Barnet Green Party's 2010 election launch at Tally Ho Corner.

North Finchley is due to acquire a new Cultural Quarter, courtesy of the Mayor’s regeneration funding.

Barnet Green Party chair Andrew Newby had a letter published in the Barnet Times (26-1-12, p20), What About the Pollution? Here it is. Below that are Poppy’s reflections on the proposed plans.

What about the pollution?

The Mayor of London’s office has announced that North Finchley will receive a grant of more than £1m for a street makeover near the Arts Depot and at Tally Ho corner.

Let us hope the money is spent effectively.

When will Barnet Council or the Mayor of London find some money to do something about the unhealthy pollution levels in North Finchley?

The Tally Ho pollution monitor has recorded average annual Nitrogen Dioxide levels around 50 percent above the World Health Organisation recommended maximum every year since the monitor was installed in the 1990s. See the Barnet section on http://www.londonair.org.uk/.

Nitrogen Dioxide, emitted mostly by motor vehicles, can itself damage your lungs and can combine with other substances to form other pollutants.

Specialists tell me that taking action to reduce Nitrogen Dioxide at Tally Ho would require a political decision to fund a project.

Barnet Green Party has campaigned on this issue for several years but unfortunately, neither Mayor of London Boris Johnson nor Barnet Council’s Conservative administration seem much bothered about pollution, in North Finchley or anywhere else.

I hope the people who go to see the promised ‘public art displays’ at the Arts Depot are not affected by the fumes they will be inhaling.

Not that there are likely to be many such people, unless Barnet Council sorts out its car parks policy.

Ironically, the freshest air in North Finchley at the moment is probably right in the middle of Lodge Lane car park. At midday on Saturday, a time when the car park would once have been jam-packed, the windswept rows of empty parking spaces provided forlorn evidence of the failure of Barnet Council’s switch to payment by mobile phone.

The council needs to revise its car parking policy urgently. Many suggestions have been made. One idea would be for Barnet to link in to the Oyster system so that users can just touch in and touch out of council car parks, being charged for the length of time their vehicle had been in the car park. Or Barnet could use one of the systems available which read a chip embedded in the vehicle.

Of course linking to Oyster or something other system would require an initially outlay but the council should quickly gets its money back from fuller car parks.

To go back to my initial point, if money can be found to pay for a “cultural quarter” in North Finchley why can’t any be found to try to reduce pollution or sort out Barnet’s car parking crisis?

What About Local Businesses?

The ArtsDepot is in a desolate wind tunnel

I welcome the overdue news that the area around the ArtsDepot in North Finchley is due to receive a facelift.
The Artsdepot towers in a shabby windswept urban desolation that does its best both to run over and blow away any brave soul who strays into its narrow orbit.

The borough recently announced that the Mayor of London has allotted over £1million to create a new Cultural Quarter around the Artsdepot, to include they say “new lighting, a space for public art installation and improved signage… [plus] improved pedestrian access, decluttering the high street as well as supporting local businesses to give the high street an uplift.”

I look forward to find out more about the plan: how is it proposed to undo the wind tunnel effect; to cut the heavy pollution in the area; and to make the quarter welcoming to local people. More realistically I want to know a lot more about the substance behind the promise to “support local businesses”.

I know culture quarters. I’ve seen them in regenerated areas such as London’s South Bank and Brunswick Square. They all feature the same uncheap eateries (whose names commemorate their Italian founder, or South American reptiles, or African long-necked ungulates, you know the ones I mean). Once opened, they might claim “local business” status. Lets not let that happen.

Listen Barnet, support genuinely local businesses that will give us a sense of community. You could start by bringing back the wonderful Quadruples and Lavender Lady, our local health food shops (we’re losing the Finchley Health Food Centre) that could perhaps expand into catering. Talk to Helen at Buzz Cafe and the industrious people at Ari about how to talk to the local businesses and what works for them. Keep out the big chains and keep your promise.

Green Party member Donald Lyven’s observations on the forum of 23 November:

I attended the Finchley Forum at Avenue House last Wednesday.  The problem with customers not using local shops due to pay and display machines being covered is getting very serious.  I heard testimony from shop keepers in Temple Fortune and East Finchley all saying they are losing business since there are fewer customers as people drive away when they see the covered parking machines and need a mobile phone and bank card to park.

