Taken from the Sunday Tribune 30th Jan 2011

Diarmuid Doyle – Bertie is out of public sight but it’s never been more important to keep an eye on him….

Timely, because Ahern cannot yet be consigned to history. In fact, now that he will be out of public sight, it has never been more important to keep an eye on him. He remains a menace and a threat to Ireland’s prosperity through his significant, but little commented on, position as chairman of the International Forestry Fund.

So far, only the Sunday Tribune among the country’s newspapers has paid close attention to Ahern’s role in this private company. Independent TD Maureen O’Sullivan has asked a Dáil question and Sinn Féin’s Martin Ferris has thrown a few shapes about the former taoiseach’s latest gig. But, as with John O’Donoghue’s expenses a few years ago, it is taking the political classes a while to wake up to this issue.

Although the International Forestry Fund sounds like a vaguely cuddly group, which loves trees the way some of us love kittens, it is in fact a very profit-conscious joint venture between two private asset management companies, Helvetia Wealth and IFS Asset Managers Limited. It makes its money by acquiring existing forests on behalf of investors. As it says on its website, Helvetia has 1.1bn Swiss Francs (€867m) in assets “following a number of very successful acquisitions in the UK, Germany and Ireland”. IFS currently manages in excess of €100m of forestry assets on behalf of 18,000 private and corporate clients in this country.

In Ireland, most of our trees and forests belong to the state agency Coillte, which owns more than one million acres of land – about 7% of Irish land cover. In July last year, Colm McCarthy issued his An Bord Snip Nua report in which he suggested, among other ideas, that the government look at flogging Coillte as part of a mass sell-off of state assets.

This obviously piqued the interest of the cash-rich International Forestry Fund and five months later it announced that Bertie Ahern had been appointed as its chairman. “MrAhern implemented bold economic initiatives that included corporate tax incentives and education reform”, the Fund said at the time. “His efforts laid out a welcome mat for international corporations, making Ireland an attractive location for foreign companies”.

Indeed. Seven months after that, in July 2010, McCarthy was given a new job – to look in more depth at the idea of selling off the state assets he had mentioned in his 2009 report. One of the companies specifically targeted was Coillte.

By now, the International Forestry Fund, with Bertie Ahern firmly ensconced at the top, was salivating at the prospect of getting its hands on Coillte and the 7% of Ireland that comes with it. “We would certainly have an interest in that regard,” Paul Brosnan, the fund’s director, told this newspaper last year. “We have always had an interest in Coillte. It certainly would not be beyond the bounds of possibility that we would acquire it.”

Of the very many questions that arise from all of this, here are just some: why on earth would we sell 7% of Irish land to private investors? Why is a former taoiseach heading up a company registered in the Virgin Islands which wants to profit from more than one million acres of the country he used to run? How much is he getting for whatever advice or help he will be giving to help secure this grand sell-off? Does the Green Party have anything to say? Will Bertie Ahern make a statement on the issue?

Many of these questions would be irrelevant if Ahern was to resign from the International Forestry Fund or if the fund was to confirm that it had no interest whatsoever in Coillte, now, or in the future. Such outcomes seem unlikely, however. The former taoiseach and the company he chairs are apparently both driven by an insatiable greed for money. They are perfect bedfellows.

Demand for maximum income to cut gap between rich and poor emerges at Ireland’s first ‘citizens forum’.
A maximum income, a reformed tax system, and a minimum income threshold emerged as policy priorities at Ireland’s first ‘citizens forum’ in Dublin’s RDS today (Saturday). Over 1,100 participants also called for a stimulus package to maximise job creation in the social and green economy, and expressed overwhelming support for a radical new emphasis on economic security and social and environmental sustainability.

The event, which saw the launch of a new progressive civil society movement called Claiming Our Future, ranked equality, environmental sustainability and accountability among its core values.

“The huge endorsement of minimum and maximum incomes is very exciting because it’s totally doable regardless of whether we are in recession or not. This is an entirely deliverable demand to reduce the gap between rich and poor through a redistribution of income and wealth. Nobody can claim that it must wait for better economic times,” according to Mary Murphy, one of the MCs at Claiming Our Future.

Siobhan O’Donoghue of the Community Platform said today’s event was a huge success, which demonstrated a massive appetite for an alternative approach to economic, environmental and social policy in Ireland. “We brought together people from every county in Ireland and from a vast range of backgrounds and experience. The movement we launched today is going to grow in size and volume until the political system wakes up to demands for sustainable economic and social policies based on values of equality, accountability, solidarity and participation,” she said.

The organisers emphasised the high value placed by participants on environmental sustainability. “This shows that people understand the importance of the environment even though we’re in an economic crisis. I am really pleased to see that people are taking a long-term view because true sustainability is dependent of new and different social, economic and environmental policies,” according to Charles Stanley-Smith of An Taisce who was among the organisers.

