Rob Edwards

The Sunday Herald on the environment: doom, gloom and occasional rays of light

from the Sunday Herald, 2 September 2018

It wasn’t, perhaps, the most important environment story the Sunday Herald has ever run. But it was certainly one of the most read.

‘Virgin's wildlife orgy campaign labelled tasteless’ was the headline on 13 October 2007. It reported on a viral marketing campaign for Richard Branson’s Virgin Trains featuring a “sex party” video of pantomime animals “simulating vigorous and varied sex acts”.

There was a tenuous connection to climate change, suggesting that rising temperatures would make animals mate earlier and more often. But it’s real and somewhat tacky purpose was to boost Branson’s transport business.

Looking back over the Sunday Herald’s 19 years covering environmental issues, the story stands out as one of the few that might have raised a wry smile. Most have been depressing: polluted air and water, wiped out wildlife and wrecked environments.

We visited India in 2014 to report on the 30th anniversary of the horrific toxic gas disaster that killed more than 25,000 people in Bhopal. The same year we also reported from Japan on the 25,000 people who will never go home because of radioactive contamination from the Fukushima nuclear accident 2011.

We wrote about the persisting radioactive pollution of Scottish uplands from the Chernobyl nuclear accident in Ukraine in 1986. We revealed numerous blunders, leaks and accidents at Scotland’s nuclear power and weapons facilities, and helped expose some of the multiple follies of Trident.

Every year we charted the faecal contamination of Scotland’s prized bathing waters, measured the climate-disrupting carbon belching from power and petrochemical plants and named the companies worst at pollution control and the councils worst at waste recycling. We repeatedly listed the city streets so polluted with traffic fumes that they would damage your health.

Lindsay Riddoch 1993-2017

My daughter, Lindsay Riddoch, who took her own life on the eve of her 25th birthday, was an ardent and articulate advocate for better mental health services, a historian, poet, pub-quizzer and demon game-player.

She was a fiercely independent thinker and debater, intent on exposing injustice. If she saw something wrong, she would try and right it, and often talked about becoming a politician in later life. She laughed a lot, and was a loyal and loving friend to many. She threw herself into life.

Lindsay was born in Edinburgh on 1 January 1993. She made a major impact at Boroughmuir High School, doing work experience in the Scottish Parliament and with the Scottish Government. She was a diver, trampoliner and trombone player, winning awards.

Aged 16, she won a place at United World College of the Atlantic near Cardiff. She joined a youth delegation helping less developed countries at the global climate summit at Cancun, Mexico, in 2010. She launched a website to help teenagers with mental health problems, and persuaded the TV presenter, Stephen Fry, to help promote it on social media.

At the University of London’s School of African and Oriental Studies (SOAS), she studied history, specialising in Islam and the Middle East, and graduated with a first class honours degree. She also learnt Arabic, and was active in student politics.

She volunteered at London Nightline, a charity offering confidential support for students, and in the Westminster office of the Green MP, Caroline Lucas. Her first job was with the digital activist group, 38 Degrees, where she campaigned for MPs to be more accountable.

In 2015 she joined the NHS working with mental health service users in Camden, and then became a service development officer with the mental health charity, Rethink. Her career options seemed manifold.

In July 2016 she admitted herself to Highgate Mental Health Centre, later moving to Cornerstone House in Borehamwood. There she ended her long and hard struggle with serious but ill-understood mental health problems.

In her last two years, poems poured out of Lindsay, angry, dark, personal, political and funny, lucidly probing her demons and the world at large. She performed some at The Roundhouse in London and posted others online. She is sorely missed.

She is survived by her sister, Robyn, her mother, Fiona, the wider family, a host of good friends and me.

In memory of Lindsay, her family and friends have set up a fund, Words That Carry On, to raise £50,000 to research mental health issues. Donations can be made here.

Versions of this obituary were also published in The Guardian on 17 January 2018 and The Herald on 22 January 2018.