I know it’s easy to mock and say people should walk or cycle to the shops instead, especially when you just want a loaf of bread or a pint of milk, however, these shops are losing ALL passing trade.  A case in point is me on Saturday.  I drove to Tally-Ho and parked in Lodge Lane car park.  As I have already registered my vehicle with the Westminster parking system, I went through the laborious procedure of entering 4 digits from my registered debit card, entering the location number, confirming which vehicle I wish to park, how long in minutes I want to park, then enter the three security digits on the back of the card!

I can now do this in 90 seconds!  However, I saw people drive in, look at the sign and drive away!  There were lots of other people standing around on their mobiles with credit cards in hand, and the carpark was eerily empty for the time of day!  As reported at the Forum, there were street parking places available in Finchley as
well as along the High Road.  Basically, those clued up to the system have never had it so good, being able to park in any shopping street!

Barnet Council refused to offer a Christmas parking amnesty to the shop owners, and the Parking Scratch Cards to be introduced from 5th Dec will be only £2 for one hour, and you can only buy a minimum of 4!  So that’s £8 to pay out before you can stop for that loaf of bread!

Anyway, I delivered three bags of stuff to the charity shop, visited my optician, went to the shoe shop for some slippers, and then popped into the newsagent, and yes, just for a pint of milk (to take to the allotment for my tea).  Had I been one of those who had no mobile, wasn’t or couldn’t register, I too may have driven to
Brent Cross instead!  Our local high streets are suffering big time, possibly leading to shops closing down; loss of business rates to the very council stupid enough to cause this current crazy situation.  And whose idea was all this?  Yep, Brian Coleman.  The anger at the Forum was evident.

Also, increased traffic speeds past schools due to mini roundabouts and humps being removed during resurfacing also caused a great amount of anger towards the council – another problem caused by yes you’ve guessed, Brian Coleman.

I trust Barnet Green Party will highlight these two severe current problems with which to criticise the current Tory Assembly member!

Dear Dollis Valley Greenwalk team

I am writing as a resident who walks and runs along Whetstone Stray and beyond (behind the school playing fields) most days of the year. I also write as the local Green Party candidate for the GLA elections next year.

I welcome the news that you plan:

• Improving Access – including signage, footpath work and entrances
• Improving/establishing biodiversity and natural habitat – creating wild flower meadows, grassland management and river enhancement works
• Improving/providing facilities and infrastructure – including litter bins, play &fitness equipment

As well as the £400,000 secured through the Mayor of London’s Help a London Park scheme for Dollis Valley Greenwalk, an additional £250,000 has been secured from TfL for cycle and footpath improvements and £30,000 from Walk London to improve signage.

You also intend “To encourage wildlife and biodiversity and improve safety, this will include:

• removal of scrub areas
• clearance at entrances
• localised new planting including native species
• retention of significant dead trees”

You do not mention in your website removing trees, which is what I discovered on the ground. I would welcome learning the reasons for the trees you propose to “replace”.
I would also welcome learning how they will be replaced – in the same locations? with indigenous, wildlife friendly or fruit bearing trees? (I note you write “including native species” – you do not say they will be preferred).
I would also welcome information on how these trees will be cared for, as I have sadly noticed as you have also no doubt, a propensity to vandalise saplings.
You will understand my regret at the potential loss of biomass and tree cover. I am seeking reassurance on these points.
You are also welcome to add me to your list when you invite comments, or plan consultations on these plans.

Yours sincerely
Poppy

HERE’S THE REPLY:

Dear Poppy

Thank you for your enquiry, the trees we intend to remove have been selected as we consider them to be in poor condition and are largely dead or dying.

We will be removing 6 of these dead/dying specimens and will replace them by planting a total of 12 trees in the corresponding vicinity, we will be planting Birch and Lime trees which will help boost biodiversity and attract wildlife.

I hope this news reassures you of our commitment to enhancing the local habitat, I have now added you to our mailing list as requested. Once gain thank you for your enquiry.

Regards

[name withheld as a courtesy]
Project Support Officer, Greenspaces
Environment, Planning and Regeneration
London Borough of Barnet, North London Business Park, Oakleigh Road South, London N11 1NP

The correspondence continues. Keep an eye on this site.

Jenny Jones and Poppy at Avenue House with their bicycles

AM Poppy, our London Assembly candidate for Barnet Camden, writes about the increasingly bad tempered standoff between local cyclists and pedestrians

It appears that conflict is escalating in an unlikely power struggle between Barnet cyclists and pedestrians.

Since the day a month to two ago when I was on a cycling tour hosted by the Barnet LCC along with Jenny Jones, our Green mayoral candidate, the debate has not gone away – and was resumed on my Twitter stream today.

