In response to the threat to their homeland posed by the construction of the M11 Link Road
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impact them to make the separation.
We, the inhabitants of Numbers Two to Twelve, Cambridge Park, also Number One Hundred and Six, Eastern Avenue, in Wanstead, do solemnly declare ourselves to be forthwith absolved of all allegiance to the British Crown, and our territory to be an Independent Free Area, henceforth to be known as Wanstonia.
We take this with great reluctance, and it is our intention to maintain cordial relations with Great Britain, and to allow free access to all friendly visitors. Nevertheless it is our view that Her Majesty�s Government of the United Kingdom, in inflicting yet another unnecessary, unpopular and deeply destructive road scheme on our locality, is showing inadequade regard for environmental concerns, or for the housing needs of the populus.
Our causes are these:
That our houses, gardens, trees, byways, open spaces and indeed all that we hold dear in our domain are to be utterly destroyed to make way for the M11 Link Road;
That, far from linking localities together, this motorway will cause brutal severance to the communities of Leyton, Leytonstone and Wanstead;
That this road will contribute not one scintilla of satisfaction or benefit to us or the surrounding communities;
That, by contrast, this road is constructed primarily for the benefit of those commercial interests known collectively as �the roads lobby�;
That this road has been imposed upon us, not through a reasonable and fair process of consultation, but through a weighted system of �public enquiry� in which the British Government, with unlimited access to taxpayers� money, with unlimited powers to select judge and jury, and with unlimited authority to determine the criteria and terms of reference of the inquiry, can engineer a decision through a process that bears no resemblance to what we and most of the rest of the world consider to be democracy;
And finally that our right to protest peacefully against this abuse of our rights, and the rights of the community, have been met with undue and sometimes viscious force and pernicious use of underhand tactics.
We therefore and more generally maintain,
That the unrelenting construction of motorways, red routes, cut-and-cover tunnels and all the other proposed conduits for high-speed traffic is incompatible with the pursuit of sustainable environmental policies;
That this same infrastructure will generate yet more of the very traffic that it is ostensibly designed to alleviate;
And that this traffic will further impair the health and restrict the freedom of those who are permitted to remain living in its vicinity.
We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That the protection of the environment takes precedent over infrastructural development;
That the provision of homes thakes precewdent over the provision of roads to serve those homes;
That fascilities provided for pedestrians, cyclists and public transport users take precedent over those provided for the use of private motor vehicles;
And that the interests of local communities take precedence over the opinions of remote political decision-makers.
Finally we advise the alien government of Great Britain:
That henceforth all political connexion between Wanstonia and the state of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved, until such time as the Governmnet of the Untied Kingdom of Great Britain shall abandon construction of the M11 Link Road;
And that as a Free and Independent Area we assume full power to resist foreign oppression, conclude peace, contract allies, join the United Nations and do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.
It is our hope and exactation that further Independent Free Areas will be declared elsewhere along the route of the M11 Link Road, and in other places threatened by infrastructural Imperealism.
We therefore call on all people who share these ideals and aspirations to come to the defence of the new domain, so that it may in time become the seed of a Confederation of Independent Free Areas, embodying our common concerns to protect and preserve our local, national and global environments.
For support of this decleration, with a firm reliance on the protection of the International Community, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our honour.
Leytonstone
Activist Group
environment & road protest camps - 2002
our mayday