21st Century Vision

Iraq - Much More To Do

“The success of the election augurs well for the transition process,” Kofi Annan, the UN General-Secretary declared.

Today's balloting paves the way for Iraq's Transitional National Assembly to draft a permanent constitution which is expected to be put to a referendum in October.

The Secretary-General said that process should be inclusive. “It is important to ensure that all individuals, groups and parties who, for whatever reason, were unable or unwilling to take part in the election are now brought into the constitution-making process,” he said.

“This is a time for reconciliation on all sides,” he added, welcoming recent statements by a number of Iraqi political leaders indicating their willingness to support this process.

For its part, the UN “stands ready to continue its electoral assistance, to facilitate vital outreach efforts, and, if invited, to assist the elected TNA in its work of drafting the constitution.” However the Guardian Leader stated.

The most obvious message to draw from yesterday's elections in Iraq is that it will be a long time before it becomes clear who the real winners are. Not only is this literally the case - in that it will be at least a week and a half before the results are known, and many of the candidates were anonymous - but figuratively too. This election is, as Kofi Annan observed, only a first step in deciding Iraq's future. What happens from now on will decide what path Iraq continues along.

Many Western leaders are reading into the Election more significance than there probably is. The election is only the beginning. Whether there is sufficient infrastructure in Iraq to maintain a healthy democracy is the most important question; and whether the coalition has put as much resources into building that infrastructure as they did into the War itself is another vital issue.

See Guardian Leader …

See Kofi Annan’s statement ..

Shell Chief Joins Green Lobby!

The Sunday Times has reported that the outgoing chairman of Shell has announced he wants to take up a post with a climate-change charity when he quits the oil giant later this year. Lord Oxburgh is so concerned at the potential destruction from global warming that he wants to devote more of his time to cutting greenhouse gas emissions and the use of fossil fuels.

The Sunday Times claims that the move is likely to cause some embarrassment at Shell, one of the biggest oil and gas producers in the world. Despite a history of environmental controversies, it is now seen as one of the greenest oil companies, but each year its worldwide activities and products still release about 700m tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

By contrast, emissions from the whole of Britain total around 560m tons out of a total world output of 25 billion tons. Oxburgh, who chairs Shell as a non-executive, said: “When I leave I would like to go onto the board of a climate change charity. I would be campaigning for more responsible use of hydrocarbons.”

Oxburgh, who is also chairman of the House of Lords science and technology committee, emphasises that the target of such campaigns would not be so much the oil companies as government ministers and departments.

He believes it is only through taxation, regulation and new technology that the world can have any hope of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. However, his belief that governments should impose higher taxes on aviation fuels, petrol, oil, gas and other hydrocarbons to discourage their use may alarm other oil company executives.

See full article ..

Civil Society In Enfield & Autonomy

Civil society is normally a robust plant, but can sometimes prove surprisingly delicate. It thrives in the soil of single issues – like the rights of the disabled, world development, race equality and the global environment – and can grow to an impressive scale in the form of international NGOs, like the Red Cross/Red Crescent, Greenpeace and Amnesty. There are signs that the individual trees are beginning to see themselves as a mighty forest. They are bidding for a greater and independent voice in the deliberations of the United Nations, while the global justice movement, springing from the Porto Alegre World Social Forum (now in session in Brazil), has been called the planet’s ‘second superpower’.

Besides the sunlight of disinterested commitment and free debate, however, the growth of civil society requires steady irrigation by a supply of funds. As the Enfield voluntary sector (VS) found out this week, herein lies its weakness. The borough council, which funds a wide range of local agencies, many of them based at Community House, has suddenly announced a reduction in ‘corporate grants’ from £1.14m to £845,000, with much greater cuts in its social services grants. Those voluntary organizations (VOs) significantly defunded include Age Concern, the Enfield Bangladesh Welfare Association, the Citizens Advice Bureaux, Enfield Caribbean Association and (unbelievably for a council professing so much concern for the rise of violent crime) Victim Support. Those whose services are at risk include the young, the old, many black and minority ethnic groups, women and carers. Who is left?

Against this background an illuminating council debate took place before an understandably crowded public gallery at the Enfield Civic Centre on 26th January. The opposition Labour party tabled a paper accusing the ruling Conservatives of failing to appreciate the role of the VS in Enfield, and lacking a will to work in partnership with it to ensure ‘the community will benefit in a way that the council can never undertake on its own’. Opposition councillors described the VS as a ‘political, financial, informational, moral and social asset’ and a ‘bulwark against tyranny’. How for example could the local health economy function without the patchwork of support groups focused on such areas as diabetes, stroke and mental health? The burden of their charge, however, was that the administration lacked a strategy to mobilise revenue, physical assets and staff time to assist the VS to ‘download external funding’, particularly from European social and regional development sources.