ICTU deputy general secretary Sally-Ann Kinahan welcomed the endorsement of policies to stimulate the economy and create jobs. “We have to tackle the deficit but policy must also take account of need for jobs and sustainable economic activity. Three austerity budgets have already taken €13 billion out of the economy and the Government is talking about more than doubling that. But the economy isn’t reacting and many now believe the adjustment is too fast and too deep. It’s time to prioritise tackling unemployment, particularly youth unemployment which now stands at 30%,” she said.

Today’s event was massively oversubscribed with over 2,000 seeking to register for the 1,100 available places. Hundreds more have participated in local events and debates at www.claimingourfuture.ie and its associated social networking sites.

Uniquely in Ireland, the event used new software technology, which allowed participants to have an equal input into discussing and agreeing the values and priorities for this new civil society coalition. Innovative software enabled the 1,100 participants to follow the debate across the whole event and to identify, in real time, the emerging themes and final agreement. Hundreds more participated on line through social media and www.claimingourfuture.ie, where the event was streamed live.

Claiming Our Future was initially developed by Is Feidir Linn, the Community Platform, ICTU, the Environmental Pillar of social partnership, the TASC think tank and Social Justice Ireland. Registered participants in the event were from groups involved in community action (18%) voluntary services (11%) education, arts and culture (10%) conservation and environmentalism (12%) trade unions and workers’ rights (19%) urban and rural enterprise and economy (7%) politics (10%) global justice and development (7%) and faith beliefs and ethics (6%). (Note: These figures have been rounded).

Claiming Our Future is neither a political party nor an electoral initiative. It has no permanent staff and is sustained by volunteer effort and the contribution of time and volunteers from its supporting organisations. The 30th October event is financially supported by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust, Atlantic Philanthropies, the One Foundation and the Community Foundation for Ireland. Mandate trade union has given temporary office space and other trade unions are providing small financial contributions. The overall initiative is not dependent on any of the organisations that have allocated funds, time or expertise.

Sylvia Earle photo credit TED Tallks

Sylvia Earle’s TED Prize Wish

to highlight the ongoing destruction of the Tara Complex by the Irish Government. The Feis was

addressed by Pulitzer prize winner Paul Muldoon and Poet Laureate Seamus Heaney .

The event was organised in the open air of the Tara Churchyard and included the songs of

Susan Mc Keown and the harp of Laoise Kelly.

updated link
see report at Google Docs

KarmaTube [via Digg]

hello! spring is here… and the Shell AGM approaches in May. We have 6 shell shares to give away! You must be prepared to be an active shareholder!! (go along to the meetings either in London or Holland on Tuesday 20th May 2008)

http://www.shell.com/home/content/investor-en/shareholder/faq/rds_shareholder_faqs.html

You will have to give some personal details.

for contact see The Rossport Solidary Camp website.

The Nobel Prize in Literature 2007
“that epicist of the female experience, who with scepticism, fire and visionary power has subjected a divided civilisation to scrutiny”
Doris Lessing

The citation for the IPCC and Al Gore reads

The Nobel Peace Prize 2007
“for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change”
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Albert Arnold (Al) Gore Jr.

These links will be work returning to after December 10, when the Prizes are awarded and the Laureates’ speeches will be online.

The Nobel Prize in Literature 2007

Nobel Peace Prize 2007

She’s hosting the inaugural celebration of Spirituality at the Dun Laoghaire Festival of World Cultures, a festival that’s been running since 2002. Different world cultures have their own religions, right? So it’s a natural step.
This celebration will invite practising Sikhs, Muslims, Christians, Druids, Buddhists, and Shamans, to explore and explain their beliefs and how they relate to the earth, to Festival Visitors, with time in between for revellers and the plain curious or dedicated alike to take time out.

It’s on Saturday and Sunday afternoon, a free event at Newtownsmith Green.

This is what is says on the Festival of World Cultures Website

And this is Christine’s website where you can find a timetable, and a downloadable/printable poster, which boasts a photo by Ged Barrow.

This is where out-of-print and out-of-circulation Irish books are brought back into the world. Although our name is a pun, our intentions are serious.

Would that we both had more time to promote the site, but there has been some really nice feedback in the intererim, and none more so than from Rosemarie Rowley, who contributed her poetry collection The Sea of Affliction. She tells me she has been invited to conferences as a result of her book’s presence on ILR. Rosemarie, who has been an environmentalist for forty years, and was an eco-critic long before the term was invented, writes:

I suppose at the end of the day, none of us know what will happen to our work once we put it out there…
…I was honoured to be part of a literary conference last year in Austria which had as its theme “Water”. There is now a European Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment (EASCLE). It is only when you meet others working in the field that you become aware of the strength of your own work.

