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<h1><b>The Death of Monkton
Wyld..?</b></h1><a href="https://tlio.org.uk/the-death-of-monkton-wyld/">
30 December 2023</a> <a href="https://tlio.org.uk/author/tony/">Tony
Gosling</a>
<a href="https://tlio.org.uk/the-death-of-monkton-wyld/#respond">Leave a
comment</a>
<a href="https://tlio.org.uk/the-death-of-monkton-wyld/" eudora="autourl">
https://tlio.org.uk/the-death-of-monkton-wyld/<br>
</a><b>The Death of Monkton Wyld? 30th December 2023 – by
Linda Beamish<br>
<i>… It’s s if Four Headless Horsemen rode in on the back of Stephen
Williams in 2023 – and murdered the Charity and the Community that
ran it!<br>
</i></b>When 4 new trustees; <b>Laura Guest, Steven Slavin, Juliet Ann
Lovelace-Johnson and Richard Lovelace-Johnson</b>; took over their roles
in January 2023, they effectively killed the charity they took over.-
just as if it were a hostile corporate
takeover.<i> Like poison, the
Toxicity of The City spread through the green veins of the countryside
all the way to the rolling hills of Dorset, blackening the capillaries of
it’s host body as it did so, seemingly aiming to kill-off their own
hosts, the experts in Sustainable Living that provided the educational
and exemplary aims of the UK registered Charity. <b>[continues
below....]<br><br>
<br>
</i><h1><b>Offshore windfarm anyone? King Charles has acquired our
continental shelf, almost three times the UK’s land area<br>
</b></h1><h4><b>Subsidised offshore Windfarm Anyone? How The King Cashed
In On Our Seabed – a tale of Medieval power and private property
ownership… as UK poverty spirals out of control </b></h4>The
royal family has made millions from the exploitation of the seabeda
resource that belongs to us all. Is it time for people and planet to be
put ahead of profit?
<a href="https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/world/monarchy/62141/how-the-monarchy-cashes-in-on-our-seabed">
Prospect Magazine – By Guy Standing Jul23</a> <br>
<a href="https://tlio.org.uk/offshore-windfarm-anyone-king-charles-has-acquired-our-continental-shelf-almost-three-times-the-uks-land-area/" eudora="autourl">
https://tlio.org.uk/offshore-windfarm-anyone-king-charles-has-acquired-our-continental-shelf-almost-three-times-the-uks-land-area/<br>
<br>
</a>Ever since ancient Rome, the sea, seabed and seashore have been
accepted as part of the commonsres communes omniumbelonging to
everybody equally, and inalienable as state or private property. The
commons as a distinct form of property was taken forward in Magna Carta
and the Charter of the Forest of 1217, the twin bedrocks of common law
and all democracies.<br>
A commons depends on the “sovereign”in the UK’s case, the
monarchyacting as steward or trustee, with responsibility for preserving
it for generations to come. For more than 650 years, following a ruling
by King Edward I in 1299, the monarchy accepted this positive duty, known
as the Public Trust Doctrine.<br>
However, in the past 60 years, the monarchy has gradually plundered the
blue commonsthe seabed around the British Islestransforming it into
nothing less than a rentier capitalist empire. That empire, in the decade
since 2013, is thought to have earned the royal family in the region of
£193m. The new king, Charles III, who while heir to the throne
established a reputation as an environment protector, has inherited and
continues to profit from this system.<br>
The evolution began in 1961, two years after the discovery in Dutch
waters of large quantities of North Sea gas. The Crown Estate was
constituted by an act of parliament to manage the assets belonging to the
monarchy, with a mandate to maximise revenue and capital value for the
Treasury. As King, Charles is not involved in managing these assets; they
are not the monarch’s personal property but “the sovereign’s public
estate”, managed by the Crown Estate supposedly in the public
interest.<b> {continues below....}<br><br>
<br><br>
<br>
<h1><b>(continued....) The Death of Monkton Wyld..?</b></h1><b>If the UK
Charity Commission does not take any form of Legal action against the
four new trustees, and the instigator, following complaint, it must be
seen as duplicitous as a government body.<br><br>
</b>What’s happened at Monkton Wyld Court this year should not be allowed
to happen anywhere else to anyone else, and the world needs to learn from
this case now. (Change your foundation documents so that Trustees
do <u>NOT</u> Own The Land and Property.)<br><br>
On the 11th October, quote:<i> ‘Without any warning or consultation,
Trustees change the Charity’s Articles of Association on the Company
House website. They take the Articles of a London-based Community
Interest Company called Public Voice CIC, make a few small changes, and
paste it in to replace the previous Articles. Funnily enough, one of the
Directors of Public Voice is Laura Guest who is also the main Trustee
driving all the changes at Monkton Wyld Court. <br><br>
Among other things, there are changes to the objects of the Charity,
which for many years have been to promote education in sustainability and
to maintain the listed buildings. Now the Charity’s objects include the
promotion of “commerce, art, science, education, religion, charity or any
profession, and to promote any social, political or sporting activity and
anything incidental or conducive to the above objects”. Just about
anything in fact. There are also changes making it easier to pay Trustees
for their services and to sell off the charity to something other than
another charity. A complaint to the Charity Commission has been made by
former Trustees and community members.’</i> reference the Monkton Wyld
Court Case website linked above, which transparently carries continuing