On that day in August, we approached Windsor Open Space, dismounted and were being briefed about the debate over how to spend Boris’s thousands on improving the Dollis Valley Greenwalk when we encountered a dog walker. One of us hailed h

er in a neighbourly way and was repaid with a torrent of angry invective. We sought to mollify her but she was having none of it.

She left us with the curse ringing in our ears that now she’d met us she would lend only more energy to the campaign opposing cyclists along that stretch of the Dollis Valley.

Her tone is echoed in a lobbying e-mail from a constituent this week, who hurled intemperate contumely on cyclists in parks:
“Anyway if you met one or more cyclists coming towards you – you get out of their way or suffer abuse and threats. Cyclists NEVER get out of the way for pedestrians,” he raged.

On those occasions when I have been a cyclist (in summer only, I’m a fair weather cyclist) I have always dodged pedestrians, often on paths dedicated to cycling, so I know he’s wrong, but the volume of this conflict seems to have risen too high for anyone voice to be heard.

On Twitter this week the admirable Mrs Angry and Londonneur have been continuing the controversy over the wheeled-or-footed fate of the Dollis Valley Green Walk – and I’m thinking, who is winning here? Who do I imagine is looking at these exchanges and chuckling closed-jawed like a Barnet Muttley in an unseemly Wacky Races that he controls? Why, Barnet’s own transport supremo and our esteemed representative in the glassy City Hall, Brian.

In this battle, whom are we fighting if not ourselves? There are no cyclists who are not also pedestrians. This battle is absurd. If we don’t wish to play directly into Muttley’s dastardly hands this must stop!

Lets recognise that we all need to share this planet, which means yielding to the weaker and slower, and flying our bikes shouting “wheee” when the opportunity and the slope allow for it.

By all means put up a sign saying Pedestrian Priority Area in places if you must, but that should surely be the rule on all paths. Then we can attend to the real issues that threaten us – global warming, air pollution and the highest road traffic casualty figures of any London borough. Guess where our ire really needs to be directed?

Poppy (second right) and supporters campaign outside East Finchley Underground Station

Please sign our online petition for a 20 mph speed limit in Barnet, at:
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/20-mph-speed-limit-on-barnet-residential-streets.html

Barnet’s AM Poppy launched her campaign as Green candidate for Barnet and Camden Boroughs in next year’s London Assembly elections by cycling slowly up East Finchley High Road to highlight our campaign for a 20 mph speed limit on Barnet residential streets.

She was joined by around 10 other Greens and cycling enthusiasts and their protest attracted quite a crowd of onlookers.

Poppy said: “I know it’s provocative to cycle slowly up the road, but the challenges facing Barnet’s residents call for urgent, drastic action, including curbing traffic speed.

“Firstly, there’s Barnet’s tragic road casualty figures – the highest number of road deaths in London, and the second highest number of people suffering injury on our roads last year. (In 2010, nine people died and 1,520 were injured on Barnet’s road network, a rise of 8% on the previous year.)

“There is also our shameful air pollution. For example, the pollution monitor at Tally Ho (the only monitor in Finchley) has registered average annual Nitrogen Dioxide levels above the World Health Organisation recommended maximum ever since the monitor was installed in the 1990s.

“The dangers of bad air are consistently underplayed, and the mayor does everything he can to avoid paying the hefty fines that exceeding the levels carries, rather than everything to bring down the levels.

“In any case I want to see London become a more livable, affordable and happy city, and convert Barnet into a model borough for cycling and pollution reduction, not like it is now – London’s most deadly borough for road users of all kinds.”

Please sign our online petition for a 20 mph speed limit in Barnet, at:
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/20-mph-speed-limit-on-barnet-residential-streets.html

- The elections for the Mayor and London Assembly take place in May 2012.

- Jenny Jones has been selected as the Green Party candidate for Mayor.

- The London Assembly consists of 25 members – 14 elected from constituencies 11 elected from a Londonwide proportional list. The Greens have two members on the outgoing Assembly.

- POPPY BIO:

A communications professional with experience on three continents, Poppy went to school and lives in Barnet borough. A life-long campaigner for community, sustainability and fairness, Poppy chaired the committee that spearheaded the successful campaign to introduce anti-sex discrimination legislation in Hong Kong in the last days of the colonial government, and has served as a peace worker in Palestine and in the Philippines. She has stood in Barnet

as Green parliamentary candidate, and now co-chairs the party’s Regional Council. She can also be found jogging along Dollis Brook, cycling across Hampstead Heath, and people-watching with her family at Camden Lock.

