In 1981, long before the internet, I was a student in Leeds. My mum, always a good letter-writer, sent me a newspaper cutting about the women who had set up a peace camp outside RAF Greenham Common. “On 5 September 1981 the Welsh group, ‘Women for Life on Earth’ arrived on Greenham Common, Berkshire, England. […]
Tag: Nuclear Weapons
Reflection on the horror of war – 75 years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Yesterday was ‘VJ Day’ or ‘Victory in Japan Day’. On 15 August 1945, 75 years ago, Japan surrendered to the Allied forces, including the UK. This was the end of the Second World War. But there is no victory in war. Human beings on all sides, whether they are soldiers or civilians, lose in war. […]
International webinar marks Global Days of Action on Military Spending
I was very excited to be invited to speak at an international webinar ‘Move the Nuclear Weapons (and Fossil Fuel) Money‘ on 21 April. The webinar was organised by Abolition 2000, Basel Peace Office, Move the Nuclear Weapons Money, Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament, and the World Future Council. Conscience worked with many of […]
Fear in the sunshine
This afternoon I did something apparently normal. I went out of the house into the beautiful March sunshine. The roads were peaceful. Not many people about. I walked round the edge of a nearby park. The grass was fresh and green. A few children on bikes and scooters with their parents. And yet this was […]
Part of me still frightened and frozen inside – after standing outside Faslane nuclear weapons base
A few weeks ago I went to Faslane in Scotland; to HM Naval Base Clyde where the submarines carrying UK nuclear weapons are based. I went as part of a group from the 15th International Conference on War Tax Resistance and Peace Tax Campaigns. The people in the group were from five countries. It was […]
Counting the UK nuclear weapons money
Tomorrow (Saturday 26 October) Conscience: Taxes For Peace Not War is holding an event outside the Ministry of Defence in London; ‘Count the money we spend on nuclear weapons – and divert it to saving our climate’. From 10.00 – 16.00 we will be physically counting the £5.2 billion the UK spends on nuclear weapons […]
Count the money we spend on nuclear weapons – and divert it to saving our climate
The National Audit Office forecast that the UK would spend £5.2 billion on its nuclear weapons programme in 2018-2019. It is almost impossible to imagine the horror that would be unleashed if just one of those nuclear weapons were ever used. £5.2 billion is such a huge amount of money it is difficult to visualise […]