The future is The Ferret

comment, 5 May 2016

Many of the stories that I used to post here for free, I now post on The Ferret, a new investigative journalism co-operative with which I am involved. That means that after three free views, you have to subscribe for £3 a month in order to see more.

The Ferret is a much-needed bid to try and find a sustainable future for investigative journalism, which is suffering with the decline of newspapers. If you think, as I do, that Scotland needs a non-aligned, not-for-profit group of journalists dedicated to holding power to account, please consider subscribing.

Recent stories I have published on The Ferret include the revelation that the Scottish Information Commissioner was leant on by the Scottish Government, an exposé of a secretive Cairngorms land deal and the woman who has been charged with peeing at Donald Trump's golf links in Aberdeenshire. My Ferret colleagues have also run a series of important stories on the domestic abuse suffered by refugee women in the UK, Facebook cracking down on Kurdish content, universities' continued use of zero hours contracts and MSPs expenses.

You can find out more about the people running The Ferret, plus our history and founding statement here. You can get involved in The Ferret community, sharing information and opinions here. And you can subscribe here.

Row over Westminster bid to vet Holyrood human rights letters

from Sunday Herald, 28 February 2016

The Foreign Office in Westminster is demanding to vet Scottish Government dealings with other countries on human rights, according to correspondence seen by the Sunday Herald.

The UK foreign minister, James Duddridge, has asked the Scottish international development minister, Humza Yousaf, to clear all his letters to foreign governments before raising concerns about human rights infringements and other matters.

The move has infuriated Yousaf. “It beggars belief that the Tories – who are in the midst of scrapping the Human Rights Act – want to vet the Scottish Government’s letters raising human rights concerns abroad,” he said.

“I am proud of the SNP raising concerns about human rights without fear or favour – and certainly will take no lessons from the Tories on this,” he added.

“Whilst we are happy to share correspondence with Westminster, as we have done to date as a matter of courtesy, we certainly will not be asking or seeking permission before raising legitimate concerns about human rights.”

Anti-Trump campaigner threatened with violence

from Sunday Herald, 17 January 2016

Police in Scotland are investigating a threat of physical violence against a campaigner who is battling the American hard right in her bid to ban Donald Trump from the UK.

Suzanne Kelly, a 54-year-old New Yorker who has made her home in Aberdeen, has complained to Police Scotland about an email warning her not to leave the UK and suggesting that she could end up picking cotton.

Kelly started a petition calling on the UK government to bar Trump, the front-runner to be the Republican Party’s candidate for US president, from entering the UK. It has been signed by over 574,000 people, and is due to be debated by the UK parliament on 18 January.

Last week Kelly went on The O’Reilly Factor, a widely-watched Fox News talk show hosted by the tough-talking right-wing pundit, Bill O’Reilly. “He didn’t eviscerate me, which was good,” Kelly said.

“He’s a staunch conservative showman who got more than a bit of an aggressive twist to him. Clearly O’Reilly and Trump have a bit of bromance going on.”

For the four minutes she was on air Kelly was allowed to speak for just 1 minute and 15 seconds, with O’Reilly talking for the remaining 2 minutes 45 seconds. It looked like more of a harangue than an interview.

While insisting that he didn’t agree with all of Trump’s comments, O’Reilly highlighted problems allegedly caused by Mexican immigrants in the US and Muslim refugees in Europe. He said it was wrong of Kelly to accuse Trump of “hate speech” and try to have him banned.

Lomond park board member forced to resign over gold shares

from The National, 14 September 2015

Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park has been branded an “embarrassment to Scotland” after one of its leading members was forced to resign from the park board for failing to declare shares in a £200 million gold mining company.

Owen McKee, who bought shares for £12,000 in the Australian company Scotgold after it was given permission to dig for gold at Cononish near Tyndrum in the park, has triggered a by-election next month by standing down as an elected member of the board. He had previously sold his shares and resigned as vice-convener and chair of the planning committee, but remained a member of the board.

