On Sunday 27th February Yorkshire CND are taking at least 4 coaches full of protesters to a Demonstration in London from across the Yorkshire Region. The demonstration is very, very important, to persuade the government not to renew our Nuclear Weapons programme called Trident. We have raised money through events and called on our members to donate and participants to help towards costs. We still need more help to send the biggest contingent from Yorkshire ever, we are making the cost of a seat on the coaches as affordable as possible so that all people regardless of income can make their voices heard.
We want to "Scrap the Trident" Nuclear Weapons programme because:
1. We can't afford them
Replacing Trident will cost £183,000,000,000. In times of austerity, when the NHS has become unaffordable, students are running up thousands of pounds of debt and people are sleeping on the streets can we really afford a nuclear deterrent that has never been used in the last 65 years and unlikely to be used in the next 40 years.
2. The transport of nuclear weapons around our country is highly dangerous
Every 6 to 8 weeks, nuclear weapons are transported from the south of the country to Scotland on our motorways. Do we want to live with this risk?
In July 2005, the Scottish Herald revealed an internal MoD report warning nuclear warheads could accidentally explode if involved in a major crash. A bomb's key safety feature could be disabled, enabling a nuclear reaction to unleash a burst of lethal radiation, termed an "inadvertent yield" by the MoD. The movements could also be viewed as a terrorist target.
3. They don't make our country more secure
Most countries on the planet do not have nuclear weapons, South Africa dismantled its entire arsenal in 1989. There are far more pressing security threats in the risks presented by climate change, terrorism, cyber threats and disease as outlined in the governments Strategic Defence Review in 2015.
4. They are damaging to the environment and health
The mining of Uranium ore causes untold damage to the environment. The toxic waste produced makes the environment radioactive for thousands of years, causes health damage to miners and local people. Nuclear waste from testing is still in the atosphere from the 50s and 60s. The US government has finally acknowledged the link between nuclear weapons production facilities and elevated levels of at least 22 kinds of cancers in workers (at those facilities). Uranium tipped missiles fired in the Iraq war have caused birth defects and cancer in soldiers and the local population.
5. Are illegal under international Law
The Geneva Convention Protocol 1977 prohibits attacks on civilians and methods of warfare which are intended, or may be anticipated, to cause widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment (Article 35). The inherent impossibility of distinguishing between civilian and military targets and the obvious fact that the use of nuclear weapons would result in a massive number of casualties in a wide area, clearly renders the use or threat of a nuclear weapons system illegal. It is clear that the use of Trident would result in a massive number of casualties across a wide area.
6. Could annihilate millions of people
Each of the country's nuclear submarine carries 45 nuclear warheads, each 8 times more destructive than the Hiroshima or Nagasaki bombs, which killed 140000 people.
Please help us with the costs of the coach or if you want to come to the demo click on the link to book a seat: join us.