updates.<br><br>
It is vital, now, that ALL communities and Intentional Communities,
EcoVillages, Coops and CoHousing Communities, everywhere, take note and
learn from this case – fast. (Please help to spread the
word.) Ensure that, where your community may have (new) trustees,
they have a genuine understanding of, and empathy to, your charitable
aims, and that – if they come from the corporate sector they have
understanding, experience, and/or training in environmental
sustainability, and aims of your community.<br><br>
If you have set up as a Workers Cooperative, please (please) do insure
that NO former members have any form of access to your online accounts,
if they do, they could also achieve the aims of the former member of the
workers coop that ran Monkton Wyld Court charity, that hacked into their
accounts and changed details to cast shadow on their good work.<br><br>
The corporate world should not be allowed to have anything to do with the
control of the non-profit Third Sector – let alone sustainable and
ecological communities like Monkton Wyld Court, particularly since it has
been the unsustainable and unethical practices of the Corporate sector,
that have created the need for the Third Sector guidelines for
environmental sustainability and sustainable community living projects
like this in the first place!<br><br>
People need to feel safe in living in communities, not be under constant
attack by people who haven’t even a thread of understanding of the aims
of sustainable communities they’ve never left The City to take a look at
– but taken the word of one man – against the democratic community
vote. (Living safely in communities is one of the planning
guidelines.)<br><br>
Lessons need to be learned – and not just in how to live sustainably –
but most especially now for communities, since several other well
established ecologically sustainable community living projects in the UK
have also been subject to similar or corporate takeover recently.
(We are all vulnerable, especially rurally and in isolation.)<br><br>
<b><i>The non-profit Third Sector has a whole mountain of additional
rules to adhere to, and targets to meet, that are completely alien and
opposite to those of the the corporate (capitalistic) Private Sector, and
even much of the Public Sector too now, since Councils boast of their new
Corporate bodies on the colourful covers of their glossy
journals.<br><br>
</i></b>It appears that we are at that point in time that has been
prophesied for millennia, (as well as that of the millennium prophecy of
2002)… But don’t worry, since: ‘The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth’
(Matthew 5:5).<br><br>
I<i>n short, some of us knew what was coming… Some of us didn’t, and some
of us didn’t want to know, or thought that they had the solution in place
already, and – like Monkton Wyld Court – were taken off-guard, and
without defence or the opportunity to defend themselves.<br><br>
<b>If any intentional community member is reading this now, please ensure
that it </i><u>is</u><i> possible for your community non-profit to
scrutinise any trustee applicants credentials, and if applicants come
directly from any other sector than the Third Sector, that they have
fully studied the full quota of rules, laws and guidance for the
governance of non-profits and coops stipulated by the United Nations,
government departmental guidelines, and more. If they haven’t, they
should not become trustees of a charity – nor be directors of a
non-profit.<br><br>
</i></b>According to the Law, nobody, in any sector, should ever take the
word of one person, and/or take action against a community of at least 15
witnesses – without first taking diligent notice of the statement of
every other person witness to, involved or accused, or looking at the
evidence – and most especially not when they have only just walked into
the position as trustee of a UK registered charity, as in this
case.<br><br>
From what I was able to ascertain speaking with friends at the
Resistance Festival at Monkton Wyld Court and the Valley Vibes Festival
in Devon held earlier this summer – including investigative journalist
Tony Gosling and other members of
<a href="http://www.tlio.org.uk/" eudora="autourl"><u>www.tlio.org.uk</a>
– action needs to be taken to support the rights of Simon Fairlie, Gill
Barron, Jasmine, Jon, Jarred, and all the other community members
affected. <br><br>
</u>As is the case with communities and intentional communities, this is
not just ‘a job’ it is a way of life – it is both home and environment –
in other words, the community has lost everything. The people have
lost everything,<br><br>
The pigs were gone by the time the Resistance Festival was held at the
end of August, and since then, the micro-dairy, which was one of
Britain’s oldest examples as taught at the Resistance Festival, the
Programme for which is shown right.<br><br>
<b><u>Because</u></b> the members of the intentional community followed
the law – they were sacked – and made homeless. And in fact, aged
72, sustainability and rural planning expert, author Simon Fairlie was
himself put into virtual house arrest as the new rules of the new
(ruling) trustees, governing his lack of access to any of the community
spaces or amenities, since the entire 11 acres where the community lives,
is, of course, both!<br><br>
According to the latest news from Monkton Wyld, Simon’s virtual house
arrest eventually spiralled into a police arrest, on a trumped up charge
of car theft by trustees. As shown in the photograph online, Simon,
co-author of The Land magazine, was forced into the back of a police van
– as if he were a criminal – and kept in custody for nine hours.
