People in the Park

Salisbury group attends this event with its focus on sustainability

May 2026

This event, organised by Salisbury Transition City each year with 75 exhibitors present this year. The theme is sustainability and with this in mind the Salisbury group focused on the abuse behind the manufacture an everyday item such as a pair of jeans. Billions are made every year and millions are employed in making them. This followed the publication by Amnesty International of a report Stitched Up which details the multiple abuses of this massive industry. From health hazards, physical and sexual abuse of the mainly female workforce, wage theft and the denial of union and collective bargaining rights are all described. The failure of high street retailers to control adequately what is going on is also noted.

The results were muted and only a few of the handouts were taken (see below). It is disappointing to report the Mayor of Salisbury and her party quickly walked past our stall without stopping. Perhaps it was because people view sustainability mainly as an environmental problem. The idea that globalisation and the abuses that flow from it is perhaps not so well appreciated. Massive amounts of water are consumed in their production and of course the fuel needed to move the items from country to country during the course of their manufacture.

Clearly the idea that abuses taking place on the far side of the globe are both a human rights and a sustainable issue is not well recognised. Around a quarter of the cotton used comes from the Xinjiang region of China where the abuse of Uyghurs is taking place and their culture being systematically destroyed. Thousands are engaged in forced labour to produce the cotton. The region is closed to outsiders for obvious reasons.

There is work to do to convince people that sustainability is not just about trees – important though that is – but about the clothes we wear, where they come from and how they’re made. Retailers can continue to sell goods made with the exploitation of millions of mostly female workers, some in near slave like conditions, while claiming their humanitarian credentials on their web sites.

Salisbury vigil #127 well attended

Good turnout for the latest vigil. High level of recognition from passers-by

Excellent turnout to today’s vigil with around 35 coming. There was also a fairly steady flow of car horns from passing motorists. A larger number than usual of people stopped to take note – nearly a hundred – which is encouraging. In a few days it is Nakba Day, which commemorates the expulsion and death of at least 700,000 Arabs and Palestinians following the establishing of Jewish state in 1948 at the end of the British mandate. Prior to that event and the violence which took place in 1948/49, Jews and Palestinians lived side by side in the area together with other communities.

It is important to remember the events of 1948 which cast a shadow over what is happening today. In the photo below you’ll notice a key which has symbolic importance. When people were evicted from their homes by Israeli forces or the Hagana, they kept their keys in the hope of returning one day. It never happened as most of the settlements were destroyed. Much of our media focus on the terrible events of October 7th and ignore the considerably more massive events of an earlier era.

Nakba event

There will be an event run by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign in London on 16 May, see the Salisbury CND site for further details and background. Following the terrible events and attacks in Golders Green, there have been calls for a ban on marches such as this.

Being able to protest is an important right we have and governments of all persuasions have been keen to limit or control them. Labour has introduced further legislation and controls and left to their own devices would probably cancel this one. They are aided by some elements of the media labelling them ‘hate’ or ‘terror’ marches.

Once again we must note the absence of the local MP Mr John Glen at this or any of the previous 126 vigils. In a letter to the Salisbury Journal, which provides him with a column each week, he said he was a ‘proud member’ of the Conservative Friends of Israel lobby organisation in Westminster. Labour and LibDem MPs are also members of their respective friends groups making it the largest such lobby organisation.

A video of the vigil can be seen here, courtesy of Peter Gloyns (and the photo).

We shall be at People in the Park next Saturday 16th, so if you are interested in joining us or saying ‘hello’ that would be a good opportunity to do so.

Previous posts:

• A most terrible prison
• The tragedy only gets worse
• Execution spree continues in Florida
• Vigil following a horrific week
• Podcast Episode: Rights Trade And Sustainability

People in the Park

Members of the group will be there on Saturday

May 2025

Members of the Salisbury group will be at the People in the Park event this Saturday 17th from around 10:00 and we would be delighted to see you. It would be a good opportunity to say hello if you are interested in joining us. To get an idea of what we are doing, have a glance at our last set of minutes and news. Look forward to seeing you there.

The following handout will be available.

• Appeal case – arms to Israel
• Arms to Israel: the Appeal starts
• Big increase in executions in Iran
• People in the Park
• The 75th Vigil

#PeopleInThePark #Salisbury

Forthcoming group activities

These are the activities planned for the coming months

April 2025

This is a list of forthcoming events the Salisbury group will be engaged in over the coming months. Each of them would be a good opportunity to approach us if you were thinking of joining. To join us is free but to become a member of Amnesty International UK there is a membership fee. The group, as well as campaigning for prisoners of conscience, is increasingly concerned with the erosion of rights in the UK. Britain has a proud history of protest and such activity has led to a number of reforms: a look at this list will give you a taste of the numbers that have taken place over the centuries. The essential truth is that those who have power do not like relinquishing it. Recent governments have introduced legislation making it harder to protest and have given the Police even more powers to arrest or interrupt demonstrations. It is more than ever important to be part of organisations like ours to stand firm against governments and their paymasters who want to clamp down on opposition.

Several of our local MPs are reported in They Work for You website as ‘generally voting against’ human rights matters. Danny Kruger, the MP for the newly created East Wiltshire constituency (which starts about a mile north of Salisbury), would like to see the Human Right Act abolished. Protecting our rights is therefore truly important as we cannot rely on our elected representatives to do it for us.

Events

• Market stall in the Market place, Salisbury on 3 May starting at 9am and finishing at 1pm. If you have any items for the stall, please bring them along on the day.
• People in the Park where we will have a stand on 17 May for most of the day. This would be an ideal opportunity to make contact.
• We are continuing with our school visits (this won’t be an opportunity to drop by of course) and something we see as important*. The last one of the current programme is in June.
• A presence on the EcoHub stall in the Market place on a Tuesday. Dates to be confirmed but likely to be late summer/autumn. Dates will be posted on here, on Facebook (@Salisburyai) and on Bluesky once agreed .
• A coffee morning at St Thomas’s Church Salisbury on 5 July from around 10am. Home made cakes available and in the centre of the City.
• Don’t forget that we take place – with other groups in Salisbury – in the vigils which take place in the Market place by the Library every Saturday. They are for peace in the Middle East and in particular Gaza where over 50,000 have now died, the majority of whom were women and children. Thousands more are unaccounted for under the rubble. We have just held our 70th such event. They start at 5pm for half an hour.

Later in the year we will be holding:

• Death penalty action on the World Day Against the Death Penalty – see Amnesty’s recently published report for 2024 – on 10 October. See also our monthly reports on the death penalty the latest of which has just been posted.
• Write for Rights will be on 30 November.

Other events which are not yet settled are:

• Evensong at the Cathedral. The Cathedral has the Prisoner of Conscience window and the Amnesty candle on display. Agreed date under discussion.
• Refugee Week. Details not known yet. See our latest Refugee report.

*If by chance you are a teacher reading this at a school in South Wiltshire and would like to discuss a visit as part of your school’s citizenship programme, please get in touch.

#evensong #events #HumanRights #marketStall #PeopleInThePark #Salisbury #WDADP

March minutes

Minutes of our meeting in March

March 2025

We are pleased to attach our minutes (and almost a newsletter) from the March meeting of the group thanks to group member Lesley for compiling them. They contain details of future events (towards the end) as well as items on the death penalty, refugees and other items of interest. The meeting took place on 12 March.

#GroupNews #Iran #PeopleInThePark #Salisbury #USA