Showing posts with label Suzanne Jeffery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Suzanne Jeffery. Show all posts

Tuesday 13 December 2016

Ken Montague: 'He made the seemingly impossible happen...and without fuss'



Tributes to Ken Montague from Campaign Against Climate Change

We are deeply saddened at the death of our friend and great climate campaigner and socialist, Ken Montague, who passed away last Friday.

Ken was secretary of the Campaign Against Climate Change trade union group and a member of CACC steering group for many years. During that time Ken played an invaluable role in developing the work of the trade union group and especially the One Million Climate jobs report and campaign.

Ken's work was unseen and often unsung but without it much of what the CACC trade union group have done in the last few years would not have happened. Ken's work allowed the trade union group to campaign increasingly effectively within the wider trade union movement, to develop a deeper understanding of the climate crisis, its relevance to the struggle of working people and to counter the false narrative that jobs and the environment are mutually exclusive.

Ken had so many skills that he put to use in the climate campaigning work which he prioritised in the final years of a lifetime of campaigning for a better world. Most especially Ken was a great organiser, he made the seemingly impossible happen and always without any great fuss.

One of his greatest feats was the organisation of the climate jobs caravan which involved organising two low emissions vehicles and the co-ordination of many, many people and events across the UK. The two week long event was hugely creative and successful. Arriving in towns and cities with a visible display of the campaign on the sides of the two vehicles, the tour was able to put the case for trade union campaigning on climate and for climate jobs in towns and cities across the country. It was a huge logistical operation, the bulk of the work carried humbly, as usual by Ken and was a testament to Ken's organisation, perseverance and equanimity.

Ken was also a great negotiator of situations and especially people. He had insight and empathy into individuals, their concerns and complexities. He used this regularly to great effect to help progress work in which there were conflicting views about how to take things forward. Ken didn't slide over differences of opinion but he always looked for ways through which encouraged understanding between people and more often than not a solution.

Such skills were last employed in one of Ken's last successful achievements before the news of his illness which was the organising of the first official fringe meeting for the CACC trade union group at this year’s TUC conference.

This time last year Ken was in Paris alongside 10,000s of climate activists from across the world, demonstrating for climate justice, despite a ban imposed by the French government. Many of us have wonderful memories of Ken from this time and the meetings and protests that he took part in. Coming out of Paris, Ken shared an optimism and determination, alongside others, about the growing climate movement and the necessity of an even more effective movement able to make connections and alliances in order to deliver the changes needed to tackle climate change.

It was as a result of the meetings and discussions that Ken had in Paris that he proposed to the CACC trade union groups the idea of a conference on climate change and refugees. Ken took the initial steps of setting this up, putting in place, despite as ever many logistical obstacles, the key organising group, speakers and venue in the months after his proposal. This important conference will take place next year on February 11th.

When Ken informed us only weeks ago that he was ill with cancer and his illness was terminal we all hoped that Ken would be able to be with us for this very important conference he had initiated. Unfortunately, Ken will not be there. But the conference should be and will be a huge testament to the work that Ken did and the immeasurable contribution Ken made to fighting for an equal, just and sustainable world.

We will all miss him greatly. He leaves an enormous gap which we will find hard to fill. We will miss his hard work, determination and positive outlook. We send our deepest condolences to Ken's family - his partner Janet and children Brendan, Kate and Alex, who have lost Ken far too young.

Suzanne Jeffery - Chair

On behalf of CACC steering group and CACC trade union group



Ken Montague died on Friday. When we heard the news, Nancy said, ‘How incredibly sad. He was so very nice.’

‘Yes’ I said, ‘He was nice. It’s incredibly sad.'

It stood out. Ken was nice because he was such a good man. He was kind. When people talked, he listened. He sympathised.

Another way he was good was in his dedication. He was a dogged, determined man, but not harsh. Ken was a trade unionist all his life. He was the secretary of Brent Trades Council during the Grunwick dispute, and secretary of his further education teachers branch for many years. He was a loyal member of the International Socialists, and then the Socialist Workers Party.

In his sixties Ken dedicated himself to climate activism. For the last several years he was secretary of the trade union group of the Campaign against Climate Change. It would be wrong to say Ken worked tirelessly, because he got tired. But he kept on working.

There was a thing that happened over and over at our meetings. We would be going through the agenda, generating jobs that needed doing. Then there would be a silence while none of us volunteered. Someone would suggest that Ken do it. Ken would nod. Someone else would say that we had already asked Ken to do too much, and other people would nod. But then another person would say, but Ken will actually do it. And heads would nod. Ken would say, I’ll do it, because he knew it needed doing. And also, he knew that actual human labour was what changed the world.

He did it because he cared. To listen to him talking about the planet, or socialism, or trade unionism, was to see someone putting his whole body, a whole world of emotion, into what he was saying. There was something about his shoulders, and the way he leaned forward. But he was never loud. Ken was passionate and gentle.

