitting programme in Leeds are challenging the piecemeal approach taken by national government and calling for investment that meets the needs of local communities and creates climate jobs ‘from the ground up’. Workshop participants are invited to bring their experiences of mobilising for a just transition and climate jobs in their own sector / community.

All events will take place on Zoom and we will email through the relevant links beforehand when you register. You can get help installing zoom here.

Contributors
Antony Devalle (Sindipetro-RJ, Brazil), Gabi Jeliazkov (Platform), Stuart Graham (FreeOurCity), Ellen Robottom (Leeds Trade Union Council)

Closing Down Big Oil

Closing Down Big Oil was our contribution to the Edinburgh World Justice Festival 2020. At the event on 9th October there were contributions from Andy Georghiou, Brian Parkin and Neil Rothnie. In this post we’ve collated video, audio, Powerpoint slides and links which give a flavour of the discussion.

Andy talked about the local and global role of INEOS and the importance of petrochemicals in the debate on just transition.

Brian gave an overview of the rise of big oil, its dominance in the twentieth century and the necessity for its demise in the twenty first.

Neil brought the discussion back to the importance of the North Sea for the campaign for a just transition to a sustainable economy here in Scotland

#Ineos v thepeople from petecannell

Here are Andy’s slides as a Power Point presentation

In this audio file Neil addresses a question about the role of XR

And in this audio file Andy addresses a question on greenwashing and reflects on the overall discussion

The Glasgow Agreement

Apologies for the short notice – we’ve just received notification that there’s an Open Assembly of the ‘Glasgow Agreement’ tomorrow (Sunday) at 2pm – the invitation to attend is copied below. You can see the latest draft of the agreement here.

We want to invite you to our next open assembly of the Glasgow Agreement on the 27th of September (Sunday), from 2pm GMT until 4pm GMT. You are more than welcome to participate, and to invite other groups that you know and that might be interested to participate in the Glasgow Agreement, even if they are not in the process yet.

Agenda:
We will talk about: the current status of the text and how you can be involved on the process; what space does the climate justice movement need in 2021; what is the inventory tool and the climate agenda.
Introductory webinar:
We will also have an introductory webinar at 1:30pm GMT, in the same links, for those who don’t know the Glasgow Agreement that well. Feel free to join us if you want to know more about the agreement before the assembly!

Platform:
The assembly will be online, using the Big Blue Button (BBB) platform.
In English, the link will be this one: https://meet.nixnet.services/b/gla-nnw-hgv.
(You can download here a guide about how to use BBB or watch this tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYYnryIM0Uw)

Scot.E3 is not currently signed up to the agreement we’ll discuss this at our next meeting – please send feedback to triple.e.scot@gmail.com

Action notes and an appeal for help

The minutes and action points from our March organising meeting are now available for viewing or download.

There were two particular actions that we would really appreciate your help with.

We have taken out a subscription to the Zoom online conferencing platform and we plan to hold regular online public events. Please email suggestions for topics and for speakers to triple.e.scot@gmail.com. If you would like to offer to do a presentation yourself do let us know. We’re aware that online meetings may be a new experience for some people or you may not be familiar with Zoom. There is a now a simple guide to accessing Zoom meetings on this site.

We have five new briefings in production

The role of Hydrogen in a sustainable economy
Organising at work
The COPs and COP 26 – a guide
Is nuclear part of a sustainable solution?
Decarbonising Transport.

If you know of good resources on any of these topics and can share links or references that would be really helpful. Our aim when we produce briefings is to develop a concise summary of the issues on 2 sides of A4 with links to further readings and resources via the website. If you’ve an interest in one or more of the topics and would like to link up with 2 or three others to help write the briefing and collate the web links do let us know. You can just email us at triple.e.scot@gmail.com

Finally if you have ideas for other topics that would work in the briefing format or for updates to existing briefings do get in touch.

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March organising meeting

Thursday 19th March – 7.30pm by Zoom click here for details of how to join

If you are new to online meetings there is a simple guide to joining Zoom meetings here .

Draft Agenda

Reports from activity over the last month including:

North Sea Oil and Gas report
Meetings that we’ve attended
Wet’suwet’en solidarity
Funding application
Ineos and fracking
International Climate Jobs Conference
COP 26

Discussion on strategy and direction

Organising meetings and events in the new circumstances of Covid 19 – ideas for online meetings – other ways of reaching and engaging people

Fringe meeting at STUC – report on progress and decision on how we proceed

Developing new materials for the website – priorities – getting people to provide material for the briefings and act as authors/ reviewers

Outcomes from the 20th February organising meeting

What follows is a summary of the main points from the meeting – the full write up of the action points from the meeting is available here.

