Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has renewed his call for a suspension of arms sales to Saudi Arabia. He told BBC Radio 4’s World at One recently that Britain should stop supplying arms which were being used in the war in Yemen. ‘I fully appreciate the size and enormity of the arms industry, and the need for working with industry to protect those jobs, in some cases by arms-conversion work, but above all we have to look at the consequences of a vast amount of arms sales to Saudi Arabia,’ he said.
London Arms Fair Protests
Over 100 peace activists were arrested during protests against the DSEI arms fair, 4-11 September, including Angie Zelter a high-profile Trident Ploughshares campaigner. Angie, who was part of the anti-nuclear themed protest on Wednesday, told journalists: ‘I said with my action that selling components of illegal weapons of mass destruction is not done in my name, she told journalists. ‘I consider that nuclear arms deals are part of an ongoing conspiracy to commit a war crime.’
DSEI, the Defence and Security Equipment International is the world’s largest arms fair which is held biennially at the ExCel Centre in London’s Docklands. Stop the Arms Fair network, which includes many peace movement groups, organised a week of protest again this year, with CND contingents from Yorkshire, Manchester and elsewhere taking part, as well as many from London CND.
Green Party MP Caroline Lucas, chair of Parliamentary CND, called the arms fair a ‘gross spectacle. Chris Cole, who runs Drone Wars UK website, took part in Tuesday’s No Faith in War protests, said: ‘It’s important sometimes to put your body on the line and to try to stop the normalcy of the arms trade.'
TUC Congress back Defence Diversification Agency
London CND welcomes the decision of the TUC Congress 2017 to lobby the Labour Party to set up a Shadow Defence Diversification Agency before the next general election, and work to develop a national industrial strategy which includes the possibility of arms conversion.
The Unite union’s support for the motion is particularly welcome, but the GMB opposed it. CND general secretary, Kate Hudson welcomed the news. ‘Jobs are often presented as an argument in favour of Trident replacement, so it's essential that there is a plan to secure alternative high-skilled jobs and to create many more jobs.’
Motion 17, Defence, jobs and diversification, from the Artists Union England, recalled the ground-breaking plan for alternative, socially useful work pioneered by the Lucas Aerospace workers in 1976. It highlighted ‘a convergence of crises – militarism and nuclear weapons, climate chaos, and the destruction of jobs by automation’, but acknowledged that defence workers ‘are rightly concerned about the potential loss of jobs, for example if Trident replacement is cancelled’. Read the text in full