I don’t know about you, but our heads are starting to spin somewhat with all that’s going on this month! Now’s the time, people. In whatever way you feel called, please get involved. Our planet needs you NOW!

We had a wonderful (though very hot and exhausting!) time at the Northern Green Gathering. It was so good to connect with rebels from other XR North Local Groups who came along to help with outreach, block printing, badge-making, games, listening circles and workshops. Huge THANK YOU to everyone who took part!

In this month’s newsletter…

Dates for your diary in September

9th September: Axe Drax Comms Blockade! People-v-Lobbyists phone banking action – see below for details.

13th-20th September: Climate Coalition’s Mass Lobby Week Join others in your constituency to meet your MP – see below for details.

16th September, 5.30pm-8pm: Green Drinks Leeds at Imagine Leeds: the Climate Action Hub, 9 Blenheim Terrace, Leeds LS2 9HZ. Full details here. This month our guest speaker is Andrew Metheven from War Resisters’ International and Climate Action Leeds. This event is happening during the Global Week of Action for Peace and Climate Justice.

20th September: “Make Them Pay” Global Day of Action (Climate Justice Coalition) March in London – see below for details.

22nd & 29th September: Reclaim the Power: support the Drax 15 defendants at Leeds Magistrates Court – see below for details.

22nd September: Insure our Survival: Leeds Action Join us outside AXA’s Leeds office (21 Queen Street, Leeds LS1 2TW) – see below for details.

27th September: Active Hope Book Group Our next six week course begins – see Activist Wellbeing Support section below for details.

28th September, 10am-4pm: An Introduction to the Art of Listening (& The Joy of Being Heard!) Workshop at Imagine Leeds, the Climate Action Hub, 9 Blenheim Terrace, Leeds LS2 9HZ – see Activist Wellbeing Support section below for details.

Looking ahead to COP30… save the dates

14th & 15th November 2025 (Friday & Saturday): We need a big mobilisation on 15th November, the middle weekend of the COP30 negotiations in Brazil. As usual, this will be part of a global day of action for climate justice, and will follow a day of workplace climate action by UK trade unions the day before (14th November).

We’ll be working with Trade Unions as it is the year of Trade Union Climate Action and we are all keen to involve other groups, for example those involved in health, housing, anti-racism, anti-war and social welfare. The plan for West & North Yorkshire groups is for a rally/march, followed by an indoor space for networking, in Leeds.

Further details to follow soon. If you are part of any groups that would like to be involved, email us at xrleeds@protonmail.com and we’ll put you in touch with the organisers.

Axe Drax Comms Blockade – 9th September

Earlier this year, Drax was granted billions more in public subsidies for burning trees, following aggressive lobbying from Grayling. Join us to send Grayling an unmissable message: cut ties with Drax now.

Grayling’s contract with Drax even directly contradicts their own ethics policy, which states that they ‘would never accept fees or a contract from a company that we know to have knowingly broken environmental regulation in any of the countries in which we operate’. Drax has broken environmental regulations in the US 11,000 times.

As long as Grayling’s relationship with Drax continues, Grayling are equally responsible for every person suffocated and forest burned through Drax’s operations. We will be blocking the phone lines of Grayling to make sure they get the message to cut ties with Drax now! Sign up to join the action by joining the WhatsApp chat group.

Sign the Drax petition

Just last week, Drax’s shares tumbled 12% as the Financial Conduct Authority launched an investigation into Drax, following the explosive whistleblower tribunal earlier this year. Drax now wants to build a huge AI data processing centre in North Yorkshire. If their proposal is successful, it will mean more forests felled, communities polluted and ever-increasing emissions from the UK’s single largest carbon emitter. Please sign this petition against the proposal.

Support The Drax 15 – 22nd September

This month 15 peaceful climate protesters are in court after they were pre-emptively arrested in a police operation that cost millions of pounds while far-right violence was spreading across the country last summer. The Drax 15 will stand trial at Leeds Magistrates Court starting on 22nd September and the trial is expected to last until 2nd October.

