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December 4, 2024

Ukraine – step back from the brink

We are deeply concerned about the dangerous escalation in Ukraine. The conflict has killed hundreds of thousands of people, and has brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

CND condemns the Russian military aggression against Ukraine. There is no justification for war and we must stand against the escalating threats of the conflict turning nuclear. Real global security means a commitment towards peace, dialogue and disarmament. It also means putting pressure on politicians to prioritise the real threats to the way we live – including economic hardship and the environmental catastrophe.

The threat of an all-out military confrontation between NATO and Russia must be stopped. Between them, NATO and Russia have around 12,000 nuclear weapons – some 100 times the power of the Hiroshima bomb. Even one nuclear warhead could kill and injure over a million people.

Instead of escalating the war, by allowing the use of powerfully destructive long-range, Storm Shadow missiles, we urge the British government to instead get all parties to the negotiating table, secure a peaceful settlement to the conflict and call a halt to NATO expansion.

War and military aggression will not resolve these complex problems, and it might end with the destruction of humanity. Only dialogue and openness to the concerns of others will make a difference. This is where government efforts must be focused.
Join CND’s calls for an end to conflict in Ukraine and an end to the threat of nuclear war.

Actions you can take
• Share the graphic on social media.
• Download the poster and put it up in your window.
• Lobby your MP demanding the government stop escalating the conflict and help secure a peaceful, negotiated settlement
• Get in touch with your local group or region and help organise local protests, public meetings, street stalls and leafletting sessions.

June 14, 2023

Disinvesting in Nuclear Weapons Manufacture

The West Midlands Pension Fund Committee last met on Wednesday 25 September 2024 and the minutes are now available. It is now possible to download the agenda and papers relating to the next meeting on 11 December. Minutes and webcasts of previous meetings are also available.

The Committee is made up of councillors from each local authority in the West Midlands Metropolitan area. Their next meeting will be on 11 December – please write to your delegate and ask them to consider disinvestment from nuclear weapons manufacture – they have a leaflet about responsible investment. Here is the text of an email I sent on 4 Dectember to Councillor Mary Locke, the Birmingham delegate – it refers to the ICAN week of action. Feel free to copy or amend as you wish. Here’s a list of the committee members. Wolverhampton members are at the top – scroll down for members from other WM councils.

Dear Councillor Locke

I am writing to you in your capacity as the City of Birmingham’s delegate to the committee of the West Midlands Pension Fund, which has its next meeting on Wednesday 11 December. Item 5 on the agenda refers to a report on Responsible Investment Activities, which contains negotiations regarding climate change, resource efficiency and social equality. Clearly the Fund is concerned that its investments are used in a socially responsible manner, but weapons and particularly nuclear weapons are not mentioned, even though the use of weapons contributes massively to the carbon footprint.

Nuclear weapons programmes divert public funds from health care, education, disaster relief and other vital services. The nuclear-armed countries spend more than $173,000 per minute on their nuclear bombs, over $90 billion each year. Meanwhile, the companies producing these weapons of mass destruction and their investors make billions in profit. Nuclear weapons affect all of us, so it’s up to all of us to push back against the absurd sums of money wasted on them.

One year of nuclear weapons spending could…..

Convert more than 16.5 million homes to solar power
Secure a year of clean water & sanitation for 1.2 billion people
Hire 1.5 million high school science teachers
Vaccinate 2 billion people against coronavirus
Pay for ⅓ of the costs for climate change adaptation in developing countries

I understand that the Pension Fund has investments in firms that make nuclear weapons or their components, including Lockheed Martin, BAE systems, General Dynamics and many others. Nuclear weapons could kill millions of people, and built up areas such as the West Midlands would be particular targets. It should be part of the responsibility of local councils to try and prevent nuclear bombs falling on the West Midlands. It is therefore important that the Pension Fund stops investing in nuclear weapons manufacturers.

I would be grateful if you could convey my views as a council tax payer in Birmingham and a beneficiary of the Pension Fund to the committee next Wednesday, and if possible report back to me on any discussion.