People said Ken was modest, but the word isn’t quite right. He was humble, really. He thought humble people should rule the earth. I think the way he saw it was, he was doing what he could. He held our one million climate jobs campaign together. He organised all our conferences. He talked to people. He put his heart into organising for a climate jobs presence at the Paris climate talks in 2015.
He never claimed credit, never pushed himself forward as a speaker. In fact he was shy about
speaking. But we started asking Ken to speak all round the country about climate jobs. I asked people how he was a speaker, and they said wonderful. Then I listened carefully as he spoke a few times. Ken was not showy. He was not loud, though everyone in the room could hear him. There were no rhetorical flourishes. What he did, I began to realise, was that he explained the situation we found ourselves in and what we had to do about it. And he explained it so clearly that everyone in the room could understand. I realised I was listening to an experienced, and very good, teacher.

I think that was at the core of Ken’s humility, his goodness and his dedication. Always it was for the other person. He wanted people to understand, so we could do something.

Ken was my friend, too, and I’m proud of that. After they found the cancer he died so much faster than anyone expected. Our thoughts are with his partner, Janet, and his children, Brendan, Kate and Alex.

Jonathan Neale

Friday 21 February 2014

Rise up against the Coalition on Climate Change and Fuel Poverty

Left to Right: Sophie Neuborg, Suzanne Jeffery, Martin Francis (Chair) Ruth London, Murad Qureshi
There were stirring calls for action on climate change and energy when Brent residents met together at an urgent meeting on 'Energy Crisis, Climate Crisis - What is the solution?' at Chalkhill Primary School, Wembley.

Suzanne Jeffery, from One Million Climate Jobs, said that the Coalition Government had been exposed by the recent floods. The recognition of the connection between extreme weather events and climate change revealed Cameron's dismissal of 'green crap' as particularly ill-timed. In fact the government had locked the country into rising emissions that accelerated climate change through the 'dash for gas' and fracking, and Osborn's collusion with the oil and energy industries in his budget statement. Deregulation of planning regulations and cuts to the Environment Agency had worsened the impact of the highest ever rainfall last month.

With scientists predicting devastating consequences of a failure to act, campaigners had to use this period of heightened awareness to press home the message that there is still, just, time to act. There needed to be investment in renewable energy and a massive programme of insulation and other green measures through the creation of one million climate change jobs. As well as contributing to reducing energy usage and thus carbon emissions, they would also boost the economy.

Ruth London, from Fuel Poverty Action, said that 'climate change is poverty' as people unable to heat their homes or cook their food because of the high costs of energy were impacted by cold and damp and resulting ill-health and strain on relationships. Education was affected when children did not have a comfortable place to do their homework.  Fossil energy is subsidised and renewables are actually cheaper. The London Pensioners' Association had recognised this when they had passed a resolution calling for safe, clean energy.

Government policy meant that Housing Associations were scrapping insulation schemes and that some attempts at market solutions to the problem had been abandoned.  She said that the probloems was built into the nature of the market where the primary purpose was acculumation. The market was the opposite of caring:: 'what's good for thje market has nothing to do with what's good for people'.

Sophie Neuborg of Friends of the Earth said that there was a major crisis with 7 million people paying over 10% of their income to keep their houses warm and this would be 9m by 2016. FoE believed that energy saving measures should be supported from general taxation rather than levies on fuel bills. More incentives were needed to persuade landlords to make their properties energy efficient and hypothecated carbon taxes needed. She called for a revolution in the way energy was produced through community production of renewable energy.

Link to FoE actions including petition on fracking HERE

Murad Qureshi, London Assembly Member and chair of its Environment Committee, spoke about the highest rainfall levelo for 250 years, record river flows and rising ground water levels. The Thames Barrier, which had saved London from major flooding, and built by the GLC, would not have been built in current times.

He called for work envisaged for the future on flood defences to be brought forward. The Thames should be seen as an extension of the sea into London to bring home the issue. River restoration was needed in terms of London's hidden culverted rivers to protect the 24,000 London homes at high risk of flooding and there needed to be a stop to the concreting over of gardens that had removed the equivalent of 18 Hyde Parks from the capital.* We have to learn with live with water through adaptation and mitigations. Surveys had shown that 80% of the population were concerned not with housing or transport but with the high costs of gas, electricity and water. 68% had reduced their energy consumption because of the cost and half a million were depednent on food backs.

Boris Johnson had failed to take on the energy companies with EDF failing to deliver on their Olympic promises. The Mayor's retrofitting scheme had failed to meet its target with only 99,000 properties tackled amongst the millions in London.

In the discussion that followed there were calls for mass demonstrations on climate change, re-nationalisation of the energy and water companies on a more participative and response model that previously, action against British Gas in particular, campaigns against pre-payment meters and how they make the poor pay more - including Can't Pay-Won't Pay, pickets of the BBC over their insistence on 'balancing' discussion over climate change giving equal time to the sceptics, demand new housing incorporates solar ppwer roof tiles, and the need to reach out to faith groups about the issue.

Videos of the event can be found here:


Introduction and Suzanne Jefferies http://youtu.be/MbzDUNHynxQ
Questions and discussion 1  http://youtu.be/qWBtR2xGn0Y
Questions and discussion 2  http://youtu.be/JlzAru-abnc

* I am disappointed that so much of the Quintain development around the Civic Centre and Wembley Stadium is hard landscaping with potted shrubs. We were promised new parks which I imagined would include grassed areas and flower beds - as well as children's play faciltities.. A question of maintenance costs?