Early yesterday residents of the Mainshill Solidarity Camp in South Lanarkshire stopped logging for the day by putting their bodies and ingenuity between machinery and the trees, rigging up a sky raft across a logging path used by heavy machinery to rip up unoccupied parts of the site.
In the past week Scottish Woodlands Ltd have been removing trees from the site of the camp. The clear felling is facilitating the creation of a new open cast coal mine on the site by Scottish Coal Ltd. Despite local outrage at the development plan and over 700 letters of objection sent to the council in protest, plans are going ahead to create what could become the 5th mine in this already heavily polluted area of Scotland.
But people from all over the world and all walks of life are determined to stop them! Residents of the Solidarity Camp suspended a sky raft above the access road with one person in it, effectively preventing the tree harvester from gaining access to part of the wood where felling was to resume. The blockade lasted for 8 hours, after which one arrest was made at 12:30pm.
Residents of the camp condemn the behavior of Scottish Woodlands Ltd in the last few weeks, who have endangered peoples’ lives by working dangerously close to tree houses and continuing work despite being within a distance deemed inappropriate by health and safety standards.
Despite dangerous conditions and worsening weather, campers remain determined to continue fighting against the injustice of this development and to stand in solidarity with the local residents of Douglas who have been ignored at every level of the planning system.
As one inhabitant of Mainshill camp site stated ”We will not allow work to continue on the Mainshill site as long as we are here. Plans for this new open cast coal mine are a blatant case of putting profit before the health of Douglas Valley residents and environmental concerns, in particular climate change.”
The camp needs YOUR support today. Go to http://coalactionscotland.noflag.org.uk/ for information on what help is needed, and how to get to the site.
No more mines in the Douglas valley! No New Coal!