That’s one of the most gratifying things I’ve heard in a long time, and I’m delighted that ILR played some small role. As well as the Sea of Affliction on ILR, you can read some of her work on Representative Poetry Online.

Incidentally, we’re in the process of testing how Irish Literary Revival might work in WordPress. It would make everything that much easier. Watch this space.

Of the “pale blue dot” reproduced at Futility Closet (link below), he said

That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every ‘superstar,’ every ‘supreme leader,’ every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

Earth seen from 4 billion miles away, photographed by Voyager 1 on June 6, 1990

It seems extraordinary that the Irish police would baton-charge its own people to allow a multinational company to build a dangerous pipeline near residences, and on boggy, unstable land. The locals want the gas to be processed at sea – hence the Shell to Sea campaign. Five local men have already spent time in prison because of their oppostion to Shell. They are ordinary, decent men, who would have lived out their lives in peace but for this monstrosity on their doorstep.

RTÉ quotes Taoiseach Bertie Ahern as saying

the Government’s position is clear in relation to the Corrib gas situation – that the negotiating is over and ‘that is it’.

And what royalty can the Irish people expect for Shell’s exploitation of Irish gas? Why, dear reader, zero. Zilch. Nada. Dada. Rud ar bith. Not one red cent.

The field is estimated to be worth €50 billion. That’s right. Billion. Would it happen in any other democracy? The deal was set up by former energy minister Ray Burke, who has since been jailed for corruption, yet the consequences of this deal continue to blight the lives of the people of Rossport and Erris in North Mayo in scenes reminiscent of evictions of tenants by landlords 150 years ago, under British rule. Michael Davitt, the Mayo-born founder of the Land League, must be turning in his grave.

Ironically today, November 10th, is the eleventh anniversary of the execution of poet Ken Saro Wiwa who was hung along with seven of his human rights activist colleagues by the Nigerian government for standing up to oil interests in Nigeria, “especially the Anglo-Dutch group, Shell.”

By all means comment.

RTÉ Report
RTÉ Video Report (requires Real Audio)

Nigeria Hangs Human Rights Activists for oppostion to oil interests (BBC On This Day, 10 November 1995)
Ken Saro Wiwa Trust

Shell to Sea

Humanity slides into the red today and begins racking up an ecological overdraft driven by unsustainable exploitation of the world’s resources, according to a report by the sustainable development organisation Global Footprint Network.

In little more than nine months, humans have used up all that nature can replenish in one year, and for the rest of 2006 are destined to eat into the planet’s ecological capital, the study claims.

if the world adopted a US lifestyle, four extra planets would be needed.

Guardian Report

And then…
Al Gore’s Speech in NYU advocating replacement of income tax with carbon tax (text)

And then….
Country: Ireland

Population: 4,234,925
1000 tonnes of CO2 emitted every: 12.2 minutes
1 person dies every: 15.8 minutes
1 person born every: 8.6 minutes

Breathing Earth

[via Tree Hugger] which states: The Breathing Earth simulation shows “real time” CO2 emissions and births/deaths per country based on the most up-to-date data available (that’s what they claim). You can hover your mouse cursor over each country to see more detailed statistics.

“It was pure luck that there was not a meltdown. Since the electricity supply from the network didn’t work as it should have, it could have been a catastrophe.”

Needless to say, if the luck had not held, it would have been a serious matter for Northern Europe.

via Treehugger

By the way, today, August 6, is Hiroshima Day.

Nanotechwire.com

Nuclear power is against the law in Ireland, and they want to change that.

“The nuclear debate in Ireland has been more emotional than rational,” the group said.

Really?

Oscar Wilde described foxhunting as the unspeakable in pursuit of the inedible. Perhaps nuclear power could be described as the indefensible in pursuit of the uneconomical.

It wasn’t emotion that constructed the Chernobyl and Three Mile Island nuclear plants and it wasn’t emotion that led to both accidents.

As The Irish Times has recorded, the nuclear campaign group includes David Sowby, a doctor and fellow of the Society For Radiological Protection in the UK. He was a former scientific secretary to the International Commission on Radiological Protection between 1962 and 1985;
Philip W Walton, who worked at NUI Galway as Professor of Applied Physics from 1978, where he remained for 27 years, currently retied;
John Stafford, an accountant, business adviser and consultant;
Frank J Turvey, a former assistant chief executive of the Irish Radiological Protection Institute; and Jim Morrissey, who has 15 years’ experience in a nuclear research centre.

Read Ken Livingstone in the London Telegraph making an eminently rational argument against the British Government’s promotion of nuclear power.

Urgency needed on Nuclear Waste: BBC

And if you have half an hour to spare, watch the
BBC World’s report on the Chernobyl Disaster. Just to remind you that Chernobyl was a disaster in the most extreme and irremediable sense of the word, and that it is only luck which has prevented more such disasters.