The trustees have also now forced Simon’s micro dairy to have no income
whatsoever, as they have initiated action with the authorities
prohibiting the sale of their wonderful range of organic raw dairy
products. <i> (It was amazing to hear how much could be made from so few
jersey cows at the festival. And the taste, <b><u>was</u></b> truly
scrumptious!)</i> What an unwarranted sad loss.<br><br>
Co-Author of The Land magazine Jill Barron, aged 73, was also sacked by
the trustees and forced to move out of the community, as was Jasmine the
Gardener, her partner Jon, Jarred and his partner, and more – and most of
the community have resigned in protest, alongside the only remaining
original trustee.<br><br>
On top of all that, somebody, somewhere, has also hacked into the workers
coop accounts – and altered them – changing evidence vital to their
case. (Another reminder for Intentional Communities: make sure that
accounts CANNOT be hacked into by anyone not currently a member of their
Workers Cooperative or Community.)<br><br>
There is now nobody with the knowledge, educational research, or
understanding, left, to run Monkton Wyld – and as such it really has been
murdered. <i>(The question is, can it be rebuilt, like Stiffkey
Bridge? Or perhaps to Rebuild Community @WhatsApp?)<br><br>
<b>Sustainable Community Living Projects are even more vital today than
ever, so it really is crucial that communities ensure that this sort of
takeover doesn’t happen again, for the futures of everyone concerned –
and for Earth.<br><br>
</i></b>What’s happened in the Monkton Wyld Court Case linked above,
should be criminal, and is:<br><br>
On the Pearson BTEC HNC in Building Studies 2001-2003, students were
taught of the need for (truly) sustainable construction, and, as the
government and Local Authorities had targets we all needed to aim to
achieve as designers, exactly what that is in terms of construction and
the environment, with aims to achieve the highest possible design and
build targets of build code Level 6 (+). *IE GREEN DESIGN by Avril
Fox and Robin Murrell, 1989 © Longmans ISBN: 1 85454 200 1<br><br>
Students were advised to further research CAT EcoVillage in Wales –
Canolfan Y Dechnoleg Amgen –
<a href="http://www.cat.org.uk/" eudora="autourl"><u>www.cat.org.uk</a>
<br><br>
</u>– And were also advised to look online for others as there were many
exemplars to the same educational standards – one such being Monkton Wyld
Court Centre for Sustainable Living, until now.<br><br>
It’s seriously wrong isn’t it…<br><br>
So… Why would anyone, ever, want to become a trustee of a charity such as
Monkton Wyld Court? (School?)<br><br>
Well, in this case, it might also later prove to be a case of The Land –
and not just the now homeless magazine.<br><br>
If trustees takeover the running of charities, wherein <b><i>the trustees
Own The Land</i></b> under the terms of the Intentional Community
documents, as recorded on the Intentional Community platform
<a href="http://www.ic.org/" eudora="autourl"><u>www.ic.org</a> – there
could easily be incentive. <i>(Beware! Write Community
Foundation Documents differently! Protect The Community that lives
on The Land! Protect the Village! Protect the EcoVillage! Save The
Parish! Save The Children & Vulnerable too.)<br><br>
</u></i>The Four trustees took on their roles in January 2023, and
apparently took the complaint of a disgruntled rejected applicant to the
intentional community as a Code Red, and sacked the backbone of the
community in flagrant disregard for the rule of law that actually governs
sustainable community living projects. (As students were taught at
HNC level in Building Law, quote: <b><u>‘Ignorance Is No Defence In A
Court Of Law’</u></b> – that cuts both ways.)<br><br>
In other words, ensure that you do you your own research.
