Members of East Devon Greens and the Torbay Greens together at the Exeter Animal Aid Christmas Without Cruelty Festival Dec 2011

January 2012 marks two years since the East Devon Green Party (EDGP) was formed. Previously part of the Exeter Green Party, the decision was made to set up a more local group in January 2010 in order to be more effective in this large rural area. We broke away with the blessing of the Exeter Green Party and some funds to get us started which enabled the EDGP to put me up as a candidate for East Devon for the 2010 General Election. We still work with the Exeter Greens and will be supporting them in their campaign to get a Green Councillor elected onto Exeter City Council this spring. We also have good links with the South Devon Green Party, the Torbay Green Party, the Mid Devon Greens and the West Devon Greens.

Members of East Devon Green Party with West Devon & Exeter Greens protesting against Devon County Council cutting £30 million from their annual budget Oct 2011

2011 saw our first two Green Councillors elected here in East Devon – myself onto Honiton Town Council and Emily McIvor onto Axmouth Parish Council. We also fought the East Devon District Council Elections – with Green candidates standing in several wards giving people the opportunity to vote Green. We had a large team of dedicated Green Party members working very hard in Honiton St Michael’s, where I was the candidate, and we came SECOND to the Tories. Greens beat all the other candidates including the libdems, labour and several independents and we are working even harder towards a breakthrough next time.

Me & Aleck voting GREEN at the General Election 2010 where I stood as a Green Parliamentary candidate for East Devon

The next elections in our area are the County Council elections in May 2013 where we are confident we can get our first Green County Councillor elected here in East Devon. Greens are real contenders, being elected to all levels of government all over the country. There is no reason why it can’t be done here!

Happy Birthday East Devon Green Party!

Sharon Pavey – Coordinator East Devon Green Party & Fundraiser for the South West Green Party

Follow me on twitter @sharonpavey

]]> http://www.sharonpavey.org/east-devon-green-party-happy-2nd-birthday/feed/ 2 http://www.sharonpavey.org/south-west-green-party-cookbook/ http://www.sharonpavey.org/south-west-green-party-cookbook/#comments Mon, 28 Nov 2011 14:08:44 +0000 sharon http://www.sharonpavey.org/?p=1673 I’m extremely pleased to be able to announce that after many months of preparation – the South West Green Party cookbook is now available! Hot off the press from the lovely people at Axminster Printing, our book features over 60 vegetarian and vegan recipes contributed by Green Party members in the region.

The front & back cover of the book is one photo I took at the recent Embercombe apple day

You should be able to order the  book from your local Green Party here in the South West. Scroll down to the bottom of this page to find your nearest group http://southwest.greenparty.org.uk/region/southwest

Or you can get it direct from me – email sdpavey@gmail.com or call me on 07740973990. The cookbook costs £7.50 and all the funds raised go to the Green Party here in the South West.

As lovely as it is the turks turban squash is not included with the cookbook!

Printed on 100% recycled paper, there are wonderful homemade soups, stews, salads, starters, main courses, cakes, biscuits, breads and more! And Caroline Lucas has contributed her delicious Christmas cake. It’s a great gift idea.

A huge thank you to Green Party member Cherry Puddicombe who did all the design work for free! Check out Cherry’s website http://lifework.biz The book includes a chapter on ‘Green Eateries’ – a useful list of veggie and vegan restaurants and cafe’s in the South West.

There are some friendly familiar faces dotted throughout the book

BREAKING NEWS: AS OF THURSDAY 8TH DECEMBER WE NOW HAVE A FEW COPIES OF THE COOKBOOK SIGNED BY CAROLINE LUCAS – A GREAT GIFT FOR ANY GREEN FRIENDS. THESE SPECIAL EDITION COPIES ARE PRICED AT £10 EACH. POSTAGE FOR ONE BOOK IS £1.