Yours sincerely
Pam Bishop

May 20, 2022

WM Nuclear Ban Communities

West Midlands CND is part of a movement to make UK towns and cities Nuclear Ban Communities. Working with your local politicians, your town or city council could soon join others who are already working towards a nuclear free world. Manchester, Leeds, Oxford and Norwich Councils have already passed resolutions supporting the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and calling on the UK Government to sign it – let’s get the West Midlands signed up too.

To get started, please contact your local councillor to explain that you would like them to sign a pledge of support for the Treaty. Councillors can sign by emailing pledgewm@gmail.com expressing their support, or by signing a copy of the pledge and returning it to the West Midlands CND office, 54 Allison Street, Digbeth, Birmingham B5 5TH – a list of those who have already responded is published on our website.

If you’re not sure what to say, there is a template at https://wmcnd.org.uk/write-to-your-local-representative which you may want to copy or amend. If you don’t know who your local councillor is, enter your postcode into https://www.writetothem.com to get their email address.

Let us all, as CND supporters in the West Midlands, take this first step. Please let us know when you have sent the email (or letter) and send us a copy of any reply. Our email address is wmcndoffice2@gmail.com

May 20, 2022

The Economics of Nuclear Power

Government spin doctors and the nuclear industry have been working overtime to repackage nuclear power as a green solution to climate change. They want to build new nuclear power stations, but they know we won’t want them if we know the reality – nuclear power is dirty and dangerous and not the answer to climate change.

Even if we doubled the amount of nuclear power in the UK there would only be an 8% reduction in greenhouse gases. Nuclear power is neither carbon emission free nor would new power stations come on stream for at least ten years.

The use of nuclear power threatens the environment and people’s health. No safe solution has yet been devised to store its carcinogenic toxic radioactive waste, some of which is dangerous for thousands of years. It also leaves us vulnerable to the possibility of nuclear accidents or even terrorist attack.

Embarking on the creation of a new generation of nuclear plants also sends the wrong message internationally, where building a nuclear reactor is a necessary step in the creation of a nuclear weapon. If we want any credibility in discouraging the proliferation of nuclear weapons, we cannot discourage others from building reactors whilst we construct many more of our own. An energy mix of renewable energy sources, cleaned up fossil fuels and energy efficiency measures – all of which are safe, effective and proven technologies – is available now.

Climate change is happening now. A new nuclear power station will take at least 10 years to build and longer to generate electricity. Wind farms can be up and running in less than a year.
It’s expensive. The nuclear industry is massively subsidised by the British public. Sizewell B, the UK’s most recent power station cost the taxpayer around £3.7billion just to install Decommissioning and cleaning up all of our current nuclear sites is costing more than £70 billion.
It’s not sustainable. The reserves of uranium ores used to generate nuclear power are going to run out. There is only 50 years worth of high uranium ores left in the world. There may be only 200 years left of all uranium ores including poor uranium ores which take more energy to mine and process and thus release more carbon emissions.
- Uranium mining kills. Uranium mining is the first step in the nuclear power cycle; it has taken the lives of many miners all over the world causing environmental contamination, cancers and nuclear waste.
- Nuclear accidents. The risk of terrible nuclear accidents like Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and Windscale (Sellafield) will plague a new generation of power stations as it did the first. Read more about these accidents.
- A terrorist target. Nuclear power carries with it the risk of nuclear terrorism. In this age of uncertainty, dirty bombs and attacks on power stations are a terrifying threat.
- The proliferation of nuclear weapons is inextricably linked to nuclear power by a shared need for enriched uranium, and through the generation of plutonium as a by-product of spent nuclear fuel. The two industries have been linked since the very beginning and a nuclear weapons free world requires a non-nuclear energy policy.
We need a safe, genuinely sustainable, global and green solution to our energy needs. A combination of renewable energy sources and energy efficiency measures which are safe, effective and proven technologies are available now. The government must live up to its Kyoto agreements and invest in sustainable clean solutions to climate change.

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