Training | 2009.07.02
Drax protesters plead climate cause
Climate change protesters accused of hijacking a power station coal train managed to mount a vigorous political defence of their actions in court yesterday during hours of cat-and-mouse negotiations with a judge.
In spite of repeated adjournments and warnings to stick to the facts of the ambush in June last year, the group of university lecturers, film-makers and others addressed a jury in Leeds on global warming, Arctic melt and the history of reforming Britain\'s laws.
Initially, the trial of 22 activists at Leeds crown court seemed doomed to a stalemate, with Judge Spencer insisting that he would cut short any attempt to justify the hijack by what he acknowledged were "genuine and deeply felt motives". He told the trial more than 20 times that the jury\'s only task was to decide whether the train, taking coal to Drax power station in North Yorkshire, had been illegally stopped.
Three times he interrupted Dr Paul Chatterton, lead speaker of the defendants, who are conducting their own case, to ask him politely "to come back to what happened on the train". But equally politely, Chatterton, a senior lecturer in geography at Leeds University, returned to the "deadly and urgent threat" posed to the planet by carbon emissions from Drax, the largest coal-fired power station in Europe.
The pattern continued all day, as the defendants succeeded in getting a wealth of evidence across to the seven women and five men on the jury. Judge Spencer allowed film-maker Beth Stratford, 26, to show the court pictures of her flooded home town, which had spurred her to join climate change campaigners. She revealed that the defence had lined up expert witnesses from the UN, Nasa and several universities, but these had been stood down because of a previous ruling that wider motive issues would not be admitted in evidence.
The defendants, aged between 21 and 43, have pleaded not guilty to obstructing a railway engine contrary to the Malicious Damage Act of 1861. The trial has heard that the train was stopped in a "well-planned and executed operation, which was also polite and orderly" by protesters dressed as railway staff waving red flags.
The ambush took place at a river bridge and allowed the group to clamber on board some of the 21 huge hoppers and shovel coal on to the track. The action disrupted local passenger and freight services for two days and cost £30,000 to clean up.
Richard Mansell QC, prosecuting, gave the court details yesterday of a wedding code used by the group in which the train was the bride, at whose approach the campaigners, nicknamed "priests" and "in-laws", moved into action.
The six defendants who gave evidence yesterday all agreed that they had taken part, and Chatterton, described in character references from his colleagues as "an outstanding scholar, citizen and role model for students", told the judge plainly: "I was on the train and I intended to stay on it for as long as possible."
Turning to the jury, he said: "I need to tell you the reasons for my involvement and what was going through my mind. In my studies at university, I had come to see the impact that pollution from Drax was having, both globally and locally.
"UN statistics show that the amount of carbon produced by Drax was responsible for 180 deaths a year. Every minute we were on that train, we were stopping carbon emissions."
In fact, Drax functioned uninterrupted during the 16-hour stand-off before police cut climbing bolts and locks attaching protesters to the train and bridge. But the hijack led to renewed interest in the climate change debate.
The case continues.
For more information, please visit
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/20[...]protesters-climate-change-jury