Alexis Rowell with Maya de Souza (second left) and other Camden Green Party campaigners

If can help in the campaign contact Alexis at alexis.rowell@greenparty.org.uk

The Green Party has chosen former Liberal Democrat councillor and Camden Eco Champion, Alexis Rowell, as their candidate for the Highgate by-election on Thursday 15^th September.

The Green Party’s Maya de Souza topped the poll in Highgate ward in last year’s council elections and the Greens are going all out to get Alexis elected so that he can help Maya with the great work she does.

The by-election follows the resignation of a Labour councillor who was only elected last year.

Alexis was a leading Lib Dem councillor in Camden from 2006 to 2010, and is widely credited with having significantly raised the profile of environmental issues in the council and across the borough.

But, shortly after winning a national Sustainability Councillor of the Year award, he stood down at the May 2010 elections.

Alexis said: “I have been growing increasingly disillusioned with the Lib Dems since the party joined the coalition government. My principal reason for leaving was Chris Huhne’s support for nuclear power, but I have also been completely unimpressed with the coalition’s overall environmental record and appalled by what their policies and cuts are doing to the social fabric.”

In the past the Greens have held all three seats in Highgate.

Maya de Souza said: “We are delighted to have such an experienced and energetic candidate standing for us in Highgate. It is largely thanks to the work Alexis did last time he was a councillor that sustainability is such a key concern at Camden Council. But he’s also got a great track record as a ward councillor responding to residents’ concerns. His energy, enthusiasm and hard work will be a great asset to Highgate.”

The Chair of the Camden Green Party, Natalie Bennett, said: “At a time when the Conservatives and the Lib Dems are creating havoc nationally, and Camden Council’s Labour administration is closing libraries and playgroups, Alexis is a strong candidate for anyone who cares about the environment and progressive issues generally.”

The leader of the national Green Party, Caroline Lucas MP, said: “Alexis’s move from the Lib Dems to the Greens shows that it is the Greens who are leading the way on progressive and environmental politics in the UK. I encourage all Lib Dems to take a long hard look at what the coalition is doing and to ask themselves whether they really support what’s happening.”

Waste bins at a Whetstone home

Latest news: The number of ideas has reached 27 but we still want more. We’re sure there are dozens of possibilities.

There are so many different things wrong with the planned Pinkham Way waste treatment plant in Friern Barnet that the Green parties in the three boroughs involved have divided up the research responsibilities so that we can mount the strongest possible case against this awful proposal.

Barnet Green Party has take on the task of assembling suggestions and proposals for ways in which Barnet, Enfield and Haringey Councils could improve their recycling rates and thus reduce the need for their plan to  build a 300,000 tonnes a year MBT (mechanical bio-treatment) factory at Pinkham Way.

Please send your ideas and comments by e-mail to Andrew.Newby@barnetgreenparty.co.uk.

We plan to submit the ideas by the end of  July to the three councils and the North London Waste Authority, the seven-borough organisation which is behind the Pinkham Way project.

Here are the main suggestions we have collated so far:

Proposals for improved recycling, reduction and re-use of waste materials in Barnet, Enfield and Haringey boroughs:

1/ Councils should bring in incentives and/or penalties to encourage businesses to recycle. Business waste contributes up to half of the total and most boroughs have made little effort. Responsibilities for business waste are scheduled to transfer to councils from central government.

2/ Councils should start recycling all recyclable plastics, instead of just a small proportion, eg in Barnet plastic bottles only and in Enfield only plastic of grades 1 to 3.

3/ Improve the recycling arrangements for blocks of flats. Cities abroad don’t seem to have a problem with recycling from flats. Many cities in European countries have large bins at the entrance to blocks of flats with the recycling bin or bins right next to the ‘grey’ bin. Barnet and Haringey have failed to take public funding to encourage recycling at flats.

4/ Make businesses take back packaging, which would encourage them to use less packaging to start with.

5/ Provide more neighbourhood recycling centres, like Summers Lane in Barnet.

6/ Improve the recycling lorries so that crews are better able to take larger items, eg cardboard from large packages.

7/ Bring in reduced charges for small amounts of rubbish in the traditional bins, eg by putting a line in bins and lowering fees if the rubbish is below the line.

8/ Implement penalties or disincentives for putting large amounts of rubbish in the traditional bins. Even better than recycling is keeping your waste to a minimum in the first place.

9/ Empty traditional bins only once a fortnight instead of once a week. Councils which have tried this (often Tory ones aiming to save money) say that it does lead to increased recycling rates and to smaller volumes in traditional bins.

