Selling our forests !!!!!

[wjlacey]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/co...s-plan-huge-sell-off-of-Britains-forests.html

please please stop this sign the petition, !!!

save our forests!!!
http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/save-our-forests#petition

 

[The Big Lebowski]

Do i need to get my credit card out to sign a petition... Surley a signature is all thats needed.

TBL.

 

[_scorpio_]

the life cycle of this thread will be:
outrage - riot planning - flaming - locked forum - everyone being british and doing nothing about any of it, even though everyone on here is probably shocked by the news, and the government will win again.

 

[telwebb]

Hopefully the life cycle of this thread will be its early merging with one or both of the other identical ones that have been running on here for the last couple of days

 

[wjlacey]

its free to sign the petition, hopefully this will get sorted. im willing to riot haha

 

[BunnyMazonas]

I'm pleased to say that recent developments are indicating this isnt going quite how the government had hoped...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/ea...ean/8097935/Dont-sell-our-woodland-walks.html

Local protests broke out. Business Secretary Vince Cable materialised from his wife's cottage in the New Forest to call for the area to be preserved as "a national resource". And, most embarrassing of all, the Welsh and Scottish administrations – who, under their devolved powers, are responsible for three quarters of the Forestry Commission's land – announced that they had no intention of privatising any, leaving only England's 258,000 hectares in play.

Officials have held talks with environmental bodies like the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds to try to persuade them to buy both woodlands and nature reserves, only to be told that they don't have much money and that – if they did – they would already be using it to buy land. In desperation, the Government has privately offered them to the organisations for free, only to be reminded that they cost money to run. The groups would be happy to accept the gifts if ministers paid for their upkeep, but that would rather defeat the object of the exercise.

 

[Retired Member southey]

Haha If thats correct then brilliant, BUT will it push the government to instead concider selling to out an out logging and development concerns, with very lax regulations for the maintanance of special sites?

 

[_scorpio_]

ooh, i will take some local ancient woodland for free if they are offering!!!

 

[crazydave]

wales and scotland have flatly refused to take part and I reckon some counties might be more inclined to find a way to say no going by the amount of land in the lakes, yorkshire and northumberland owned by the FC, in most cases its the only established woodland anywere.

I knew it was a big ww2 thing but didnt realise it was set up to provide wood to reinforce trench systems in france.

 

[StigOfTheDump]

What worries me is that high profile sites like The New Forest, Sherwood Forest et al will be saved as a sop to the environmentalists but that small unglamorous plots will be sold of and become someone's private property. I think it serves us well to have land turned over to a strategic timber reserve. I dont believe you can trust the private sector to plant with a view to the long term benefit of the nation. Its a shame we grew too much timber for pit props, but considering the energy crisis we will face in the next 20 years, we might be mining coal again soon anyway.

This policy is ideological i believe, masked as an austerity measure.
Its selling off the furniture to buy crack on a monumental scale.

 

[Big_bazza99]

..........I've just bought one!

 

[bushbarbie]

I'd like to see more of the ancient woodland protected - The forestry commision have done a great job of increasing forest use - especially, with mountainbiking. Personally, I think using managed renewable forest for things like this is a great win: win - but ancient woodlands should be protected.

B.