Author: Martyn

My Current Concerns

What I am really looking forward to is having the time to focus upon just one or two issues at a time, but things are not working out that way.

Here is a summary of just what I have been dealing with over the last few months.

I’ve now got a new landlord and so odd details about my current tenancy have changed, but that is not my greatest issue to deal with.

It is the kind of limited housing options one gets over 75. A good example being it is no longer possible to get a mortgage.

So I am having to work out what are now my various housing options.

Meanwhile it is very noticeable how few activists there are in the North West, or people willing to travel the distances needed to maintain ongoing campaigning.

While both Tesco & Holland and Barrett are no longer selling Vegan cheese. So I am wondering just what they are playing about with. There are still a lot of places outside of the main towns where vegan options are very limited. This is at a time when we need many more people to become vegan in order to counter global warming.

On the plus side my need to contribute a lot of my time to the spycops public inquiry has lessened.

The other thing which I have noticed over the last couple of years is just how many of my old friends and comrades have died, or now have health issues which makes it difficult to see them.

That is essentially problematic as many of them are scattered throughout the globe.

This is the aspect of getting older which a lot of people don’t think about.

All of the above issues I’ll come back to over the next few months.

Come Join The Urgent Protest

I keep saying this, but wonder just how few people think the same.

The larger the number of people attending a protest event the less inclined I am to attend it, while if it is going to just attract a few people I’m much more likely to take part in it.

This comes from the experience of being on too many pickets of 2 to 5 people, and knowing just how much a couple more people attending will make.

At the same time I keep being told that protesters at the DRS depots, Springfields, Capenhust, or Whitehaven are just too far away to attend them.

Yet the very same people will urge me to attend national demonstrations which attraction vaste numbers, or that really are both difficult and expensive to attend.

That is why I will not be going to protest at Lakenheath, but will be going back to Whitehaven in June.

Highlights From ISC

Highlights From ISC

As some of you will know I am involved Information for Social Change [ ISC ] which is ‘ An activist organisation that examines issues of censorship, freedom and ethics amongst library and information workers…’

Over the years I have writted a lot which has been published in ISC.

The following are pieces which I think are still very relevent to what is happening right now/

In ISC 15

After the Organisation: A guide for Activists &Information workers.

         Introduction.

There are many manuals that are aimed at political organisers, which cover how to successfully organisea campaign, yet none of these ever go into how one might efficiently close down a campaigning body.

https://dn790001.ca.archive.org/0/items/information_for_social_change/ISC%2015%20Whole%20Issue%20fixed.pdf

In ISC 16.

        Going Through the Raid.

Why this article?

As I think many of you might already know , I have an interest in both the radical media and clandestine publishing. Librarians and radicals have an interest in alternative publishing and free speech. Yet there are very few radical Librarians that have had any direct experience of this kind of work. I think that I am also one of the few individuals within the radical Library world that has any direct experience of beingi nvolved with periodicals that have been raided.

https://dn790001.ca.archive.org/0/items/information_for_social_change/ISC%2016%20Whole%20Issue.pdf

Dave Dane

 About Dave

Dave Dane was an activist within Greenpeace [ London ] which is how I got to know him.

He had attained a degree in Organic Chemistry, becaming a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry, and went on to teach at a further education college in Haringey.

He was also a key figure within the London Anarchist Forum, active in his trade union, and within the IWW [ Industrial Workers of the World ].

The Most Well Read Individual

Something which Dave said on a regular basis was: “ I’ve read about that”.

That was a reflection of his wide ranging knowledge upon aspects of ancient history, radical history, aspects of science, trade unionism, and coins.

For a long time I was trying to persuade him to write a history of the ancient world via an examination of the various coins of the period. He was the only person I ever met who might have been able to do so.

His other great interest was playing chess which he continued to do
until very recently.

Sayings and Slogans

Dave had a wonderful way of making various political points via his slogans and posterboard on demonstrations.