<b><u>Historically:<br><br>
</u></b>Going back to the HNC course in Building Studies, students were
taught building history, and why it really is crucial now, to design for
social exclusion – and without any more waste, to design for low impact
and zero impact construction – and to consider ecological and
regenerative designs for the landscape too, I.e. Permaculture.<br><br>
Following on from The Egan Report, the construction sector also needed to
change to become Ethical – as so much of the sector wasn’t – and again,
this followed UK government guidelines that included Partnering (experts)
rather than Tendering for projects. (Architects and designers need
to know this, as they often guide the design team, which now also
includes their clients, whom they have a legal requirement to
advise.)<br><br>
Does any of this ever get taught to financiers, bankers, or anyone
working in the corporate sector? (I don’t know because I’m not from
there myself thank God – but it should, especially in terms of Building
Law.)<br><br>
The fact that we all need to design and build differently now – SHOULD be
taught to everyone – not just students on HNC courses following their own
Continued Professional Development.<br><br>
We can’t carry on designing and building unsustainably as it goes against
all the government EU and UN guidelines.<br><br>
This is because 70% of our planet is covered with water, and of the 30%
of land above sea level, one third is now desert or suffering from
drought, and is degenerating at an alarming rate – while the human
population increases, landmass decreases – and as arctic and antarctic
ice continues to melt, (also at an alarming rate), designers needed to
design differently. It is also criminal to cause any more land,
water or air pollution or contamination, or take away natural habitat
vital to the support of endangered species.<br><br>
(We couldn’t carry on living or building unsustainably. UK Planning
Guidelines were changed to keep the UK in line with UN
guidelines.)<br><br>
We couldn’t carry on and on, fighting for The Land to build upon, mine or
excavate – and in 2002, when the lecturer delivered THE most damning and
accurate prophecy – there was a terrible frenzy for every single piece of
land that came up on the market, with everyone bidding hoping to make
vast profits from property investment. Some people even gave up
their day jobs, and built up property portfolios instead, never bothering
to study Building Studies first.<br><br>
Property and land values were positively booming – and that was a second
problem – because it was completely unsustainable as proven
historically. From Boom to Bang to Bust – repeatedly – repeatedly
leaving millions in dire poverty, homeless, bankrupt, bereft of food and
water, and shelter.<br><br>
Historically, it has always been the same really, hasn’t it? And
that is exactly why all the rules were changed after WWII, giving people
their human rights back, and ensuring their protection under
International Law.<br><br>
Since The Roman Invasion 2000 years ago, it’s been a case of Divide,
Rule, Conquer – and make money in the process.<br><br>
And that’s exactly where the Third Sector differs, because it really is
<u>dead</u> opposite.<br><br>
IF the UK Charity Commission fails to take action AGAINST the four new
trustees at Monkton Wyld Court, listed on the UK government Charity
Commission pages as being: <b>Laura Guest, Steven Slavin, Juliet Ann
Lovelace Johnson and Richard Lovelace Johnson</b>, then perhaps as
Friends we should take further action in support of MWC.<br><br>
Perhaps we should call in the (new) Ketts brothers to protect rural, and
urban, communities rights, or a renewed Boudicca force to be reckoned
with, or co-create and drum up a new Peasants Revolt.<br><br>
The Land Is Ours,
<a href="http://www.tlio.org.uk/" eudora="autourl"><u>www.tlio.org.uk</a>
– is possibly the best place to click to start and join the Peasants
Revolt – it’s possibly one of The Best platforms now to get your voice
heard – especially as a rural Peasant!<br><br>
</u>Common Land (peasants have registered rights to in gross) has been
reregistered by the CRA in the UK, after application by Corporate Bodies,
and Private Estates, (and some major and minor charities), for their
profits, at the loss of Common Rights Holders Rights and due consultation
with CRH.<br><br>
Historically, Rights have been removed from local rural people and
parishes, which were finally returned and guaranteed protection by ALL
the Nations united in forming the UN.<br><br>
Once upon a time, we were ALL rural, lived in the countryside, and
understood the importance of stewarding The Land wisely, for the benefit
of our families and communities, for future generations. We once
understood, and were wise, to the ways of the countryside – or, we
died.<br><br>
We knew we were completely at the hands of God and nature, and were
dependent on the natural environment – and were as flexible as we needed
to be to survive.<br><br>
The Romans started to change all of that, changing the landscape,
bringing in non-native species, and separating the communities that
carried the knowledge of the natural environment, and introducing and
enforcing their own rules.<br><br>
People were no longer free, and were expected to pay taxes for the food
they grew, and that was just the start of it.<br><br>
Over the years, The Land has repeatedly been removed from the people
indigenous to it, who were either forced to work as slaves, were tortured
or killed.<br><br>
The Domesday Book of 1086 originally cast in stone WHO owned The Land at
the behest of William the Conqueror – King William 1 – listing the Lords
of The Land, as decreed then, and what their dues were to the
King.<br><br>
Over the centuries, the amount of land available to The People has been
taken away from them, and, in the end, the Industrial Revolution was the
start of the end.<br><br>
The Land Inclosure Acts then went on to create legal property rights to
land previously held in common in England and Wales according to
Wikipedia, which goes on to explain that between 1604 and 1914, over
5,200 individual acts enclosing public land were passed, effecting
28,000sq kilometres.<br><br>
The vast majority of the public land still available at the time, was
categorized as either common or waste land, which rural peasants being
landless themselves, were able to farm or forage. This then led
homeless or landless peasants to go to work in the factories in the towns
and cities, since they had no other options, or very few.<br><br>
Apparently, quote: <i>“The powers granted in the Inclosure Act 1773 of
the Parliament of Great Britain were often abused by landowners: the
preliminary meetings where enclosure was discussed, intended to be held
in public, often took place in the presence of only the local landowners,
who regularly chose their own solicitors, surveyors and commissioners to
decide on each case. <b> In 1786 there were still 250,000 independent
landowners, but in the course of only thirty years their number was
reduced to 32,000</b>.</i> (Reference Wikipedia.)<br><br>
<i>Obviously, as shown by the four trustees, despite or in spite of all
the new laws and governance, this is <u>STILL</u> going on
today.<br><br>
</i>It IS historically the case, that the corporate and capitalist, needs
slaves working for nothing in order to maximise profits – and even more
people to count it all, and protect or defend it from thieves.<br><br>
But it is also very wrong to expect people working in communities or in
the non-profit sector, to have the same wage or working conditions as
those in the corporate, Public or Private sectors. Or even to have
the same expectations.<br><br>
Most people forming the Intentional Community at Monkton Wyld Court,
lived there FREE – or at least, had FREE Free-range organic dairy
produce, organic fruit and vegetables, and FREE facilities.
