TTIP Day of Action - April 2015

We held a stall in collaboration with Global Justice on Saturday 18th to raise awareness of and take action against TTIP. It went really well with over 300 signatures in 3 hours. Thank you François for organising this.

François has been attending TTIP meeting on behalf of the group. His first meeting was 2 weeks ago and he will carry on attending.and feeding back information to the group. It is hoped future actions will take place later in the year.

See https://www.foe.co.uk/page/ttip-secret-eu-us-trade-deal and http://www.globaljustice.org.uk/tags/ttip for more details.

Run on Sun Update April 2015

Kiran, Richard and Beatrice composed and sent a letter to Julie Dore asking about funding for schools to purchase solar panels.

Sun on Sun materials have been promoted on our stalls and Kiran and Richard went to the Yorkshire gathering to learn more about the campaign and future steps.

The last meeting was at the University of Sheffield's Students' Union reception on the 27th April.

Fracking Update - April 2015

It has been noticed that Frack Free Zone signs have gone up around Sheffield central.

Frack Free South Yorkshire (FFSY) will be at Rotherham show with Greenpeace in September.

A report found that 5000 lorries and 10,000 extra cars would be driving along the roads near Bawtry and Hatfield approximately 50 weeks before fracking.

Let Dave from FFSY know if you can help him leaflet on 9th May. Get in touch with us if you can help.

Stalls & Events Update - April 2015

Feedback was given on the recent TTIP stall and the Space for Cycling bike ride.

Beatrice ran a stall at the Environment Careers Day.

We decided not to run as stall at Sheffield Hallam University's Nutrition Fair as we decided it was too expensive and it was more about selling food than promoting sustainable food.

Sheffield Climate Alliance would like to share stalls with us in future. This will reduce the amount of money we need to pay for stalls and we'll have more volunteers on the stalls. We agreed to this in principle

The stalls sub group last met on the 28th April. Some action points were:

• John to find post box
• Hayley to donate plastic wallets for postcards
• Group to decide on which stalls to have and let Liddy know for booking
• Pop up posters would be useful. We need the content to be generic.

There will be a gazebo part at Richard's house on on Bank Holiday 4th May to practice putting up the new gazebo and arranging our stall.

Upcoming stalls & Events (See Diary tab for more details)

• Green Commission - Tuesday 21st April 6-7.30pm Stoddart Building.
• Bike to work day 15th May
• Sheffield food festival 23rd – 25th May
• Spring Garden Fayre Wortley Hall 25th May (John to find out: what is provided, what is the cost and what is required)
• Morning Star Conference 30th May (Richard to email more information)
• Garden Up 6-7th June (John to research)
• Green Build Roadshow SUFC 10th June
• Basecamp 12-14th June
• Peace in the Park by night 13th June
• Heeley Festival and Sharrow Festival (John to find out dates)
• Run on Sun day of action 21st June

Smithy Wood - Update April 2015

CRAG campaigners held a meeting last week as they are trying to get Smithy Wood made into a village green. The Inspector's summary is expected to be released shortly

As for the planning meeting for building a motorway service station, no official council meeting has been organised yet. David will update the group when more details are know.

Wellbeing Workshop

Is economic growth alone the route to a better life? Friends of the Earth think not – and work is under way to create an alternative.

Ask a group of people: “What are the key things which contribute to your wellbeing?” Money – or a livelihood – will be in there as an answer. But so will many other things, including education, health, green space, leisure time and community. By establishing the components of wellbeing, we can start to guide policies towards improving wellbeing – not just increasing GDP (Gross Domestic Product).

Friends of the Earth are working in partnership with the Network of Wellbeing (NOW) to develop local participative wellbeing workshops in communities around the country. The outcomes from these discussions will be used to campaign locally for action to improve wellbeing.

Hayley and John from Sheffield Friends of the Earth will be attending the Well Being workshop in London later in April. They will feedback to the group in May.

For more details see:

https://www.foe.co.uk/page/wellbeing-it-s-about-people-planet

https://www.foe.co.uk/sites/default/files/downloads/wellbeing.pdf

Food Campaign

Several people in the group decide to launch a new food campaign. A sub group is to be formed with John, Hayley, Liddy and François.