Our sister paper the Sunday Herald revealed in August that McKee breached the park’s code of conduct by failing to declare his shareholding at 15 meetings over more than two years. It has emerged that two days after the story appeared, he wrote a letter resigning from the park board “in the light of recent media coverage”.

Dave Morris, the former director of Ramblers Scotland, described McKee’s resignation as “inevitable” after the “cover-up” of his mistakes was exposed. “It is unlikely to be the last resignation as the board's reputation continues to spiral downwards,” he claimed.

“Our national parks were supposed to demonstrate best practice, but instead in Loch Lomond we have never-ending lessons in leadership failure. It is an embarrassment to Scotland.”

Wealthy lairds bid to block land reform

from Sunday Herald, 31 May 2015

Rich private landowners have come under heavy fire after a series of intemperate outbursts aimed at blocking Scottish Government’s plans to tackle huge inequalities in wealth by radically reforming land law.

Large sporting estates have blasted the proposed changes as “ideological”, “emotive” and likely to stir up “hate tactics based upon jealousy”. They have drawn comparisons with Zimbabwe, and said they “resent” interference from urban-dwellers “with little experience of the countryside” and “distorted views”. 

One landowner pronounced it “inconceivable” that private land should be required to deliver a public benefit, while another did not believe that land ownership “has to be in the public interest.” The government’s policy would only be acceptable if it deleted the idea of “building a fairer society in Scotland”, according to a major group of landowners.

Scottish ministers are proposing a major package of land reforms, including new powers for ministers to intervene, ending a tax break for sporting estates, and making ownership more transparent. Although about 70 per cent of the 1,269 responses to a recent public consultation were in favour, there were up to 50 private landowners who strongly objected. 

Ministers have promised to publish a land reform bill in the next few weeks, but there is little sign that they are going to cave in to landowner pressure. In recent speeches, the land reform minister, Dr Aileen McLeod, has stressed the need to reduce the unequal distribution of wealth.

Say hello to The Ferret nosing up the trousers of power

Comment, 28 May 2015

For the last two years a small group of us have been trying to figure out the future of investigative journalism. With a lot of help and hopefully a little inspiration, we have come up with The Ferret.

It's a new platform for fearless reporting beholden to no-one except its writers and readers. It will be a co-operative, it will be accountable, and it will be transparent. It will depend on crowdfunding and subscriptions not adverts - and it is promising to "nose up the trousers of power".

Yesterday we went public and invited people to say which of three proposed investigations - asylum seekers, NHS cuts and fracking - we should pursue first. If you want to take part, please go here. But, be warned, we will be asking for your money next.

We think investigative journalism is suffering. "The advertising revenues that have traditionally funded journalists to uncover scandals are being swept away in the whirlwind of the electronic information revolution – and nobody is quite sure what to do about it," says The Ferret's founding statement.

"We believe that something has to be done. In a democracy like ours few things are more important than a free, fair and independent media holding the powerful to account by discovering their secrets. Without serious, fact-based journalism in pursuit of the public interest and beholden to no-one, Scotland would be a smaller place."

The Ferret is not the only solution to the problem, but it could be a start. Our core team - Billy Briggs, Peter Geoghegan, Rachel Hamada, Alastair Tibbitt and me - all feel strongly that investigative journalism must not be allowed to wither and die in the hands of corporations. It is too important for that. Please join us.

Campaign to sack arms dealer from BBC Trust

from The Guardian, 24 April 2015

The head of a £16 billion defence company accused of arming dictatorships should be ousted from the governing body of the BBC, say campaigners.

Sir Roger Carr, chairman of Europe’s biggest arms dealer, BAE Systems, is due to start work as vice-chairman of the BBC Trust on 1 May. But a campaign has been launched to get him sacked because of fears that he could influence BBC coverage of the arms trade. 

A petition demanding his dismissal has been signed by more than 5,500 people, and is due to be handed in to BBC Broadcasting House in London on 30 April. “Arms industry executives have no place in public service broadcasting,” it says.