(Instead of High Wages.)<br><br>
Some things in life are worth far (far) more than money…<br><br>
Since the end of WWII, a raft of Human Rights have been written to
protect humanity – and to protect Earth’s natural and organic
environment. The Third Sector specialises in giving all to these
aims – where the Corporate, the Private and the Public Sectors do
not. The 1950s and 1960s led to an environmental awakening, and the
call for World Peace – ‘Make Love Not War’ was the order of the
day.<br><br>
Veteran environmentalists and authors such as Avril Fox, George Monbiot,
Simon Fairlie, Tony Gosling, Dame Jennifer Lonsdale, Dr Christopher Busby
and David Attenborough, have been researching, educating or spearheading
protests and campaigning for change for decades. In some instances
their knowledge spearheaded UN guidelines for change.<br><br>
Right now, we either need to start to build environmentally and
economically sustainable community living projects across the entire UK,
(and Arks in risk zones), following the exemplars of EcoVillages and
other eco-communities that have already blazed the trail and pioneered
ways in which to hit ALL the Planning Guidelines, both in terms of
Nationally and Internationally – or we will end up in the fullness of the
1984 projection.<br><br>
Right now, today, there are two paths we can go by (quote: from The Long
Road to Realism, autobiography of Avril Fox), one is inherently good and
follows those guidelines, the other is disastrously bad – and will end in
the end of humanity, and the end of an environmentally sustainable
planet.<br><br>
It was only on the award winning and green exemplars of EcoVillages such
as CAT, Lammas, Findhorn, Fife Earthship, and the Hockerton Housing
Project, CoHousing Communities and Eco-Communities such as Monkton Wyld
that set the standards for others to follow that the UK government set
aside as many millions as it did for Community Land Trusts (CLTs), and
gave us the Right to Bid and the Right to Build. <i>If the
exemplars that we are supposed to learn from are taken away from us, as
is proving to be the case for Monkton Wyld and other established eco
communities, then God help us – all.<br><br>
</i>If we have ‘Proven Need’, are suffering from exclusion, poverty, and
have the evidence to prove our case, then we have the Right to Build as
either individuals or intentional communities in application, according
to the UK government’s Communities website and PDFs, and Exemption and
Exception sites <i><u>were</u></i> to be allocated by Councils, then
where should we be allowed to learn what is required? (Should
everyone just keep on and on reinventing the wheel?)<br><br>
Given the fact that humans now ALL have a Right to Life protected by Law,
a Right to Water, a Right to Life – a Right to Live as one in
Nature.<br><br>
The Workers Cooperative formed by the Intentional Community had an Agreed
Low Wage. Ergo, it was very wrong for the new trustees to use the
clamant’s claim of a Low Wage against the Community that democratically
chose or voted between them to refuse The Claimant’s Application to join
Their Community.<br><br>
FREE showers – free water and toilet facilities – free organic food, and
a healthy, safe and happy environment in the beautiful Dorset hills, WHO
wouldn’t want to work there, learn there, and become a part of this
amazing coop community. (I know I would – if it weren’t for my
dependents, and other commitments within the non-profit sector I
volunteer. <i>N.B. Note to the UK Charity Commission – IF
action is taken against the four new trustees, and you need to fill
vacancies for trustees of the Monkton Wyld Court Charity – I, for one,
volunteer</i>.)<br><br>
In fact, when I heard what had happened at Monkton Wyld Court, I first
travelled down to Devon this summer to attend the Valley Vibes Festival,
to meet with investigative journalist Tony Gosling and other
<a href="http://www.tlio.og.uk/" eudora="autourl"><u>www.tlio.og.uk</a>
members and supporters to discuss the case, and then later travelled back
down to the West, to The Resistance Festival held at Monkton Wyld Court
in Dorset to find out if there was anything that I could do to help, and
again, to network with other supporters and members of The Land Is
Ours. <br><br>
</u>Although it wasn’t the same as the T.L.I.O. Gathering of 2011 – I
still managed to learn an awful lot, (and not solely about the Monkton
Wyld Court Case), as I attended as many of the classes as I could!
