[page 44]
Do the Greens
have the answer!
by Christine Morris
In the last few years working people have become increasingly aware of the wanton destruction of our environment.The Green Party and particularly Greenpeace have played a role in this heightened awareness. Forty-five per cent of those polled by The Independent (7 July 1989) said they would consider voting for the Green Party. But can the Green Party's policies resolve the problems now facing us?
Jonathan Porritt, Director of Friends of the Earth, sees the problem as rooted in 'industrialism.' Most of his analysis is based on 'minimising exploitation and domination by breaking down hierarchies', glossing over the fact that hierarchies exist to protect class interests.
For Marxists, the destruction of our environment is one of the greatest indictments not of 'industrialism' but of capitalism and its relentless search for profits at all costs. It is the anarchic nature of capitalism and the one-sided approach of production for profit, ignoring the needs of the majority of the population and the necessity of safeguarding the environment which makes it impossible for capitalists to deal effectively with pollution. One problem is replaced by another.
For example, the Clean Air Acts reduced the smog in industrial areas and especially in London in the 1960s. Yet, the decline of the infrasructure, especially the public transport system, combined with the concentration of development in the South East, have led to people breathing in toxic gases such as carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide which regularly exceed safety levels.
These pollution problems cannot be dealt with piecemeal. The Observer unwittingly identified the same obstacles as Marxists when it commented (3 July 88): 'Humanity will find it hard to adapt, particularly in a world fragmented by natjonal boundaries and competing interests.'
It is the particular degeneration of British
italism which leaves it at the top of every league in Europe for pollution and at the bottom of any league for doing anything about it. When a future recession hits the major capitalist countries and competition is sharper, corners will be cut and long term considerations forgotten in the search for immediate profits. It will not be a case of Britain coming up to the standards of the rest of Europe but workers in other EEC countries fighting not to be forced down to conditions in Britain.
The Tory government is determined to protect big business and safeguard profits. They have been prepared to lie and cover up scandals. They respond to pressure from public opinion and environmental groups by devising schemes which have simply lined the pockets of their rich friends.
The Wildlife and Countryside Act is completely based on the obscene policy of private ownership of land. The &l million compensation given to a North Kent farmer not to drain salt marshes for cereal production encouraged other landowners to threaten to destroy parts of their land, including national nature reserves. This pot of gold for landowners is costing taxpayers £42.8 million.
Section 2 of the Official Secrets Act and Section 28 of the Health and Safety at Work Act are used to conceal information about the content of food, asbestos shipping, nuclear waste, pesticide spraying and the location of factories storing dangerous, flammable or explosive chemicals. Often any information supplied is not independent but supplied by the vested interests of big business.
When Sir Douglas Black, President of the Royal College of Physicians and former DHSS chief scientist, confirmed that there was evidence of more cases of cancer around the Sellafield nuclear plant than the average, he failed to draw any link between this and the level of
The destruction of our environmer is an indictment of capitalism not 'industriali
MIR 043
[page 45]
440 Autu Ecok
MIR nn
An effective
policy on
the environment
means a struggle for
ownership of industry
radiation area.
Why? Because he had to rely on information provided by British Nuclear Fuels. They told Black that between 1952-1955 only 400 grams of uranium had been released, whereas the company now admits to 20 kilograms being discharged (Guardian 17 February 1986). In 1988 the Committee on Medical Aspects of Radiation in the environment reported that 'some features' of Sellafield contributed to an increase in childhood cancers, improving the prospects of relatives seeking compensation but not preventing the deaths of the children.
It is no wonder that in The Independent poll, 53% did not trust industrial companies at all and 39% did not trust them very much. Such secrecy is not in the interests of working class, either in the public or the private sector. We need the immediate repeal by the next Labour government of this legislation.
Capitalist bosses understand that a labour movement campaign on pollution would run up against their interests. The TGWU campaigned for the banning of 2,4,5-T, a pesticide containing dioxin. Dr. David Hessayon, retiring as chair of the British Agrochemicals Association responded: If we give way on 2,4,5-T, the unions will then go on to campaign against another chemical and then another. We are engaged in a power struggle for control over the industry which we can't afford to lose'
Chris Rose, an environmentalist who works with the TGWU on this campaign replied: Wrong. We are engaged in a power struggle to protect the health and safety of those in work on the land in whatever guise or who are in any way affected by the unregulated flow of dangerous chemicals into our environment, wild animals, local people, amateur gardeners, city dwellers using public parks or school playing fields.'
But it is David Hessayon who is right. To achieve a policy which protects all of those mentioned by Chris Rose requires a struggle for the control of industry. As long as industry remains in private hands, victories for workers in one country which result in the banning of some chemicals will lead only to the bosses stepping up exports to the Third World.
When DDT was officially banned in 1984 (although there are suspicions that it is still being used) exports jumped from 1,840 kilograms in 1980 to 125,503 kilograms in 1984. In the Third World at least 10,000 people die every year from occupational pesticide poisoning and 400,000 fall sick. The callousness of the bosses is expressed by an asbestos producer. When queried about the health of asbestos workers in India and Africa, he retorted: 'Our workers
don't live long enough to get cancer.'
But it is not just through dumping of dangerous
chemicals that the Third World is drawn into en-
vironmental disaster. The current boom has been fuelled by increased exploitation and transfer of resources from the Third World to the advanced industrialised countries. While individual capitalists might adjust to the new mood on the environment by slight improvements in their processes or products in order to cash in, the debt crisis and the policies pursued by the IMF and World Bank sets up a chain reaction of destruction on a massive scale.
Third World governments are encouraged to borrow money for prestige projects such as the Tucuri dam in Brazil costing $8bn and part of a massive project to tap the mineral resources of the area. The dam itself is a disaster. According to Susan George in her recent book* it has caused, 'the loss of silt and fertile soil downstream, the flooding of agricultural land and 540,000 acres of forest, the destruction of wild life and salinisation of soil?
Between 1979 and 1983 it is estimated that 400,000 to 450,000 people have been 'resettled' asa resultof World Bank approved hydro-electric projects. Electronorte, the government company in charge in Brazil, did not even clear the forest but left hardwood to rot, having first sprayed the forest cover with agent orange (a dioxin). A number of full drums were left on the forest floor when it was submerged. These drums could burst under pressure from water. The reservoir is the main water supply to Belem, the state capital of 1.2 million people.
The destruction of the environment, the suppression of the rights of workers, peasants, ethnic and tribal minorities, the pollution of our food and water and the extreme poverty of the masses of the Third World can all be traced back to one source - the capitalist system itself.
Yet Dr Robin Russell Jones, Chair of the Pollution Advisory Committee of Friends of the Earth, argues that in a letter to The Independent: 'Wedo not seek the overthrow of capitalism. We merely ask that all nations recognise the consequence of uncontrolled industrial activity'
But it is not 'nations' who take decisions and own industry, it is capitalists. Even if they were to recognise the consequences, their system is incapable of taking the necessary systematic planned action to eradicate the problem. A planned economy under workers' control and management would allow us to assess information, do research and marshal the resources of society.
It may be that we would decide to discontinue certain products, find replacements for others,
end built-in obsolescence and completely reor-
ganise the energy system with an emphasis on safety, efficient use and conservation. Only the
development of a socialist system can bring back into harmony the need to develop human society
and the need to preserve the world's rich resour-
ces of plant and animal life for the enjoyment of
future generations.