BAE Systems has sold weapons to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Libya, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, which have all been criticised for poor records on human rights. Saudi Arabia has reportedly used the company’s Eurofighters in recent attacks on Yemen.

“BAE Systems has made its money through arming dictatorships and human rights abusers around the world,” said Andrew Smith from Campaign Against Arms Trade, which is organising the petition.

Westminster seeks to gag tens of thousands of civil servants in Scotland

from Sunday Herald, 5 April 2015 

The First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, has rejected a bid by the Prime Minister, David Cameron, to prevent civil servants in Scotland from talking to the media without getting permission from ministers, the Sunday Herald can reveal.

But unions say that tens of thousands of people employed by UK government agencies north of the border will still be “gagged”. Pressure on Westminster to reverse its new curb on freedom of speech is now mounting.

On 16 March, the retiring Conservative Cabinet Secretary, Francis Maud, made a surprise change to the civil service code requiring nearly half a million government employees across the UK to “ensure you have ministerial authorisation for any contact with the media”.

The change was greeted with outrage by trade unions, scientists and human rights campaigners, who accused Maude of trying to intimidate civil servants into silence. According to the senior civil service union, the FDA, the move was “unnecessary, unworkable and unjustified”. 

Leading scientists also wrote to Maude warning that the new requirement could prevent thousands of publicly-funded experts from talking about a huge range of vital issues, including climate pollution, fracking, GM crops, pesticides, vaccines and infectious diseases.

Arms firm ends science festival sponsorship deal after protests

from Sunday Herald, 22 March 2015

One of the world’s biggest arms companies has pulled out of a major sponsorship deal with the Edinburgh International Science Festival following protests over “blood money”.

But Selex ES - accused of selling high-tech weapons and security systems to repressive and undemocratic regimes around the world - is still running one of the most popular children’s activities at the festival, which starts in two weeks.

Campaigners have hailed the sponsorship cancellation as a “victory”, but are now calling for the festival to cut all its ties with Selex ES. It is wrong for an educational event to have any association with a company that profits from war, they say.

Selex ES, which has a base at Crewe Toll in Edinburgh, is part of the £11 billion Italian corporate giant, Finmeccanica, one of the world’s top ten arms dealers. Selex ES describes itself as an “international leader in electronic and information technologies for defence systems”.

The company has sold military surveillance drones to Pakistan, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, weapons and missile electronics to the United Arab Emirates and weapons management systems to Malaysia and Thailand. It has also provided radar for drones to the Israeli defence electronics company, Elbit, and is helping to develop a flight training centre for the Israeli air force.

TTIP: the ugly acronym that mobilised a mass movement

from Sunday Herald, 01 February 2015

It’s not a pretty word, nor an easy idea to grasp. But it has inspired thousands from Scotland and elsewhere to get on their feet and protest. 

This week a trainload of protestors will be heading for Brussels to raise their voices against TTIP – the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership – which is beginning its crucial next round of negotiations. It’s a big business deal between the European Union and the United States that will determine how goods are traded across the world.

According to the protestors, it will do great harm. It will hand multinational corporations unprecedented powers to trash the environment, privatise public services and undermine democratic rights, they warn. 

TTIP will reduce barriers to free trade, which companies say will bring economic benefits. But the organisers of this week’s protest, Global Justice Now, formerly the World Development Movement, argue it will threaten people and the planet.

TTIP will make it easier for multinationals to sue governments, and could lead to environmental and safety standards being slashed, they say. It could be used to privatise the National Health Service, and will shift the balance of power in favour of the rich and against the poor, they argue. 

Occupational nursing: preventing illness, promoting health and reducing absence

from Hesamag, January 2015

Three workers in trouble

At the age of 45 Dipti feels her life is starting to fall apart. She is finding her job as a secretary increasingly difficult because her eyesight is deteriorating. She has type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and is overweight.