In short, I learned an awful lot this summer – including what I might be
able to do to help – for example, writing this now!<br><br>
George Monbiot originally formed T.L.I.O. However, now seems to
consider that The Land should be allowed to regenerate – without people
either stewarding it or looking after it while living upon it as we have
traditionally – and then considers himself to be the only person on the
entire planet concerned about how to feed the world simultaneous to
regenerating the natural environment – while preaching the Land Reform
Act.<br><br>
Living in a city – or even The City – looking out at the reducing
countryside, is completely different to living in the countryside looking
at the damages caused to the countryside by those of The City, the
cities and the towns, (as a peasant)…” – Speaking as a Revolting
Peasant – because the government made me so.<br><br>
<br>
<b><i>Written by Linda Beamish; Group Moderator/Regional Organiser
EcoVillage Network UK; Admin. Pentref Eco Cymru EcoVillage Wales;
Ambassador Imagine Rural Development Initiative (IRDI) Ecovillage Zambia;
Community Organiser
<a href="http://www.off-grid.net/" eudora="autourl"><u>
www.off-grid.net</a> //
<a href="http://www.landbuddy.com/" eudora="autourl">www.LandBuddy.com</a>
– freelance (self-employed) Eco-architectural designer
<a href="http://www.eco-designs.co.uk/" eudora="autourl">
www.eco-designs.co.uk</a> and social entrepreneur – AnArkAngel
representing Avril Fox, the Patron Saint of the Ark Angels non-profit
organisation.<br><br>
<br><br>
<br><br>
<br><br>
</u></i><h1><b>(.....continued) Offshore windfarm anyone? King Charles
has acquired our continental shelf, almost three times the UK’s land
area</b></h1>At the time, the Crown had no ownership rights in the sea
beyond the lower-tide mark on the seashore. Indeed, in 1951 the Labour
foreign secretary, Herbert Morrison, had declared that the sea around
Britain was not the property of the state or anybody.<br><br>
But in 1962, as was revealed much later, the Queen privately told the
first commissioner of the Estatethe leader of the board running the
corporation’s commercial intereststhat she had seen something about
“taking over rights on land under the sea”. In fact, the Estate’s legal
adviser in 1959 had proposed enshrining in law the extension of Crown
lands to the whole of the continental shelf. Other Estate officials
advised against trying to extend rights to the seabed, because this would
draw attention to the fact that no existing legislation gave such
ownership.<br><br>
However, prompted by the passing of a UN convention that granted states
rights to the continental shelves by their shores, and by drilling
companies seeking legal clarity on ownership of the seabed in expectation
of finding commercial oil and gas reserves, the outgoing Conservative
government of Alec Douglas-Home passed the Continental Shelf Act in 1964.
It gave the Crown Estate precisely the rights it had earlier refrained
from seeking. This granting of ownership to the Crown Estate was a huge
enclosure of the commons but did not change the fact that the seabed was
still part of the commons. The Crown, and the government as its agent,
became the seabed’s steward, responsible for preserving it.<br><br>
All at sea: the Crown Estate (and in Scotland, the separate Crown Estate
Scotland) owns the seabed to 12 nautical miles out. It also holds rights
to explore and use natural resources (except oil, coal and gas) and
generate renewable power on the UK’s continental shelf<br><br>
As a business, the Crown Estate grew at a modest rate during the
following decades, returning all revenue to the Treasury while the
monarch received a fixed sumthe annual “civil list”to pay for royal
expenses. The Estate’s marine activities did not include the North Sea
oil and gas bonanza, for although the Crown owns the oil and gas found
beneath the sea, as beneath the land, their exploitation is managed by
the government and its agencies.<br>
In the 1980s, the Thatcher government sold leases on lots in the North
Sea to oil companies at ridiculously low prices, taking the revenue as a
windfall profit to pay for tax cuts. This was a blatant depletion of the
commons, in sharp contrast to Norway’s decision to use its surplus oil
and gas revenues to create what is now a mammoth sovereign wealth fund,
ensuring benefits flow to both current and future generations.<br><br>
The next phase came in 2001, when offshore wind energy took off. In a
first step, the Crown Estate leased 12 seabed sites of 10 square km each.
