Category: Other stuff

Transition Town Tooting were pleased to be invited to join Sadiq Khan MP who hosted Ed Miliband, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change at a supper in Tooting last week. I attended on behalf of TTT and was invited to join Mr Miliband’s table where I was quizzed by him about the transition movement. As well as an opportunity to hear him speak, it was great to have a chance to share with him my personal enthsuiasm for TTT and for the growing community response to climate change and peak oil which is developing in Tooting. It also provided an opportunity to invite both he and Sadiq Khan to attend the upcoming transition network conference in Battersea in May. A short video clip of them in conversation appears here on Sadiq’s blog. http://www.sadiqkhan.co.uk/index.php/blog/5-general/319-dinner-with-ed-miliband?4bcca4bd673637b028d7767aee95d1b6=e59ba59755b55c5fb5e3f25ddb9c4e08 – I managed to remain out of the limelight just left of shot…

Hilary

Around 50 members of 15 different London transition networks met on Monday 23rd at Battersea Arts Centre (venue for the upcoming network conference in May) for the first ever London-wide transition event. We were welcomed by one of BAC’s co-Artistic Directors, David Micklem who gave us some insight in to the venue’s history as a centre for radical thought and action.

The evening started with a World Cafe event run by Asha Bee which focused on the particular challenges and benefits of transitioning in cities. Asha was then going on to run simliar events in other cities including Bristol and Brighton – all the input from which will feed into the new book on Transitioning Cities which Asha will be writing over the coming months.

After this there was a chance to meet and chat with other London TT networkers and to discuss the conference and plans for London beyond May. It was a great opportunity to share experiences and Finsbury TT has already stepped up and offered to host a future event possibly in June.

Tooting really is an inspiring,  quirky, humorous, resilient, inventive and diverse place. Just returned from an incredible evening at Jasmin’s Club on Tooting High St, host to this year’s Community Awards. A full house organised by the indominatable Balham and Tooting Community Association recognising the work done by ‘ordinary’ people on the ground. Transition Town Tooting had its moment: Iqbal Turk and I presented a snap-shot picture of the Tooting Earth Talk Walk as a prelude to Tara Art Pauline Nakirya’s one woman performance of The Animal’s Lawsuit (based on a 10th century Basra poem). Iqbal, Mary Boley and I were also nominated for TTT related community awards which was humbling given a) the short time TTT has been around and b) the company we were in: long-serving health workers, choir leaders, community champions for the elderly, children and women’s groups. Great Gustos singing and all topped by MP Sadiq Khan’s triumphant arrival at 11th hour with news Springfield Hospital Mega-Development Plans have been turned down by a Wandsworth Council meeting tonight.Hurray! All to play for now on a Sustainable Tooting front.  LN

The Age of Stupid – join us at Wimbledon Odeon on 15th March

‘The first succesful dramatisation of Climate Change to hit the big screen’ – The Guardian A new film, The Age of Stupid (http://www.ageofstupid.net/ and attached), looks like its going to be a fantastic vehicle to raise public awareness of the issue of climate change. The film makers are trying to get into the Guinness Book of records for the biggest premiere ever and so on 15th March at 5.30pm it is being screened simultaneously in cinemas across the UK. Sustainable Merton have managed to secure a screening at the Wimbledon Odeon and all TTT members are encouraged to attend. If it is a packed showing the Odeon have promised to hold a further free screening of the film! Tickets are available online here – looks like they are selling fast http://www.odeon.co.uk/fanatic/film_info/s142/Wimbledon/m11958/The_Age_Of_Stupid_/