John (25) is having trouble coping with his work in a call centre. He is under pressure to meet performance targets, works long hours and gets stressed. He suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder, and is worried that he is going to have to take sick leave while he waits for an appointment for therapy. 

Tracy (32) is worried that her job is disabling her. She has worked in a small bakery for five years and has become allergic to flour dust, which has turned her into an asthmatic, wheezing and short of breath. She is trying to live with her symptoms.

Three workers who face debilitating occupational health problems: three workers who - given the right experience, expertise, and resources - can be helped. In different ways, they all illustrate the vital role that can be played by a UK profession that seems unmatched in most other European countries: occupational heath nursing.

The town and country divide: the fuel poverty suffered by old people in rural areas

from Sunday Herald, 01 June 2014

Up to three-quarters of elderly people living in rural areas of Scotland are suffering fuel poverty and are “falling through the cracks” in government policy, according to an expert report to be launched tomorrow.

Growing numbers of old people on the islands and in countryside regions are struggling to meet escalating bills for heating their homes. They are much worse off than old people in urban areas, with many having to cut back on food, transport and other essentials if they want to stay warm.

The risks to people’s health can be “catastrophic”, experts warn, leading to thousands of extra deaths every winter. Cold, damp homes can cause hypothermia, and make many illnesses worse, including arthritis, respiratory and circulatory conditions, they say.

A comprehensive new analysis by Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) also reveals a myriad of linked problems facing some rural areas. Young people are leaving, transport costs are high and affordable housing can be in short supply. 

The report by SRUC shows that nearly 60 per cent of the over-60s in rural areas are in fuel poverty, compared to 45 per cent in urban areas. “Rural households in which the highest income householder is aged 60 plus are more likely than not to be living in fuel poverty,” it concludes.

Science festival facing protests over arms company funding

from Sunday Herald, 23 March 2014

The Edinburgh International Science Festival has been accused of accepting “blood money” from a £3 billion arms company that sells weapons and security technologies to undemocratic and repressive regimes around the globe.

The festival, which opens in two weeks time, has the British and Italian defence giant, Selex ES, as one of its “major funding partners”. The company helps fund visits to a quarter of Scotland’s primary schools every year and sponsors a “rampaging chariots race” for robots, expected to attract 6,000 children at this year’s festival.

Selex ES also sells weapons and missile electronics to the United Arab Emirates, weapons management systems to Malaysia and Thailand, unmanned surveillance drones to Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Pakistan, and radar for use in Israeli drones. With a base in Edinburgh, it specialises in high technology electronics. 

One of its predecessor companies, Selex SI, was reported in 2009 to have agreed a £250 million deal for a border security system with the then dictator of Libya, Colonel Gadaffi. Selex ES, of which Selex SI is now part, is owned the major Italian firm, Finmeccanica, the world’s eighth largest arms company.

Scientists, politicians and campaigners against the arms industry say that it is wrong for a festival aimed at children to be backed by a company whose products “cause death and destruction around the world.” A petition has been launched and ‘disarm the science festival’ protests are being planned.

Complaint on BT aid for drone strikes rejected

for Sunday Herald, 23 February 2014 

The UK government has rejected a formal complaint against the British communications giant, BT, alleging that its technology was aiding lethal US drone strikes on Yemen and Somalia.

The human rights group, Reprieve, had complained that a $23 million contract between BT and the US government’s Defense Information Systems Agency had helped connect a US drone base in the East African republic of Djibouti to RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire, which serves as a major US communications base.

The group claimed that this breached guidelines on responsible business behaviour drawn up by the 34-country Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) because it enabled the drone strikes, which have been blamed for killing hundreds of people since 2002.

Scotland needs an Arctic policy after UK snub, say experts

from Sunday Herald, 02 February 2014

The Scottish government should develop its own policy on the Arctic after it was snubbed by Westminster, say experts and environmentalists.

Scottish ministers were not consulted by the UK government when it drew up its first strategy on conservation and development in the Arctic last year. Now they are coming under growing pressure to come up with their own. 