Three additional rounds saw leases awarded in 2003, 2010 and finally in
2021, when the Crown Estate auctioned six large lots, most of which went
to German and French firms. The most recent round included the novel
addition that the companies would pay the Crown a ground rent, an annual
“option fee”, even before producing any wind energy. It was estimated
that this round alone could generate nearly £9bn over 10 years.<br><br>
And here is the rub. Over the past two decades, successive governments
have allowed the Crown Estate to become a monopolistic corporate
enterprise. In 2004, the New Labour government passed the Energy Act,
which enabled the Estate to claim a share of the revenue from production
of all offshore wind and wave electricity. In 2008, it extended this to
gas and carbon dioxide storage.<br><br>
These measures intensified a clear conflict of interest for the Crown
Estate between being a steward responsible for preserving the commons for
future generations and a business working to maximise revenue and
profits. Meanwhile, to add to its profits, the Estate had started to
invest in joint ventures.<br>
In 2010, the Parliamentary Treasury Committee concluded that the Crown
Estate was focusing too much on income from its control of the seabed and
seashore, rather than on the long-term public interest. In what was
hardly an adequate rebuttal, the Estate’s CEO said he was pleased the
committee recognised they were running a successful business operation,
adding only that the Estate took its responsibility to act in the wider
public interest “very seriously”.<br><br>
Nothing was done to prioritise once again the role of the Crown as
protector and steward. The situation was tilted further in favour of
commercial criteria in 2012, when George Osborne, at the time chancellor
of the exchequer, abolished the civil list in favour of a “sovereign
grant”, calculated as 15 per cent of the Crown Estate’s profit. That
figure was increased to 25 per cent in 2017, ostensibly to cover the
estimated cost of refurbishing Buckingham Palace; at present it is set to
revert to 15 per cent in 2028. The creation of a deadline in itself
created a new moral hazard, giving the Crown Estate an incentive to
maximise short-term profits.<br><br>
In brief, the Crown Estate has become a monopolistic sealord. It has
monopolised offshore wind and wave energy and created an oligopoly
consisting of a few, overwhelmingly foreign-owned multinationals, a
structure that promises to keep prices and revenues above what would
arise in a competitive market. Although the Estate uses an auction
process to decide which firms secure the leases, it still decides how
many leases to sell, as well as the size and location of the
lots.<br><br>
In the decade since 2013, the Crown Estate has made more than £1bn profit
from its marine business (known in the Estate’s accounts as energy,
minerals and infrastructure until 2019/20, and inclusive of aquaculture
until 2016/17). Over the years, this sum has been delivered to the
Treasury, and has contributed to the pot from which the sovereign grant
is calculated. Precise figures are difficult to discern due to the opaque
nature of Crown Estate accounts, but Prospect research suggests that in
the ten years to 2022/23, the seabed has earned the royals approximately
£193m.<br><br>
<h3><b>£193m: the royal family’s estimated earnings from the sea, 2013 to
2023</b></h3>This sum takes into account King Charles’ magnanimous
announcement in January 2023 that the Crown Estate would hand over to the
government what a spokesperson called the “offshore energy windfall” from
the 2021 round of sales, which boosted the marine sector’s profits from
£127.5m to £370.8m in a year. In any case, revenue from the commons
should not be treated as a “windfall” at all. It should never have been
the Crown’s to begin with.<br>
In its eagerness to make profits, the Crown Estate has even sold
development rights for one patch of seabed to two different projects at
the same time, one for a giant Danish-owned offshore windfarm, the other
for storing carbon dioxide under the seabed. An industry insider
commented tersely that the Crown Estate was being “a bit
greedy”.<br><br>
By the financial year ending in 2023, the value of the Crown Estate’s
marine businesses was £5.7bn, up by 14 per cent on the year before,
mainly because of offshore wind. The Crown is not liable to pay tax on
the sovereign grant. Overall, the Estate’s portfolio is worth almost
£16bn. It is a major industrial enterprise, but one that does not have to
adhere to free market principles, let alone be answerable to the
commoners.<br><br>
The Welsh should feel particularly aggrieved, in that whereas all
management and revenue of the Crown Estate in Scotland is in the hands of
the Scottish government, revenue generated in Wales is not devolved.
Extraordinarily, the value of the Crown Estate’s marine portfolio in
Wales rose from £49m in 2020 to £549m in 2021 and to £603m in 2022. None
of it went to the Welsh government, let alone to Welsh commoners. No
wonder a majority of Welsh people want the Estate to be devolved as it is
in Scotland.<br>
25 per cent: proportion of the Crown Estate’s profit given to the royal
family through the sovereign grant<br><br>
These inequities are compounded by the fact that the Crown Estate has not
always, before granting leases, carried out environmental impact
assessments in accordance with either international law or the
precautionary principle, which requires decision-makers to err on the
side of caution when considering projects that might entail serious or
unknown ecological risks. For the first three rounds of sale of seabed
rights, the Estate was required under EU law to demonstrate that it had
considered alternative sites before deciding where to locate
infrastructure developments such as windfarms.<br><br>
There is no evidence that it did this. Instead, assessments of the
environmental impacts were left to developers, with the UK government
judging in which sprawling zones development could occur. And the Estate
itself has admitted that in the three earlier leasing rounds it didn’t
have data with which to make objective assessments.<br><br>
There has been progress: the Crown Estate and the government will in
future examine the environmental impact of offshore windfarms, and
outside of leasing rounds, work is under way to better understand the
impact on nature of marine infrastructure. Had the Crown acted as the
steward of the commons, this work would have been started much
earlier.<br><br>
In one case, the Danish power company Ørsted received approval for a
project off the North Yorkshire coast which will affect a Special
