Government selling off our forests!!!!

[Flamethrower_]

 Government selling off our forests !! Sounds like selling the family silver!!!

http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/save-our-forests?sms_ss=facebook&at_xt=4d27408eafd1903e%2C0

[martin]

signed! - apposite comment from the Independent! - http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-for-sale--camerons-green-credentials-2177929.html 

[rondurrans]

Don't worry they will grow back. 

[martin]

Not if they've built on 'em!

[mikey9]

Didn't get the chance to sell off the one(s) we hung the baubles off.......

[rondurrans]

Be an optimist - we can always put roof gardens on the top of the new buildings - you need to read my new book that I've just started..............

[Flamethrower_]

Looks like Martin and I are the only concerned tree huggers on the Navitron Forum

Dont people realise without trees we wont be here!

http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/save-our-forests?sms_ss=facebook&at_xt=4d27408eafd1903e%2C0

[martin]

There are times I get very close to complete sense-of-humour failure over the idiocies of government, particularly regarding the environment - since this damned bunch of superannuated duck-house owners got into power they've managed to ditch nearly all the farm animal welfare measures, removed safeguards on spraying "icides", sanctioned proven-useless badger-culls, are negotiating with Mr Olly Gark to remove all our trees, and are claiming to be "the greenest government yet".....
Give it a few months, the odious Lord Henley and Caroline "GM lobbyist for 15 years" Spelman will announce the red carpet for GMOs - the latest weasellism being "on purely scientific grounds".......in other words, they've sold our futures to US multinationals.........

...and The Great Blobboid British Public will continue doing their "Wall-ee" couch surfing impressions intoning "X-factor on again soon, this week there's double Clubcard points on chickens" (that died in pools of their own misery)

[Flamethrower_]

Martin,

I concurr whole heartedly  maybe the eternal optimist in me that looks for good in the human race, will finally be consigned to the pit of cynicism.

As the morphine for the masses is poured henchforth once again!!!!

[Stuart]

  this is bad news

i posted to facebook and myspace to try and help get word round. Hopefully Radio 4 will pick up on it.
Doubt this would make any normal channels radar unless a celeb was on board

[KLD]

You would hope (ever the optimist here) that at least there'll be some public control over the felling, through planning laws / local authorities? What I've seen of the Forestry Commision's methods of looking after the woodland is not that much better than what Mr. Big Cat will do. That said, if future governments were to wake up and suddenly learn how to manage woodland, then at least a central quango could be pushed into the right direction. Once the woodland is sold, it's gone. Period.

Another main concern, is about access. Access to open countryside is difficult in the UK in any case, compared to say Germay or Scandinavia. If the remaining small woodlands were to become privately owned, then you can bet it'll be no time at all before "Get off me land" shouts echo through the trees. We live near the small remains of the ancient Wychwoods. In my early years in England I went there for a walk, not really wanting to know about Public Footpaths and all. Boy, did that gamekeeper get angry when he caught us for the second time, having strayed off the one signposted path.

Anyway, how come the government even has the right to sell the woodlands? Who does it legally belong to?

Klaus

[martin]

Us! - from the Indie article

"Britain's forests and seas do not belong to David Cameron. They belong to us. As Bill Hobman, the former chairman of Forest of Dean District Council, says: "Mr Cameron should show us the deeds to the forest. How can they sell something they don't own?... This is a wonderful part of the world and shouldn't be auctioned off to the highest bidder to have their own little bit of heaven. We will fight this all the way." The fightback will be ferocious, and, like the inspiring fight against super-rich tax-dodgers, it unites people from the Tory shires with amazing left-wing activist groups like 38 Degrees.

This is a fight about what we value as a country. Do we want to preserve Britain's most beautiful places – forests and seas that were alive for our distant ancestors, and should be alive for our distant descendants – or do we want a few rich corporations to make a little bit more money from destroying them?"

[Ivan]

The outskirts of the forest of dean are just about visible from where I live. I was always under the impression that the forest of dean was common land (although I may be wrong). Certainly, there is an ancient right for farmers to graze their animals anywhere in the forest - which they do, and which might make it difficult to sell the land. There's also a right for people born in a triangle of land (unfortunately, very rare these days as there is no hospital within this triangle) to stake a mining claim anywhere within the forest of dean (these people are called 'freeminers') - another barrier to selling the land - I did suggest to Vicky that we should make sure that our children were born in this area of the forest to gain these exclusive rights, but she wasn't keen on the idea.

[docka]

Petition signed, agreed, this is a downright monstrosity. Yet another example of short sighted, capitalist greed swallowing up the few precious resources we have left in this land. When will the penny drop?
 

[martin]

Probably when a few survivors are perched atop a vast pile of broken "consumer goods" whilst the poison gas clouds swirl............ (because we were "worth it")