Tensions between the need to protect the polar region’s fragile environment and the demand to exploit its valuable resources are increasing as global warming melts the ice cap. Last week the UK oil giant, Shell, shelved controversial plans to drill in the Alaskan Arctic this summer.

The UK government produced its Arctic strategy in October after five years of consultation. It endorsed plans to exploit oil, gas and other minerals, but said there should be high environmental standards.

But now the strategy has come under fire for being “overly timid” so as not to offend other countries. In a paper published today by the Scottish Global Forum think tank, former British diplomat, Professor Alyson Bailes, highlights “weaknesses” in the UK approach.

Voting Yes will help the environment, says referendum campaign

from Sunday Herald, 06 October 2013

The campaign for a Yes vote in the independence referendum is this weekend launching its bid for Scotland’s green vote.

Giving the country more control over its land, sea and air will enable the development of better policies to protect and sustain the natural environment and to combat pollution, says Yes Scotland.

But this is disputed by Better Together, which is campaigning for a No vote in next year’s referendum. Breaking apart the UK will make it harder to tackle global environmental problems, it argues. 

The arguments have been prompted by a “referendum challenge” made by Scottish Environment Link, the umbrella body for more than 30 environment and conservation groups. It claims that getting reasoned responses from both sides on a major policy area is “a first” in the referendum campaign.

Yes Scotland’s submission was written by Stan Blackley, the campaign’s director of communities. A prominent activist with the Scottish Green Party, he has worked as an environmental campaigner for more than 20 years with The Woodland Trust, WWF Scotland, Scottish Wildlife Trust and Friends of the Earth Scotland.

Edinburgh University pulls funding from lethal drone firm

from The Guardian, 29 September 2013

A leading UK university is ending its £1.2 million investment in a defence company that makes components for lethal US drones because it says the business is not “socially responsible”.

The University of Edinburgh has bowed to pressure from students and campaign groups and is withdrawing all funding from Ultra Electronics. The company, headquartered at Greenford in Middlesex, makes navigation controls for the US fleet of Predator and Reaper unmanned aerial vehicles.

Armed with Hellfire missiles, they are sent on covert “targeted killing” missions against suspected terrorist cells in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. But according to the Bureau for Investigative Journalism at City University in London, over 430 strikes since 2002 have killed at least 428 civilians, of whom 173 were children.

Human rights lawyers argue that the attacks breach international law because they take place in countries with which the US is not at war. The strikes were declared to be war crimes by the Peshawar High Court in Pakistan in May, and are under investigation by the United Nations (UN).

Edinburgh University Students Association (EUSA), the student environmental group, People and Planet, and the human rights charity, Reprieve, launched a campaign for the university to disinvest in June. A response under freedom of information law from the university had revealed an investment of £ 1,244,672 in Ultra Electronics at the end of 2012.

BT facing questions from investors over links to drone strikes

from Sunday Herald, 25 August 2013

The British communications giant, BT, is being quizzed by major investors over its alleged links to covert US drone strikes blamed for killing hundreds of people in Yemen and Somalia.

The Sunday Herald revealed last month that BT was the subject of a formal complaint to the UK government by a human rights group, Reprieve. The complaint concerns a $23 million contract to provide fibre-optic cables connecting Camp Lemonnier, a US drone base in the East African republic of Djibouti, to RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire, which serves as a major US communications base.

Lemonnier is the main centre for US drone operations outside Afghanistan. It sends Predator and Reaper unmanned aerial vehicles armed with Hellfire missiles on “targeted killing” missions against suspected terrorist cells in Yemen and Somalia.

But Reprieve says that the attacks violate international law, and they are under investigation by the United Nations. According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism at City University in London, confirmed drone strikes in Yemen since 2002 have killed between 268 and 393 people, of whom 21-58 were civilians, and five were children.

BT’s initial response to the complaint was to say that it was “comfortable having the US government as a client”. But now it has come under pressure from its investors to justify its position.