Apart from an irrelevant outburst about asylum seekers and the rise in violent crime, Conservative councillors replied that they could not go on raising council tax to the detriment of pensioners. They were encouraging VOs to bring in external funds from ‘the sale of services and membership fees’. Suddenly, however, a dramatic admission from the deputy leader: the council did indeed lack a strategy! NGOs were becoming ‘self-appointed single issue organizations’ which ‘blackmailed’ the council to fund them with no output guarantees. They were failing to lever in available external funds. This must stop and there must be movement towards ‘commissioned services’ and ‘value for money’.

An opposition motion to set up a working party to develop a strategic approach to VS funding was accepted by the administration, though amended to stipulate that the work be done by a council-controlled scrutiny panel rather than a working party with VS representation.

So what emerged was cross-party agreement that the role of the VS was to generate resources for non-council tax funded services in Enfield, and that the council should help it to do so. It is true the Labour party’s emphasis was on wider social goals and the less tangible benefits of VS activities, while the administration was focused on ‘value for money’ and ‘commissioned services’. The common vision however was of a voluntary sector largely existing to serve the goals of the council.

Even the towering oaks among the international NGOs must jealously maintain their autonomy of the state (Oxfam GB restricts itself to about 25% British government funding, for example). The underbrush of civil society at local level needs likewise to be wary of surrendering its independence and right to criticise the local state.

Roger Hallam

Joan Ryan & The Tobin Tax

In July of this year, the Belgium Government passed legislation for a currency transaction tax (CCT) that could pave the way for billions of dollars in revenues to benefit the world's poorest people. The CCT is a blueprint for the achievement of two substantial outcomes.

Firstly, it shows how governments can raise significant income to meet their Millennium pledge to halve world poverty by 2015. Secondly, it contains a mechanism to guard against financial shocks that often cause poverty in the first place. Both goals require different tax rates and the Belgium legislation accommodates this by enshrining into law for the first time a two-tier tax. We asked Joan Ryan MP to comment on this. She told us,

I have said previously that I am not opposed to the Tobin tax in principle. However I am not convinced that the tax would be particularly effective in stabilising international capital flows. There are a number of practical issues concerning the coverage and enforcement of the tax that would need to be resolved before the Tobin tax can become a feasible source of development finance. International initiatives such as these require coordinated implementation and rely ultimately on the political will of national governments to make them work.

There is a need to increase financing for poorer countries and indeed the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, announced on 12 th July 2004 that the total UK overseas aid will rise to nearly £6.5 billion by 2008. Meaning the UK’s contribution to Overseas Development Assistance, as a percentage of national income would rise to a figure of 0.47% in 2007-2008, from 0.26% in 1997.

In a recently published study into the Tobin tax and other innovative sources of finance development, the European Commission’s provisional conclusion was that, while the Tobin tax may look appealing as a source of additional revenue its feasibility has not been demonstrated, and it may actually increase volatility in financial markets. However, the Commission recommends that further work be undertaken on this and the other proposals, which the Government support.

If these studies generate practical suggestions for how to overcome the problems associated with implementing the tax, the Government would of course be keen to consider them and I would support this position.

See Joans full answer ..

Compare this with the answer of Theresa Villiers MEP ..

Global Warming Worse Than First Thought!

Global warming might be twice as catastrophic as previously thought, flooding settlements on the British coast and turning the interior into an unrecognisable tropical landscape, the world's biggest study of climate change shows.

Globally, average temperatures could reach 11C greater than today, double the rise predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the international body set up to investigate global warming. Such high temperatures would melt most of the polar icecaps and mountain glaciers, raising sea levels by more than 20ft.

Mr Stainforth said: "An 11C-warmed world would be a dramatically different world... There would be large areas at higher latitudes that could be up to 20C warmer than today. The UK would be at the high end of these changes. It is possible that even present levels of greenhouse gases maintained for long periods may lead to dangerous climate change... When you start to look at these temperatures, I get very worried indeed."

Meanwhile The Guardian reports that Lobby groups funded by the US oil industry are targeting Britain in a bid to play down the threat of climate change and derail action to cut greenhouse gas emissions, leading scientists have warned.

Bob May, president of the Royal Society, says a "a lobby of professional sceptics who opposed action to tackle climate change" is turning its attention to Britain because of its high profile in the debate.

Writing in the Life section of today's Guardian, Prof May says the government's decision to make global warming a focus of its G8 presidency has made it a target. So has the high profile of its chief scientific adviser, David King, who described climate change as a bigger threat than terrorism.

See Independent article ..

See Guardian article ..

World Social Forum Gathers in Brazil

Activists join presidents, as the annual World Social Forum gets under way in Porto Alegre – an ideal backdrop for the launch of the World Social Forum, which meets annually to discuss issues affecting developing countries.

Begun five years ago specifically to counter the annual meeting of world business and political leaders in Davos, Switzerland, it has unexpectedly become a global political and social phenomenon.

