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Magazine Issue 3 - Spring 1997
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| Babylonian Times Alvis under fire for selling tanks to Indonesia Protesters from Amnesty and CAAT' challenged directors of Alvis for continuing sales to the genocidal regime of Indonesia. Coventry based Alvis secured an £80m deal and passed the ethics buck to the government. Chairman Nicholas Prcst said "We rely on the Governments licencing procedure." The government sent a letter to CAAT confirming that british armoured vehicles were used to quell to the Ujung Pandang demonstrations last april where at least three students were killed. Look out for the Alvis AGM this spring. Guardian pl 7, 21-1-97. Arms Dealers Slip Through Legal Loophole Tsle of Man based arms company Mil-Tec were able to break the IJN embargo on arms sales to Rwanda because of an' oversight'' on the part of the Home Office. Mil-Tec supplied £3m worth of guns, mortars, grenades and ammunition to the Hutu militia between April and July '94. During this time a million Tutsis were butchered in the bloody civi; war. Mil-Tec. it transpires, cannot be prosecuted for the violation as the Home Office'~forgot" to incorporate the UN embargo into Isle of Man law. Gosh, how absent- minded! Indepedent 27-11-96 Anarchist Economist Lays Siege to Camelot Karl Claxloil is a man with a miSSioD: to bring down the NaiioPal Lottery. l~ve found a technical k~ophole in the system. a sli, htly cheeky catch~ but instead of uxing that to make money for myself, I'm going to bring down a hypocritical and totally unfair institution,' said the York University lecturer. "Consumers often fail to behave in the rational way that economists woulcl like them to. People know they have almost no chance of winning the jackpot... But according to Regret Theory, what motivates them is the potential regret,'' he thoughl7 so why not take out an insurance policy against the unlikely event of your numbers coming up in the draw. With the lower overheads of an insurance company a jackpot-only policy could be set up for as little as 20p per week. thus massively undercutting Camelot. Whilst no one is allowed to take bets on the outcome of the draw. which would constitute an illegal 'shadow lottery'. so far Qflot has been unable to fincl fault with the insurance scheme. and Claxton's idea has generated some interest with potential backers. Tt is known that he has spoken to several Lloyd's brokers including Alexander & Alexander. Mr Claxton who counts himself a lottery addict is motivated by sheer hatred for what he sees as the most regressive tax in existence - They didn't get away with the poll tax. but in its place they ve managed to sneal: in something worse. Poorer people spend a terrifying proportion of their income on L.ottery ticl~ets. Indepndent ~17~-11-96 Holy Burning Beefsteaks Batman! Generously putting its reputation on the line for the government's sake. Powergen has apparently been experimenting with BSE-cull cow carcasses as fuel in a test rig at its Ratcliffe station. If results are favourab]e they could end up with hundreds of thousands of cattle to burn in their power stations. Ilowever pollution controls may be bypassed in the effort to eradicate the embarrassing mountain of bovine bodies now piling up at a rate of 50.000 per week. say Rechem. the only large incinerator operator with a licence to burn cows. There is a further problem that power station furnaces (or indeed any I<ind of furnace at all) may not be able to destroy the prions (rogue proteins) thought to be responsible for BSE. Other disposal options include microwaving. chemical an:l microbiological treatments of the bodies. Protesting gineering 11-11-96 City Financiers Look to Future Tuesday week is a long term proposition for many city types. It must then have come as something of a shock Iyou can't shock someone with sand in their ears! -Ed.1 for financial research group Delphi to remind them of really long term issues like global warming. In a new report. Delphi su`~gests that investors neecl to take notice not only because of the overall impact of climate changes. but also because the impact will vary substantially from re_ion to region. ancl therefore from company to company. Southern Water N~ ill suffer n~ost. while Northumbrian `sill be least hit. promoting the North-east region to use safe water supply as an attraction for companies ith large water requirements. Thev suggested that global warming could have even further-reaching implications than that. Globb!'' said the goldfish, and swam off to see if there was a reflection on che other side of the bowl. (Gardian -11-96) Better for Baby? Hrcast-lecding mothers in Ru~lcorn are calling l~or 1(-l to pay l'or tests on their hrcast ulill; because ol'fears of increasccl levels of dioxins I'rom new incinerators plannect for a rct'incry in the area 4010 people is~ the area work for the company. so one wouldn't usually expect a great deal of local protesl, but Runcorn mothers who have chosen to breast t'eed as it's better for their babies are very worriecl that this could pump their little ones full of this locally producecl industrial by-product that accumtnulates in fat. ICl ''Safety and Environment Manager''. Jim Hill. has been on the record saying that there will be no