Letter to Horsforth School

Dear Sarah

Thank you very much for inviting Friends of the Earth to give the assemblies this week.  Its been a very enjoyable and interesting experience for me and I hope the students have learned a lot.  They certainly seemed to be interested and concerned about the issues we touched on.  One boy in yr 9  thanked me afterwards and said he was very interested and asked if a 13 yr old could really write to the council or MP (I had emphasised that it’s all our responsibility to DO something to stop the rot).  Of course I said yes.  Another girl (poss yr 8) very sweetly came to say sorry she had had to leave the room for health reasons – and she didn’t want me to think it was for any other reason.  Another boy asked where the nearest FOE group is  (Leeds – but no reason why students shouldn’t start their own local one)

It would be great if more schools invited FOE speakers  since it was worrying to discover that the  students seemed unaware of this well established organisation and most of these crucial issues, and I guess this will be the case with most young people at the moment.  I spoke briefly with Ms W and offered to come back to discuss things in more depth with your school council or any other group.  I also suggested the school might want to set up a hustings before the election in early May so that students can see and hear at first hand what each political party has to say about these issues.  Possibly parents and  the public could be invited too.   I did emphasise to the 6^th form that all these issues ARE political and they should get informed.  As you probably know, FOE is not aligned to any political party, but their policies are virtually identical to Green Party policy. You will see that I am a Green Party candidate for May’s election – but I didn’t mention this to the students since I was giving the talks on behalf of FOE.   I was, however,  in two minds about mentioning this, since I feel it’s important that young people  (particularly girls) know that politics is a route they might be interested to follow as a response to their concerns.

On a practical note – I wonder if the school might want to reimburse my travel expenses which amounted to about 30 pounds for the 5 days (train and bus).  I have tickets if that would help.

I left a poster with reception showing bee-friendly flowers and wonder if the school might consider making a wild flower meadow!   The Woodland Trust is offering free trees to schools at the moment.  Last but not least, regarding solar panels – please see FOE’s current project to encourage solar on school roofs: I know you have some – but maybe there is room for more?!

Please convey my thanks to Phil the techno wizard for his help and to everyone else who made my visits so pleasant.   Thank you again, Sarah,  for making the effort to invite us: having been a teacher myself, I know it’s a big effort to go beyond the excessive day to day workload to make external arrangements!

Very best wishes

Shan Oakes

For Friends of the Earth

Biosolids Conference

I'd  had very short notice of this event  (see my last post) so, even having perused the website, I'd not fully realised that biosolids means the organic 'fruits' of  sewerage.  I'd had in mind  the broader concept of biomass.  Euphemism getting in the way, perhaps, but apparently the experts in this large and fascinating field stick together and use familiar words with different meanings :  their 'cake' is not edible!   The invitation was to give a keynote speech about a green vision for the economy.  As I was short of time I'd adapted  a speech given by Caroline Lucas.   Luckily I was able to arrive an hour or so before my slot to eat and talk with stallholders (selling sludge management machinery, consultancy etc) and listen to other presentations. It was a steep learning curve. I discovered they are (in general) a green-minded group, so I chopped out of my speech the bit about climate change.  They are very aware of greenhouse gas emissions (as the photo of the presentation by ADAS shows).  They  want government to stop backtracking on renewable energy, and they say that regulation often gets in the way of greener ways of doing things as it's too inflexible.  Apparently the policy makers don't listen: e.g. they promise to meet at a plant and then change the venue to London, so they never really get to grips with the industry's issues.  Clearly, better communication between all sectors is needed (as it is with everything).  I'm really glad I had the opportunity to meet the biosolids gang...and I now have an invitation to speak at Leeds University, and a few contacts in this crucially important and, it seems,  misunderstood field. see www.european-biosolids.com