10/ Provide separate sealable recycling bins for food scraps, as it would appear many people don’t like putting food in with green garden etc waste.  Some councils in England already do this.  Barnet Council says a lot of food scraps still go into the general bins. If food bins were separate the big green bins could be collected less frequently.

11/ Encourage people to use kitchen bins with separate compartments so that different kinds of waste can be kept separate, making it easier to recycle all of the.

12/ Provide more recycling bins at bus stops, stations, in parks etc and set up a system to empty all public bins regularly. This would also help keep litter down.

13/ Encourage and promote schemes that re-use bottles, such as door-to-door milk delivery. Many people seem unaware that milk delivery to your door is still available.

14/ Reintroduce (ie reintroduce in Britain though they are still current elsewhere) deposits on glass and plastic bottles and jars to encourage people to take them back to the shop. Alternatively or additionally, shops and supermarkets could give loyalty points, charity tokens or ‘neighbourhood currency’ for returned bottles.

15/ Encourage more repair facilities so that items can be re-used instead of recycled or scrapped. Eg some English councils and many in other countries support repair shops for furniture, cycles, electrical and electronic equipment and many other items. Summers Lane, for instance, might be one suitable location.

16/ Encourage the teaching of repair skills so that people can provide repair services either as professionals or volunteers, whether in their own home, customers’ homes or in small workshops.

17/ Set up facilities for exchange of wood and construction materials so that craftspeople and builders can have easy access to reusable materials. This could also help avoid the needless destruction of old, traditional and attractive fittings.

18/ Amend planning and building regulations to encourage the re-use of old wood and construction materials.

19/ Allow controlled public removal of appropriate items from neighbourhood recycling centres, as happens in other countries.

20/ Allow people to help themselves from skips unless the skips are marked otherwise.

21/  Tell residents about recyling levels in their ward, street or lorry collection round. Create a competitive spirit by encouraging people to exceed past performance.

22/ Reward wards/neighbourhoods with high levels of recycling by discretionary spending, priority on other green initiatives or the issue of  ‘neighbourhood currency’ to spend with local businesses.

23/ Encourage people, including supervised children, to have garage or table sales outside their homes for unwanted items instead of throwing them away. Such events could develop community spirit by bringing neighbours together.

24/ Promote annual street ‘mini-markets’ at which people can buy, sell and exchange items among local people.

25/ As some other boroughs have done, nominate volunteers to be neighbourhood promoters of re-use and recycling, to explain recycling services to new residents and to encourage all residents to reduce, repair, re-use and recycle.

26/ Give official encouragement to charity shops, Freecycle and other services which enable goods to be re-used instead of thrown away.  Eg, with extra publicity such as website where people could look to see which local organisations will take the books, furniture or whatever items they no longer want.

27/ Develop and expand council schemes to encourage home composting. Eg: http://www.barnet.gov.uk/composters

More ideas please! I reckon we can get at least 50.  If you’ve sent an idea before that we’ve failed to include without saying why not please send it again.

Darren Johnson, Green member of the London Assembly, meets residents opposed to the Pinkham Way waste treatment plant

Join Barnet Green Party in opposing plans for a giant waste treatment plant to serve seven London boroughs, which they want to build at Pinkham Way on North Circular at the border of Barnet and Haringay.

For the full gory details see www.nlwa.gov.uk/ and www.nlwp.n

et. A full planning application is expected to be published soon by Haringey Council.  For further information or to give us your views write to Andrew.Newby@barnetgreenparty.co.uk.

Here are some of Barnet Green Party’s objections.

1/ Pinkham Way is the wrong site because it is in the middle of a densely populated area, and would therefore generate these problems:

a) The predicted 1,190 journeys a day to or from the site by heavy vehicles is far in excess of a reasonable level of traffic for people living in the area. On that reason alone, the plans need to be scrapped or substantially scaled down.
b) The site would greatly increase air pollution in the area, already at unacceptable levels because of traffic on the North Circular. Any waste treatment plant on the site should only be accepted if there are legally enforceable guarantees on maximum levels for fumes from vehicles using the site and emissions from the plant.
c) Odour. There are reports of people living near and up to two miles from other similar sites experiencing frequent spells of strong stenches from the site, even when the operators have pledged to produce no smell at all. The Pinkham Way plant plant would therefore be very likely to produce strong smells, based on available evidence.
d) Some people fear pollution of the groundwater.
e) The site is a wildlife haven.
f ) Visual impact. The MBT plant would be 46 metres high including the emissions chimney and would be an unsightly eyesore however they tried to disguise it.