difference to people's health and they will only do any such tests if the Environment Agency tells them to. Same Environment Agency has recently produced a report supporting the planning application - so no tests then, presumably. BBC Radio 4 Texaco Gets Away With It (Again) The law suit broug.ht against Texaco for en_ironmental damage in Ecuador (see Cw2) has been thrown out by Judge Jed Rakoff. Amongst the reasons he gave w as the possibility of -an intemational political debacle''. The following week the Ecuadorian government and Petroecuador. who are also implicated in the clestruction of the large areas of Andean rainforest. hItervened to provide the plaintit'fs with formal support. in lodging an appeal. oniv for Rakoff to summarily dismiss the case aC7ain. Apparently the trial should be held in Ecuatlor not Arierica. So mucl1 for American justice. Reuters 27-11-90 Honour where honourts due ... A'I'his year's Ncw Ycar's I lonours l ist in~lutleil gotngs lor reprcscntatives of sonic of Corporatc Wa~cil's t'avourilc industries and governnient uepartn~ents.'l'lIcre were consolatiot, prizes for the boys.It the Departmcnt of'l'ransport after a dif'ficult year -Tercnce Rochester. chief highway engitIeer at the l-lighways i~gency and Philip Woo~l. director of Roads and l ocal 'I~ransport at the Dept of Tratisport. Oddly enough the list also included an OBE for Herbert Neville Naliapiet. Chief L:xecutive of the UK Detention Scrvices for his services h, engineerinr and thc construction inclustry ... what were those rumours about the constructiOTI industry welcominc the buiidin~ of uew prisons? /\wards to those with connections with nuclear power includecl an ()BE for Robert Nelson. the director of Dounreay nuclear power station for services to the nuclear industry (perhaps he sucgested closing it dowtl?) and a CB for Christopher Camplin Wilcock. former head of the Nuclear Power Privatisation Team at the department of Trade and Industry. There were also awards for services to the defence industry''for many. including Robert Clarke. Ttident Boat manager. VSE1.. Michael Goodman of Pulse Power Research AWE, Aldermaston. 1~/iaureen Ilart from Vickers Dcfence Systems L.td and Kevin Smith. the managing director of British Aerospace pie's business operations. Sickenly, the list also included awards fo women who had given service to the care of the victims of torture and the handicapped Indonesia. 31-12-96 Money for mine-makers In October. Terry Thotnas of the Cooperative Bank wrote to heads of other big banks asking them to sign a declaration that they would refuse loans to companies making anti-personnel mines. Other banks objected to this as a marketing gimick - presumably those who refusecl to sign were doing so because they didn't want to cooperate with a rival marketing campaigns ... One banker has recently been quoted as saying: "Getting us to sign a declaration that won't finance landmines is like asking somebody when he stopped beating his wife.'' Among the 90 banks that refused to sign were some, who threatened legal action if identified effectively, preventing the Coperative Bank from naming those who remain. 'Reuters '. General lands Hot Job General Sir Anthony Walker, former deputy chief of defence staff. has joined Mowlem, the contruction group. in the latest example of the revolvin~ door syndrome . Sir Anthony. said his MoD experience will obviously be helpfull' . Guardian 94-1-97. Sign of the times... Hard-up Authorities in north-east England are turning to big business to maintain street signs. The unfortunately named firm 'Bribex' has drawn up plans for sponsorship. Ford. Persil and Anchor Butter are among the many companies eager to get their names on every street corner in the land. Perhaps Nestle Plc Street is only a Bribe away 11-12-96 Disney Defies the Dragon Corporate Watch note.s with pleasure an example of a rare phenonenom - corporate integrity. Disney Corp. has come into conflict with the ('hinese governmerit over a n~ovic it is producing about the life of Tibet's exiled (,od-l;ing, the L)alai Lama.'Ille Chinese have taken a strong disliking to Martin Scorsese's film which they feel '~is intended to glorify the Dalai Lama', and is i~herefore '`an interference in China~s internal alfairs.' In spite of warnings that they are jeopardising future business opportunities in the People's Republic, a potentially lucrative market for Disney, the corporation has chosen to defy Beijing. They have issued assurances that the film will be produced and distributed. Reuters 28-11-96 Midlands & Barclays Bottom of Class Midland and Barclays have come bottotm in a survey on the ethical credenti.lls oF top corporate donors carried out hy l.thical (~onsuu~cr nia~.lzi'Ic. Both of the banks clociced up _i remar~.lhie 14 negative indicalors in llIe survey oi'the soci.ll .mcl environment.ll records of leacling donors J'hey were closely followed by NatWest Otl 12 negative points.'Iheir crimes are too numerous and clistasteful to list here. 13ut F.thical Consumer would be pleasecl to explain. PR Weekly-12-Y6 ICI, I say, I say The environment agency is prossecuting ICI for spilling 320 kg of ethylene dichloride. EDC is a dioxin forming organic solvent that brings fish out in boils. ICI have 9 previous convictions in this area and 172 unauthorized releases. The Gardian 22-1-97 |