Green Party members from left: Derek, Martin, Loran, Sharon Howe, Steve, Ana, Sam then Paula Black and Sharon Pavey at the front

Huge thanks to everyone who helped on the stall, we raised over £200 with our hampers – all donated veggies from Green Party members and a hamper full of Suma goodies.

Green Party members donated fruit, veggies & wine for the hamper

Benjamin Zephaniah was the highlight of the day performing some of his poetry, the choir were great and so many amazing stalls and lovely people. A thoroughly enjoyable day.

Thank you to Suma for donating all these products for our raffle

We launched the new Green Party cookbook at the festival and it went down very well

Local councillors met in Honiton on Monday 31 October to discuss how to improve waste management and recycling in the town.

Although East Devon boasts a relatively high recycling rate of 50% compared with the national average of 41.2%, Sharon Pavey - Honiton Town Councillor and coordinator of the East Devon Green Party thinks there is room for improvement. So she invited East Devon District Council’s Environment Portfolio holder Councillor Iain Chubb and Recycling Champion Councillor Roger Giles over to Honiton.

Councillor Pavey is now one of 15 new ‘Recycling Champions’ on the town and parish councils in East Devon with responsibility to promote reducing waste through re-use, repairing and recycling rather than disposing of our waste in landfill*.

The new Champions will get together on 16 November to discuss how they can make a difference to the recycling picture in East Devon and also how they can help get messages to their community if waste collections are hit by snow and ice as they were last December and January.

Councillor Pavey says: “Apart from the problem of finding suitable landfill sites, Devon County Council has to pay a huge amount in landfill tax, so throwing away our rubbish really must be the last option”.

Councillor Pavey added “The weekly doorstep collection programme is going well in Honiton and now people are eager to see it extended to cardboard and plastics which will hopefully be rolled out in the next year or so if the trial in Beer is successful. In the meantime Tesco has a skip for both paper and cardboard and you can take all your washed plastic food tubs to Sutton Barton, which is not ideal but is an option not too far away and means you do not have to put plastic containers into your landfill bin”.

“There are also clothes banks and a plastic bag deposit point at Tesco, a place to donate unwanted shoes outside the sports shop in town, you can drop off used print cartridges at Dimonds and several opticians will take your old glasses and recycle them.”

* Defra stats today show that EDDC has the 6th lowest Residual household waste per household (kg/household) in England at 353.07 kgs. Also Devon as a county has the highest recycling rate at 55%.

Stallholders are not 100% finalised yet but there should be some locally sourced veggies, eggs, jams, plants, chutneys etc, and a delicious homemade cake stall – staffed by the local students raising funds to go to India next year and work in an orphanage. Please bring along your own donated cakes on the morning if you would like to help the students raise the funds needed to make their worthwhile journey.

Stalls booked include a fabulous environmentally friendly wooden toys stall from Busy Bees and fairtrade and ethical clothing by Emma’s Emporium. Mandy Meakins will be there with her business The Shopping Lounge which sells handmade jewellery and gorgeous girlie accessories.

Honiton Community Cinema are attending to promote their next screening following the incredibly successful test screening a couple of weeks ago and there will be an opportunity to talk renewable energy solutions with new local business Little Green Solar. The local Green Party will have a stall promoting their new local membership scheme, where you can join the East Devon branch for just £5 per year. There will also be a raffle and a book stall.

Interested stallholders can book a stall by emailing Sharon sdpavey@gmail.com or calling 07740973990.

From left: Tris & Rob Woodland from Bridgwater Greens, Lizzie Woodman from Exeter Green Party, me in the pink scarf and my nine year old Natasha & Adam (Lizzie's son) on far right

The weather was much better than expected and we did about ten miles from the Quay right down past the Double Locks pub to the Turf and back again.

Natasha having a break at the ferry crossing to Topsham

Rob & Tris took the ferry over to Topsham

Adam & Lizzie taking a break

A lovely place to enjoy some free time, either walking or cycling. We saw lots of wildlife along the way - herons, cormorants, dragonflies, ducks and lots of swans

Tasha enjoying a hot chocolate at The Turf

On the way back to Exeter

Back on the train on the way home!