More than 100,000 activists will be in Porto Alegre this year. They will be joined by two presidents, several Nobel peace and literature prizewinners, the world's leading international non-government groups, healthworkers, MPs, educators, unions, students, the landless, indigenous peoples, intellectuals, environmentalists and dissident economists.

"It's not perfect, but it is the most tangible global rejection of the neo-liberal globalisation policies of the US and G8 countries," said Ricardo Jimenez, a Uruguyan doctor.

"But it needs to be seen in context. More than 1 billion people in developing countries live in slums; 800 million go hungry every day; 27 million adults are slaves; 245 million children have to work. The poor are everywhere still getting poorer, the cities are disintegrating and bankrupt. It is a response to a global scandal."

The Enfield & Barnet UNA will be hosting a local civil society social forum in February when a number of organisations will meet to discuss some of the major international issues affecting us today. This will take place on Feb 18th. Please contact us for more information or look at our Diary of Events.

See article on World Social Forum ..

Darfur: Never again?

As the world prepares to commemorate Holocaust Day, crimes against humanity are still being committed in Darfur while diplomats bicker.

While the diplomats debate how to respond, the survivors of the atrocities are left traumatised, many in refugee camps. More than 60 per cent of refugees from Darfur have witnessed the killing of a family member by the men on horseback. Four out of every five people have witnessed the destruction of their villages. Two-thirds saw government planes laden with bombs target fleeing civilians. One-third heard racial abuse while they and their relatives were being murdered or raped.

After the Rwandan genocide in 1994, just as after the Holocaust when six million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis, the world said "never again". Now, there is Darfur.

See Independent story …

Britain Close To Bottom Of The Class

A report in the Guardian points out that Britain has one of the worst environmental records in Europe, according to a new index ranking countries on their performance on green issues which will be unveiled at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week.

By that measure, Britain is in a lowly state. It ranks 66th out of the 146 countries on the index, considerably behind most of northern Europe, the US (ranked 45th), and even most of the former Soviet Union.

"In the UK, the weakest element is land degradation. There is a high percentage of British land that has been messed with through 1,000 years of history," said Daniel Esty, director of the Yale centre for environmental law and policy and one of the report's authors. "Britain also lags badly when it comes to reducing air pollution. London and other cities have a serious air pollution problem.

Britain also scored poorly for exporting environmental pressures abroad, continuing to consume the output of polluting industries, like steel and cars, which have moved overseas. "The dirty business is being done elsewhere," Prof Esty said. "Economists will celebrate this as comparable advantage, but it looks differently from an environmental point of view."

On the positive side, Britain scores well in terms of "social and institutional capacity" to deal with environmental stress, meaning that government agencies function well with relatively little corruption and that the private sector has been responsive to efforts to curb pollution. The UK has also done better than many similar countries in the development of sustainable agriculture and fisheries.

See full article ..

Never Again

On the occasion of the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of Nazi death camps, Human Rights Watch has issued a statement that all in the UNA would agree with. It states,

The revulsion and outrage sparked by the Holocaust provided the impetus for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and the development of a growing body of international human rights law. It is on this foundation that the work of the human rights movement depends.

Anti-Semitism remains a threat today. On this anniversary, all those who commemorate the tragedy of the Holocaust must rededicate themselves to efforts to eradicate the scourge of anti-Semitism, xenophobia and all forms of racism.

The international human rights movement, inspired by the vow of “Never again,” has prevented and helped to lessen many human rights crimes over recent decades. But it has not stopped them all.

Human Rights Watch declares that on this tragic anniversary and in tribute to the victims they pledge to continue to defend those who are at greatest risk around the world. We would like to add our support to that pledge.

Measuring Government’s Effectiveness On Human Rights

Most Governments claim that they support human rights and believe that any abuse of human rights should be investigated – well unless that abuse involves themselves. So the US will not subject its own troops to human rights violation investigations and the British Government has been reluctant to accept what Amnesty International has said about violations in Northern Ireland.

If Governments support human rights and say violations happen but never in their own back yard then how do we monitor that and ensure good governance when it comes to human rights? One resolution now being actively canvassed for debate at the UNA Conference in April tackles this question and states,

noting the current movement towards enabling the United Nations to take military action against regimes which act in disregard of human rights,

noting the need for a non-violent alternative to bring pressure on inhumane regimes,

requests that the UNA Board consider and develop the proposal that UN member states should have their human rights record continuously assessed, and that the resulting score should be published annually by the UN as an Index of Governance. and that regimes with the poorest record of human rights as measured on this Index shall suffer targeted sanctions designed to affect the ruling elite rather than the general population, and

requests that the UNA Board should, having developed this proposal, press for it to be adopted by the World Federation of UNAs, with a view to having this policy eventually adopted by the UN itself.

If you are interested in this motion then find out more here.