2/ They should not be building an MBT plant of this size at Pinkham Way or anywhere else, for these reasons:

a) The councils involved should and could be recycling a lot bigger proportion of their rubbish. Many cities across Europe are recycling 80% and more of their waste and recycling ratios can be raised very quickly, in months rather than years, once municipalities put adequate systems in place. We say:
1/ Councils should bring in incentives and/or penalties to encourage businesses to recycle. Business waste contributes up to half of the total and most boroughs have made little effort.

2/ Councils should start recycling all recyclable plastics, instead of just a small proportion, eg in Barnet plastic bottles only.

3/ Improve the recycling arrangements for blocks of flats. Cities abroad don’t seem to have a problem with recycling from flats.

4/ Make businesses take back packaging, which would encourage them to use less packaging to start with.

5/ Provide more neighbourhood recycling centres.

6/ Improve the recycling lorries so that crews are better able to take larger items, eg cardboard from large packages.
b) If MBT plants are still needed once maximum recycling levels are achieved they should be on a much smaller scale in order to have less impact on surrounding areas. This was Ken Livingstone’s plan when he was Mayor of London.

Barnet Green member Elliot Folan at the Whetstone crossing reopening

Barnet Greens held a “definitely not official” ceremony after helping achieve the reopening of the “green man” pedestrian crossing at the dangerous corner where Totterid ge Lane meets Whetstone High Road.

Following objections by residents and a campaign spearheaded by local Barnet Green Party members, Barnet Council has reopened the crossing this week.

The Highways Department closed the much-used crossing several weeks ago, saying the number of pedestrians operating the “green man” facility was holding up the traffic.

“What noone could understand was why Barnet Council ever thought that was a sensible reason for closing the crossing, which is used by hundreds of people every day” said Andrew Newby, Barnet Green Party chairman and nearby resident.

“They should not put people’s lives at risk just for some notional reduction in traffic congestion. If there are too many cars on the road they should look at ways of reducing the number of cars.”

“I asked to see the road safety figures and the traffic statistics. They supplied the safety figures but not the traffic statistics and I believe that when they reviewed the statistics they realised they could not justify closing the crossing. I plan to submit a Freedom of Information request to get the facts.”

Barnet Greens will carry on campaigning for the reopening of the crossing on the opposite side, at the junction of High Road with Oakleigh Road North,  and we are also seeking appropriate zebra crossing surfaces at the junctions to alert unobservant drivers to fact that pedestrians might be in the roadway.

We will be stepping up our campaign for a 20 mph speed limit on all residential streets in the borough, now that the NHS has come out in favour of the limit. Several other boroughs have already adopted 20 mph limits but Barnet is taking its usual caveman attitude. To sign our petition click on “sign our petitions” icon on the home page.

Barnet's Zain Sardar (with 'Carbon Cuts not Job Cuts' poster) marches with other Young Greens

Barnet Greens were among a giant total of 400,000 people – the biggest protest since the invasion of Iraq – who marched through central London on March 26th to protest against the Con-Dem coalition’s proposed public spending cuts.

Gardi Vaswani, who headed the Barnet Greens delegation, said: “We met people from the Green Party across the country who had left at 4am to get there.

“We were saying that there is an alternative. If Trident was scrapped there would be 100 billion pounds which could be saved and invested in green jobs. There are many alternatives, we think.”

The Greens’ national leader, Caroline Lucas MP, said this week that the party is the only true opposition party in this country, as it is the only one calling for welfare cuts to be restored and the savings to be made elsewhere, for example by scrapping Britain’s futile nuclear missiles and withdrawing British troops from Afghanistan.

A few reminders about our viewpoint:

Are the cuts necessary? No, there is no indication that investors are worried about Britain’s debt in the way they are concerned about Greece or Ireland. Britain should instead be investing for the future, like Germany, France and the United States, where President Barack Obama has set aside 600 billion dollars to invest in developing new technologies, new industries and new jobs.

Wouldn’t it be good for Britain to reduce debt? Yes of course. The Greens have proposed more cuts that any other party but our cuts don’t include cutting welfare payments or starving health and education services. For instance, we would scrap plans for Britain to buy a new generation of nuclear missiles, saving up to 100 billion pounds in coming years. We would bring British troops back from Afghanistan immediately, saving 5 billion pounds a year – every missile fired by British forces costs 1 million pounds. etc etc