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Monday, January 29, 2007

Save Radley Lakes

I thought I was just going up to Oxford for some fresh air.
A Sunday stroll by some lovely lakes is what my friend had told me.
Of course when I arrived at his place in Oxford and found the place swarming with "swampies" I knew that something else was afoot.
We were going on a supporting mission to give aid and moral support to a group of ecologically concerned activists who are using direct action to protect a beautiful lake that was created after gravel digging from being ruined by the local polluting Didcot power station. They have squatted a building which sides one of the last remaining lakes under threat. Most of them have already been filled with a horrible ashy byproduct of powerstations called PFA. It is mixed with water and creates a quicksand-like ugly and toxic sludge that cannot be walked upon for decades. This will replace an utterly tranquil home to fish, nesting birds, water voles (and maybe even otters) amongst others. It is also a local amenity that we saw was used as part of many local peoples leisure time. We saw old couples strolling by, kids biking around, horse shoe prints show that its a nice place for a bit of a trot - and this was in January.

Anyhow there has been a local campaign to save these lakes which has sadly proved unsuccessful over the last few years. The new occupying 'accountable citizens' are not part of that local organisation and have not occupied the building at their behest. However this new group are committed, peaceful, well organised and well informed.
They need as much support as they can get.
Food, money, physical help and/or equipment to protect the site from bailiffs, people to come and help stop any attempted eviction. Campaigning scientists to come and record the species present and make the environmental case that the council failed to do.

Even though some of the Sunday afternoon visitors to the site may not have contributed a great deal to the work going onsite (ie me) they helped with building moral support and will hopefully go off and tell all of their friends - and those with media and publicity spreading powers - what is going on here.

It is important to note that at another powerstation in Britain,
this waste material is built up as a dry mound where it is less polluting and can be grown over with vegetation. The material can later be dug out and used by the building trade if the demand is there. The wet sludge cannot be re-used in this way.
The amount of this ash that is going to be put into this shallow lake would make only a small mound if deposited elsewhere locally. It could also help to disguise the eyesore that is Didcot power station.

Go along to the house and pay a visit. They have a very informative display inside. This is a last ditch battle as the council has already given permission for this beautiful lake to be destroyed by the already filthy polluting greenhouse gas emitting profiteers NPOWER.

Forget about booing Jade,
come and boo the bailiffs when they try and do NPOWER's dirty work.

For more details you can visit these websites:

Save Radley Lakes

Radley Village News

BBC

A final word - It was refreshing to get out of the big smoke and
all the trendy vain vacuous bollocks associated therewith and be with some proper principled getting-involved and doing something folk - quite humbling and shaming too cause I'm such a lazy websurfing fucktard ;-)

sketched by dweller at 10:31 pm

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1 Comments:

Anonymous said...: Thanks for the support - but this is not a last ditch attempt. This is the start of a struggle. To misquote braveheart - 'they can take away our squat, but they can't away freeeddoooooom to be a complete pain in the arse'. Pixies-are-us. And those of us who love our media have cunning plans too. Then there's the lawyers, the tree huggers, the duck squeezers...after that we're gonna get real creative.

So, don't be a stranger. We need lots of folks to add their tuppeny-worth. in't over to the fat bird warbles, the otter stops barking, and the hippies stop listeing to the Levellers.

McCavity (the artist formally known as the secret area networker); 10:23 am