Please join us outside the court for the first day of the trial on Monday 22nd September from 9am. We’ll be around all day and will have a collective moment at midday if you can’t make it first thing. We’ll be back at the same times on Monday, 29th September. Join us in solidarity with the Drax 15 to show that peaceful protest cannot be silenced and we will continue to speak out about what the government is doing in our name.

Drax power station in North Yorkshire is the UK’s single largest carbon emitter and it receives hundreds of millions of pounds of public money every year in subsidies. It burns wood pellets shipped from Mississippi in the US where trees are milled and processed at the Drax plant in Gloster, creating significant local air pollution, before being burnt in the UK.

The Drax 15 stand in solidarity with Greater Greener Gloster, a community response to the environmental racism of the Drax plant in Mississippi. Greater Greener Gloster seeks justice for the damages associated with the air pollution affecting their community. You can watch their stories here.

Act Now Change Forever – Mass Lobby Week, 13th to 20th September, the Climate Coalition & REAL Change Campaign by Zero Hour

On 9th July, more than 5,000 people came together in Westminster to call for a healthier, fairer, safer future for people, climate and nature. Together, we sent a powerful message to MPs: communities across the UK are united in demanding action. The Mass Lobby was just the beginning. We showed what’s possible when people show up together to demand a better future. And many MPs have commented on how effective lobbying such as this really makes them sit up and take notice.

Now, it’s time to take the next step by arranging a local meeting (preferably with a group of other concerned citizens in your constituency) with your MP in or around this week of action. Once you have arranged a meeting, please be sure to log it on the map! All the tools and details you need can be found here.

Leeds City Council’s Local Plan Consultation – deadline 15th September

Leeds City Council is consulting on the future of Leeds Bradford Airport until 15 September. Responding to this consultation matters because the Local Plan will set priorities for future planning decisions and LBA will make a new expansion planning application before long. Please send in your response before 15 September and ask your friends and family too. You can use GALBA’s guidance on how to respond here.

Climate Action Leeds have also produced a detailed Consultation Response Guide to help people to respond to all of the consultation questions, not just about the airport.

Update on Imagine Leeds – the Climate Action Hub

We’re working hard with Climate Action Leeds to save this vital resource hub when Lottery funding comes to an end later this month. The good news is that the University of Leeds have agreed to extend the lease at 9 Blenheim Terrace until March 2026, so we have a little breathing space to find a more ideal premises.

Insure our Survival, International Action in Leeds – 22nd September

From 8th-22nd September, people around the world will be taking part in actions urging insurance companies to stop funding fossil fuel projects. You can find more detail and information here.

In Leeds, we will be outside AXA’s office on Monday 22nd September with Discobedience paying Leeds a visit, as well as some colourful displays and plenty of “Climate Crime Scene” tape! Come and join us – keep a look out on our XR Leeds Announcements WhatsApp group as plans unfold.

World Water Wedding Campaign

24th August saw the launch of the World Water Wedding campaign, with people and groups from across the country committing to protect and nurture our precious water sources. The campaign will build up to next year’s global day of action on World Water Day, 22nd March, where people around the world will commit to honour and safeguard their local water by ‘marrying’ them in mass weddings and commit to care for water for life.

We’d love more people to get involved in the campaign! There are options to suit everyone, from creative family-friendly actions to ones that have more spice! Committing to water is a way to build awareness and create protection for our waterways in the UK. With the World Water Wedding campaign, you can do just that, with all of us beside you! All the information and resources to help you get inspired through the next month of actions, and beyond, are on the Rebel Toolkit: [World Water Wedding | Rebel Toolkit]

Two members of XR Ilkley have committed to knowing, caring for and celebrating the River Wharfe by walking the entire length of the river, from its source to its end.

That’s 81 miles in total!

They’ll be walking it on weekends from the beginning of October till just before Christmas, with potential for wider public engagement at various points en route. They would love it if other people would like to help with this, e.g. with banner drops, leafleting, creating striking visuals, etc. Please let us know if you’d like to help and we’ll put you in touch.

Petitions to sign & share

Stop all airport expansions!