Protection Area that is home to Britain’s biggest colony of seabirds. The
Estate and the government accepted that the project would threaten
endangered birds, but let it go ahead on the basis of a promise by the
company to introduce an offset breeding scheme to make up for bird
deaths. There is no evidence that the scheme will work.<br><br>
But while wind energysorely needed for the green transitionhas received
public scrutiny for its impact from nature, it is far from being the
Crown Estate’s only source of profit from the sea.<br><br>
Sand and gravel are easily the most mined minerals in the world, with
about 50bn tonnes excavated from rivers, lakes and the sea annually. This
figure is growing by around 5 per cent each year, feeding demands, led by
China, for concrete and other construction materials. There is an
impending global shortage, and excessive excavation is already causing
land erosion worldwide.<br><br>
The Crown Estate is the only body in the UK with the designated or
presumed authority to oversee the production and sale of our sea sand. It
has been quietly expanding mining, to the point where 21m tonnes of sand
were excavated in 2022. A quarter was exported, mainly to Belgium and the
Netherlands.<br><br>
The manager of the Crown Estate’s “marine minerals portfolio” said in
September 2022 that the Estate works “in partnership with industry, to
help support the sustainable use of sand and gravel resources”. If it
were a proper steward of the commons, the Estate would also work with
conservation bodies, not just those interested in maximising extraction
and profits. To protect against erosion and to avoid destruction of
underwater ecosystems, there should be regular impact assessments of sand
excavation before any more mining begins, done by independent bodies not
answerable to the Crown Estate.<br><br>
Bearing in mind that sea sand is an exhaustible common resource that will
become more expensive as it becomes scarcer, a responsible steward would
invest all or part of the revenues to maintain the capital value for the
benefit of future generations, according to what is known as the Hartwick
Rule of Intergenerational Equity. Instead, the Crown Estate is
effectively treating all revenue from the sale of sea sand (as well as
potash and other minerals found in the sea) as “windfall profit” for
current spending.<br><br>
Another seemingly innocuous activity being encouraged by the Estate is
seaweed farming. Seaweed and seagrass are valuable for the marine
ecosystem, not least as habitats and carbon sinks (they are far more
effective than woodland in absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere). Nearly 90
per cent of seagrass has vanished from UK coastlinesmuch as a result of
pollution, dredging and trawlingsince the Estate took over the seabed as
its income-earning property. Meanwhile, scientists predict that most of
the UK’s 26,000 square miles of kelp forests will be lost by
2100.<br><br>
<h3><b>£9bn: predicted windfall, over ten years, from 2023 offshore wind
leases</b></h3>Sadly, the Crown Estate has impeded some plans by civil
society groups to replant thousands of acres of seagrass by charging, in
at least one case, £500 an acre for doing so. One kelp farm company
abandoned plans to develop a network of 58 farms around the seabed due to
lengthy bureaucratic delays by the Crown Estate. These are not the
actions of a benign steward of the commons.<br>
Then there are around 750 aquaculture sitesfor farming fish (mostly
salmon), shellfish and crustaceansfrom which the Crown Estate Scotland
(CES), an independent body that gives its entire revenue to the Scottish
government, earns a hefty sum. The CES, which takes 1.5 per cent of
turnover income, must be partially answerable for fish farming’s shocking
record in Britain: farmed salmon have a premature mortality rate as high
as 24 per cent from disease and lice infestations; mass escapes threaten
wild fish species; and the corporations, most foreign-owned, pay only
half the true costs of production, with the remainder, including
environmental costs, borne by local communities.<br><br>
Scottish fisheries complain that licensed fish farms discharge sea lice
and pesticides into the sea, killing wild fish. The CES, although more
accountable to Scottish ministers, ignores the precautionary principle,
and allows seabed dredging for scallops and bottom trawling for prawns,
both of which do massive harm to marine ecosystems.<br><br>
If the CES behaved as a real steward of the commons, it would demand that
salmon farmers met higher ecological standards. If it cannot fulfil its
positive duty to protect the commons then it should not be steward at
all.<br><br>
So what should be the political agenda? In the long run, a progressive
government should want to restore the sea and seabed as part of Britain’s
commons. In the immediate term, it should reform the governance of the
Crown Estate, insisting that its primary responsibility is to preserve
and enhance the capital value of the common resources in the sea around
Britain.<br><br>
The Crown Estate could charge firms more rent for ecologically damaging
fish and shellfish farms. By contrast, it should not be charging anything
for activities such as seaweed farming or seagrass replanting that revive
marine ecosystems. It should make a commitment consistent with the High
Seas Treaty, agreed at the UN marine biodiversity conference last year,
to rewild 30 per cent of the seabed under its stewardship by 2030. It
should stop the export of our sea sand. Above all, the next government
should appoint a cabinet-level minister of the sea, whose
responsibilities should include overseeing all the marine-related
activities of the Crown Estate.<br><br>
Finally, there is a transformational opportunity for a new progressive
government. The King has said the £1bn a year “windfall” from the latest
auction of our seabed should go to the public. The only equitable way to
treat revenue from the commons would be to recycle it equally to all
commonersthat is, to all of us. That £1bn a year should go into a
Commons Capital Fund from which common dividends could be paid to every
citizen. After all, the Crown’s role was to protect, not to plunder the
commons. Charles III inherited an empire at seabut he has the chance now
to change it for the better.<br><br>
<h4><b>Guy Standing is a Professorial Research Associate at SOAS
University of London and a founding member and honorary co-president of
the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN), a non-governmental organisation
that promotes a basic income for all. He is author of The Blue Commons:
Rescuing the Economy of the Sea.<br><br>
<br><br>
<br><br>
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