Here are just two of my favourites

Outside of Australia House upon a demonstration about the building of the Franklin Dam –

‘ Damn the Dam’

Then while outside the French Embassy on the subject of Nukiller Bomb Tests at Muraora Atoll –

‘ No more banging in the Pacific.’

Outing Bob

Having known spycop Bob Lambert as Bob Robinson while he infiltrated Greenpeace [ London ] Dave joined a group of activists who outed him at a conference which was being held at the TUC building in Bloomsbury.

He was part of the group which distributed leaflets to those who attended the event.

It was only very recently that I learnt that it was Dave who distributed the leaflets to everyone who was on the speakers platform. That included Bob, who looked him in the eyes as he did so.

The Last Eight Years

Eight years ago Dave became a paraplegic and landed up in a care home due to medical negligence for which he took out a court case that he won.

Even then he continued a lot of his reading, while playing chess online and as part of a chess club.

During this period I would chat with him almost every day on the phone.

    Dave Dane

 March 7th 1951  - January 9th 2025

Getting Older And Collective Memory

There is something which increasingly comes to my mind.

The background being that one looses a lot of old friends as they become deceased, while others become so infirmed that one might only be able to chat with them on the phone from time to time.

Then there are all the people we loose of have lots contact with over the years. Some of them might just of moved on, but they might also be dead. It is sometimes very difficult to find out just which it is.

Yet there is something else which happens and most younger people don’t think about this, and that is how one might loose collective memory.

Some aspects of the spycops inquiry have really shown to me just why we need to keep good archives and keep in touch with old friends and comrades.

It all ties up with a sense of isolation.

Please keep this in mind over the coming years.

Though it is not helping if you like me have lived and worked in a lot of different places over a lifetime.

Bob Lambert Bob Robinson in His Different Personalities.

The different faces of Bob Lambert.

In his evidence Bob Lambert has referred to his undercover persona Bob Robinson in the Third Person.

He has also been trying to display himself as being very frail and forgetful, to which many people have said he is just telling lies.

This is not the only time he has reinvented himself as a public persona.

He did it when he became a well known academic.

It was certainly a shock to him when we exposed him as being a former spycop nearly a decade and a half ago.

Yet what if he has been doing this kind of thing so many times that now he lives with a multiple personality disorder ?

That might explain some of the way he reacts right now.

The whole performance he displays does remind me of a Shakespearean tragedy.

It would also make it very difficult for him to now try to write his autobiography.

The question is just what else will he come up with?

Be all this as it may, we still have to bring him to account for the way in which he has caused so much damage over the years.

Bob Lambert Spycop Evidence

The evidence given by Bob Lambert this week is very perturbing indeed.

Though getting any information from him is a very difficult process.

What upset me was what he said on Tuesday.

See: –

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MavZNV451qs

That was how and why he used me to become friends as a part of his undercover spycop cover persona.

I was not damaged as much as many other spycop victims, but I do find it upsetting.

It’s the way he treated some of the women who he targeted that are being focused upon in the press reports, but there is very little about the grief and pain they are still going through.

Dealing with this whole process does add to the deep sadness which effects me from time to time.

Pension Crisis

While a lot of fuss is being made about the winter fuel payment being snatched away from pensioners, and the triple lock, there is something which is not being considered.

For those of us who are of the Real Generation Rent, the most important issue to consider is rent inflation.

That is why pension increases should be based upon yearly rent inflation.

Meanwhile the 25% reduction in council tax needs rethinking as it discriminates again single pensioners.

Long term it should be viewed in relationship to the ongoing housing crisis, and the curtailment of social care/ social housing options for older people.

Spycops Inquiry Update

The spycops public inquiry has this week reached Tranch Two Part Two.

There is now a lot of evidence emerging about just what damage they inflicted upon many individuals.

They were also responsible for many miscarriages of justice, and adversely effected our political campaigning.

Here is an example of just what Bob Lambert who I knew as Bob Robinson got up to

I will be giving evidence about him in early November..