June 2010

Maura was released from Mountjoy this morning at 11am.   She served 4 days in jail after refusing to pay a 200 euro fine.

--- Jailing comes as Shell prepare to start destructive borehole drilling ---

Maura Harrington was today jailed for non-payment of fines relating to protests against Shell's disastrous Corrib Gas project. She is currently en route to Mountjoy Prison. Mrs Harrington is now the third opponent of Shell in jail, following Pat O'Donnell and Niall Harnett. This is the fifth time Mrs Harrington has been jailed in the last 18 months, and comes as Shell have sent letters to residents of the local area, warning them of the start of drilling works in Sruwaddacon Estuary beginning 'in the coming days'.

Campaigners hung a banner reading “Energy shouldn't cost the earth” from the roof of Shell offices in Belmullet this morning at 8am, as well as holding banners in front of the entrances. The action closed the offices until the early afternoon. The protest connected the environmental disaster suffered by the fishermen & people of Louisiana with the threat faced by the fishermen and people of Erris. In particular the protest was in solidarity with Pat O'Donnell who has been jailed for his courageous defense of the seas and his livelihood.

On a conservative estimate there could be 10 billion barrels of oil, or the equivalent in natural gas,  under the seabed off the west coast of Ireland. That’s about enough to supply all of our needs for a hundred years. But junior minister Conor Lenihan is intent on giving it away. Oil companies already have rights to some of the most promising areas off the west coast.

"You can't trust Big Oil. The only way to ensure careful management of scarce natural resources is to keep them in state control. Anything else is treason"

It's two months to the day since the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig 40 miles off Louisiana, and blame has been spreading farther and faster than a tonne of light crude at room temperature. Blame has become so tradable, it ought to get its own listing on the commodities market. America blamed the British, which really stung. "It's not British Petroleum, it's Beyond Petroleum," cried our neighbour plaintively, and even perceptively, since this disaster has gone so far beyond petroleum that oil is now definitely too small a word for it.