Following a discussion in which we shared information on the progress being made in mobilising for COP 26 we agreed to establish a new page on www.scote3.net dedicated to COP 26 and to prioritise a Briefing ‘What is the COP?’ The page is work in progress and ideas for useful content would be really appreciated. Please email them in.

At the January meeting we had sketched out an ambitious programme of meetings and events around Scotland and on the 20^th we made further plans to link up with other groups to take this forward. We are also submitting an application for grant funding to the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust to support the activities that we have planned in the run up to the COP and beyond.

The North Sea Oil and Gas report has had a significant impact and was downloaded 242 times in the first 5 days from its publication. We are exploring the possibility of a fringe meeting on the report at the STUC conference in April and are keen to promote other opportunities for sharing the information and promoting debate on the process of phasing out North Sea Oil and Gas production.

We have been invited to speak at the Edinburgh City Council Unison AGM in February and the EIS/ULA AGM in March – we are always open to invitations to speak at events and we are working on the development of speakers notes as part of expanding the pool of people who are confident to speak at these events.

We agreed to contact other groups to see if we could hold a solidarity protest in support of the Wet-suwet-en in British Columbia. This is scheduled for 2pm on Sunday March 1^st at the east end of Princes Street – there is a protest in London on the same day.

We also agreed to work with SCND and others to hold discussion meetings based around screenings of the new Lucas Plan film – The Plan. Details soon.

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Mossmorran

Public Meeting

Friday 1^st February, 7pm at Lochgelly Town Hall, Bank Street KY5 9

This is a really important meeting. According to the Scottish Environmental ProtectionAgency (SEPA) the ExxonMobil plant at Mossmorran in Fife is the second biggest emitter of greenhouse gases in Scotland – only the INEOS complex at Grangemouth is a bigger polluter. People living in the vicinity of the plant have suffered from excessive flaring and poor air quality for a long time. The Mossmorran Action group has been campaigning for a resolution to these issues. George Kerevan has recently written about the ways in which SEPA has failed to respond adequately to their concerns.

The plant is currently being returned to operation after a shut down in August 2019. Flaring and pollution has been at a high level and yesterday around 170 workers walked off the site to highlight concerns over working conditions and safety. There needs to urgent action to protect the health and safety of local residents and workers. But in light of the climate crisis Mossmorran must also be part of a plan for a rapid phased run down of the Scottish petrochemical industry in which the workers are supported in a just transition to new sustainable jobs – part of the just transition that is so urgently needed.

Mossmorran

CC BY SA 3.0 Mossmoran petrochemical plant

February Organising Meeting

Our February meeting will be held at the Edinburgh Peace and Justice Centre on Thursday 20th February. The Centre is in the basement of the Epworth Halls on Nicolson Square. The meetings are relaxed and informal and open to anyone who is keen to engage with organising around Just Transition and Climate jobs. You can download the detailed draft agenda and there’s still time to email in other ideas and contributions to the agenda. Among other things, we’ll be looking at what we can do in terms of outreach activities and meetings in the year of the Glasgow COP and planning updates and additions to the resources that are hosted on this website.

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Notes from our January organising meeting

You can read the full notes from the meeting as a PDF here. What follows are some of the main points that were discussed.

We started with a discussion on the likely impact of the general election result. It’s likely that there will be detrimental changes to regulations and standards – areas that could be effected include energy from waste, devolved powers, outsourcing and tendering, nuclear policy, targets and subsidies, energy distribution and supply and workers rights. There is a likelihood for heightened tension between Westminster and Holyrood over many of these issues. The big issues in the Scottish context include Oil and Gas (particularly INEOS), Public Transport, Housing and the opportunities and challenges presented by the COP being held in Glasgow.

We resolved to do all we can encourage discussion and action in workplaces and community settings. Wherever possible we will do this in partnership. We will encourage requests to help set up or provide resources for events. We agreed to prioritise setting up events in Fife, Falkirk and Aberdeen and with the Construction Rank and File group.

We agreed to work on four new briefings (we are always open for suggestions of amendments to existing briefings and suggestions for new ones) – working titles for the new additions are:

‘Is nuclear part of a sustainable solution’,

‘Organising at work’,

‘Hydrogen’,

‘What is the ‘COP’’.

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Common Weal launch Green New Deal

This Saturday Common Weal is launching their report on a Green New Deal for Scotland. The event is at The Arches in Glasgow – more details and booking via Eventbrite through this link. This promises to be an important contribution to the developing debate on how we tackle the climate crisis.

Jonathan Shafi from Common Weal is one of the speakers at the Scot.E3 conference on 16^th November. Book for the conference on Eventbrite and email triple.e.scot@gmail.com if you want to book one or more crèche places.

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