More than 20 airports across the UK have expansion plans, which will result in a combined increase of 60%+ capacity. More flights means more emissions, at a time when we should be doing everything we can to reduce emissions and avert climate catastrophe. You can watch a short film about the issue here. Please sign & share this Parliamentary petition today!

End the Prosecution of Peaceful Protesters in the UK!

The arrest of peaceful protesters is a violation of the UK’s international obligations to protect the rights of freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. This cannot go unchallenged. Over 700 people have been arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000 for peacefully protesting the banning of Palestine Action in the UK.

You may have also seen that some of the organisers involved in the Defend our Juries protests had their homes raided and were arrested this week! Watch their recent Lift The Ban press conference here. Further protests are planned this weekend, with over 1,000 people pledging to take part in London and more in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Please add your name to Amnesty’s letter, urging the UK’s Chief Prosecutors to drop all charges against peaceful protesters.

Tell Keir Starmer to make the fracking ban law!

There’s a pause on fracking in England but it’s not written into law. That makes it easier for any future government to allow fracking to start again. This would put England at risk of environmental degradation and earthquakes caused by fracking – and set back the fight against climate breakdown. Sign the petition here.

Oh For Frack’s Sake!

We’re also part of a team supporting Frack Free Coastal Communities in Burniston (near Scarborough) who are currently fighting a planning application by Europa to start fracking in their village. Small scale projects such as this one are not included under the Government’s current moratorium but surely need to be included! We’ll have more news to share with you on this in the coming weeks, but in the meantime, watch this short film and please sign and share their parliamentary petition far and wide!

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Call for a Maximum Wage

The Equality Trust and the High Pay Centre are calling for a maximum wage. Their research shows that the median FTSE 100 CEO is now paid 122 times more than their average employee. In a recent poll, nearly 3 in 4 people thought the limit should be 10 times the salary or less; 93% said that there should be CEO pay caps. If you support the caps, now’s the time to sign & share this petition here

Make Them Pay, London – 20th September

We’ll be taking to the streets in central London for the Make Them Pay demonstration – and we want you to join us! Half the world’s emissions come from a handful of fossil fuel companies. Polluting corporations across a host of sectors have known about the danger they’re putting us all in for decades. Make Them Pay is an alliance that represents millions of workers, citizens and communities across Britain, with three key demands:

💰Tax the super-rich

👷Protect workers, not billionaires

🛢️Make polluters pay

More than 80 organisations – unions, grassroots groups, NGOs and beyond – are signed up in support of Make Them Pay and will be joining others around the world for a globally coordinated day of action leading up to COP30. We hope you will join us and come together to deliver a powerful show of our movement’s strength.

Low-cost coach travel is being arranged from Leeds: more details here. XR UK are looking for help with stewarding and other roles – click here if you can help. If you’re going and would like to keep in touch with other XR Crew in the “Climate Bloc”, you can join this Telegram chat. Learn more from Tax Justice UK’s “Debunk the 5 Biggest Myths about the Wealth Tax”.

Activist Wellbeing Support

Active Hope Book Group: our next six-week course is starting on Saturday, 27th September. You can find more details here. (Please note, due to other commitments, dates have changed since our last newsletter).

Full Day Workshop: An Introduction to the Art of Listening (& the Joy of Being Heard!) on Sunday 28th September 2025, 10am to 4pm, at Imagine Leeds, the Climate Action Hub, 9 Blenheim Terrace, Leeds LS2 9HZ. Get more details and register here.

Listening Circles: we’re hoping to get some more listening circles organised in the coming months, so please keep a look out on our socials. In the meantime, Anne-Lise is helping to facilitate two online listening circle events with Greenpeace on 4th September and 6th October (both at 6.00pm to 7.30pm).

Did you know? We are now affiliated with the UK Counselling Network who have recently opened their new satellite office in Headingley, Leeds. (Anne-Lise will soon be starting to hold Listening Circles for them too!). Check out their website for more info.

Good news stories

Green space in Leeds: take a look at this fab CityEd. summary of latest green space development in Leeds city centre.

Orchard survives wildfire: with all the heartbreaking scenes of wildfires around southern Europe this summer, this “miracle” story from Turkey shows it is possible to work with nature to minimise the devastation.