This promises to be a very exciting event with inspiring talks as well as a variety of interesting stalls and stands. Satish Kumar, who will be a guest of Sustainable Ottery, will be speaking at 2 p.m. and taking questions. Satish was born in Rajasthan, India, in 1936.  His life is permeated with the theme of pilgrimage.  At the age of 9 he became a wandering Jain monk and spent many years in pilgrimage through his homeland.  In 1962 he set out on a peace pilgrimage of 8,000 miles from the grave of Mahatma Gandhi in New Delhi to Moscow, Paris, London and Washington.   He has studied Buddhism and Hindu philosophy.  He is the Editor of the ‘Resurgence’ magazine which is a multi faceted publication of poetry, politics, imagination, economics and creativity.  He has also published several books and is the Director of Programmes at Shumacher College.  He now lives in North Devon and his excellent profile of Dartmoor that was shown on BBC called ‘Earth Pilgrim’. Satish presented Dartmoor throughout the seasons showing, as he says “the beauty of nature, but also the economy, generosity and intentions of nature, and how we need to be pilgrims and learn from nature instead of trying to dictate to or dominate it to our whims. When you learn from nature you learn ecological humility, and gain a respect and reverence for nature”. Recently he was interviewed on the BBC programme “Town” when it featured Totnes and spoke on Radio 4. his is a rare opportunity to hear one of the World’s leading environmental thinkers and speakers live in our area. For more information on Satish and Resurgence visit http://www.resurgence.org/satish-kumar/

Sustainable Ottery’s Helen Collinson will also talk about her work for Christian Aid.

We do have two vacancies on our committee at the moment for election agent and website manager. Please let me know if you are interested in either post. Thanks.

The agenda is being drafted on the members site – please add items on there http://my.greenparty.org.uk/forum/1875

While Honiton Town Councillor Sharon Pavey was visiting the north-east last week, she took the opportunity to find out more about Darlington’s status as a designated ‘Cycling Demonstration Town’.

Sharon says “I spent some of my childhood in Darlington so when I heard about all the work that has been done on sustainable travel there over the past seven years, I took the opportunity to find out more in order to bring some practical ideas back to Honiton.”

As a keen cyclist herself, the local Green Party co-ordinator would like to see the opportunities for cycling developed in Honiton in order to cut car journeys and congestion, reduce harmful emissions and improve health. Sharon says “I was interested to find out that 34% of car journeys in Darlington had the potential to be made using alternative transport or walking/cycling. It makes you wonder what that figure is here in Honiton which is a much smaller town with shorter distances from the outskirts into the centre”.

Darlington had less than 1% of children cycling to school in 2004 and now seven years on, 8% of children cycle to school (the national average is just 2%).

Sharon adds “Apparently two out of three trips we make are less than 5 miles so there is a lot of potential to walk or cycle, but people do need safe routes, support and encouragement. Darlington was fortunate to obtain funding to allow them to run a bike hire scheme, develop a massive network of safe, marked routes, produce maps and guides, hold a cycling festival, and work constructively with schools and employers.”

Research also shows that improvements to sustainable travel can increase turnover in the high street by 5 to 15% because people who travel to the shops on foot, by bicycle or public transport perhaps surprisingly tend to spend more per head than those who travel by car.

Cycling is one of the easiest ways to fit exercise into your daily routine because it’s also a form of transport and can burn up to a staggering 650 calories in one hour. It is the third most popular recreational activity in the UK, with an estimated 3.1 million people cycling each month.

Inspired by her meeting in County Durham, Sharon is now talking with transport officers at East Devon District Council, Devon County Council and Sustrans to find out what plans they have to develop sustainable transport in the county and will be reporting back her findings to Honiton Town Council in due course.

Contact Sharon Pavey – co-ordinator East Devon Green Party

sdpavey@gmail.com

07740973990