Save our forests

Yes, they are trying to sell everything, please sign and send a message.

Our campaign to Save Our Forests hit the headlines this weekend! First our petition and then an opinion poll - paid for by hundreds of 38 Degrees members - were reported on the Today programme and BBC 5 Live breakfast. Then a group including the Archbishop of Canterbury backed our campaign - making the front page of the Sunday Telegraph! [1]

Our pressure is starting to work. If we keep the petition growing, we can make the government think again.

If we can get the petition past 200,000 signatures this week it will prove to politicians and the media this campaign is getting even bigger. Together, we can to stop these plans - before it is too late and our forests are already being sold, fenced off, run down, cut down or built over.

Click here to add your name to the Save Our Forests petition: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/save-our-forests Our opinion poll proved that 84% of the public want our forests kept in public ownership for future generations. If enough of us get involved in this campaign, we can stop the government's privatisation plan.

At the moment our public forests are national treasures. They are beautiful places millions of us can visit for free. They have wheelchair and buggy accessible paths so that everyone can enjoy them and are precious habitats for woodland wildlife like the lesser spotted woodpecker and the song thrush. If they are privatised, all that could be in danger.

Thousands of us voted to launch this campaign. We've spread the word by forwarding emails and sharing news on Facebook and Twitter. We've put up posters in forests, car parks and cafes all over the country. We've got over 180,000 signatures on our petition. And now our campaign's in the news politicians will be paying attention.

Please add your name to the Save Our Forests petition, and help us get past 200,000 signatures this week: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/save-our-forests

good man. absolutely.

sorry, i meant ibsofuckinglutely.

Done

Nah, fuck 'em.

They'll do it anyway. Even a fuckwit of a politician would expect a move like this to be unpopular and as such are unlikely to be swayed by any petition, its just underlining what they already know.

Face facts, they dont give a fuck about you or your opinion right now they just want to make money on the pretext of balancing the books.

In four years time though, when all this is done, you can expect an admission that perhaps this policy, and the hundreds like it, was misguided and if you vote for us again we'll put the mistakes right.

Your best bet is to save up and buy the bastard trees yourself, just like the National Trust is being morally blackmailed into doing by these cunts.

ermmm...

Is there anywhere I can get the full story on this?

Its obviously a political hot potato, and one which, as presented by various lobbyists, I would disagree with, as would 90 something percent of the population.

But are they selling to responsible forest maintainers? who would make their money by cutting back at the same rate as growth? I dunno, someone fill me in.

I can't believe these things are being sold off to developers or whatever. There must be proposed legislation as well, protecting them. I'm curious to see who is likely to buy them, if that was the case.

confused.

This fucking Government increasingly just take the piss. Just how are the forests theirs(The Government)to sell in the first place for fucksake?

Burt Burterson wrote: I can't believe these things are being sold off to developers or whatever.

I think its unlikely that we'll see forests being decimated (although there could be the odd one that will quietly vanish) its more an issue of access. Someone buys a forest, puts in 75 chalets or whatever and then its a private leisure area so all you local people can just fuck off.

As I posted earlier an already over-stretched National Trust is looking at possibly acquiring a number of sites which begs the question "Why the fuck should they have to do that?".

English Forest Sell-off Q & A

U-turned.

they never intended to do this in the first place.

shazzer wrote: they never intended to do this in the first place.

looks to me like it wouldn't have raised any money in the first place, and would've been an unpopular move despite 99% of the public not really understanding what exactly the policy was.

The Q & A from the Guardian a couple of posts above answered most of my questions.

exactly - a u turn to make the govt look like they care/are listening to the people.

shazzer wrote: exactly - a u turn to make the govt look like they care/are listening to the people.

A bit of that, but I suspect its more down to the economics.

Burt Burterson wrote:

shazzer wrote: exactly - a u turn to make the govt look like they care/are listening to the people.

A bit of that, but I suspect its more down to the economics.

Hmmm, so why introduce the policy in the first place without looking at the economics?

why indeed

Nick King wrote:

Burt Burterson wrote:

shazzer wrote: exactly - a u turn to make the govt look like they care/are listening to the people.

A bit of that, but I suspect its more down to the economics.

Hmmm, so why introduce the policy in the first place without looking at the economics?

consultation is exactly that... policy is another thing.

Burt Burterson wrote:

would've been an unpopular move despite 99% of the public not really understanding what exactly the policy was.

Nice percentage Bertrood.Did you just pluck it out?