Norwegian Day with Shell to Sea

dublin | rights, freedoms and repression | event notice Sunday May 14, 2006 14:39 by Shell to Sea - Dublin Shell to Sea dublinshelltosea at gmail dot com 0876181620

Assemble at Trinity College (Main Gate) at 10.45AM on Wednesday 17th May. Walk to St. Stephen's Green for a speech by the Norwegian Ambassador and music from the Garda Band.

Shell to Sea activists will join in the commemoration of Norwegian Independence, with a parade up Grafton Street from Trinity College on Wednesday morning. We will be handing out lleaflets and hopefully getting our pictures in the Norwegian papers.

Andy Pyle of Shell Exploitation Ireland may attend.

May 17th is commemorated every year by Norwegians all around the world as the anniversary of their country's independence.

This year in Ireland it will also be marked by Shell to Sea activists who want to point out the absurd situation whereby the people of Ireland will benefit nothing from the Corrib gas field, while the people of Norway will see the profits invested in their schools, hospitals and pensions. As the Irish Times put it last Autumn:

"The plain people of Norway own just over 71 per cent of Statoil. Statoil has a 36.5 per cent stake in the development of the Corrib field. (Shell has 45 per cent and Marathon 18.5 per cent.) That means that the citizens of Norway effectively own 25.5 per cent of the gas from the Corrib field. Which is precisely 25.5 per cent more than the citizens of Ireland do. A resource that lies 70 kilometres off the Mullet peninsula in Co Mayo will benefit Erik and Elsa Soap in Bergen far more than it will benefit Joe and Josephine Soap in Belmullet."

"In an almost comically absurd expression of our addiction to misgovernment, we will buy our own gas at commercial rates from, among others, the Norwegian people. Last year, 67 per cent of Statoil's profits were taken by the state in the form of taxes, boosting the exchequer in Oslo by around €5.7 billion. If these tax rates continue to apply, that means that for every €100 worth of profit that is made from Irish people buying our own Corrib gas over the next 15 years or so, around €17 will go into the Norwegian exchequer. Most of it, presumably, will go into the vast Government Petroleum Fund, which the Norwegian state is storing up against the day when its own oil runs out. So Irish gas will be helping to pay the pensions of Sami deer-herders in Lapland in 2050."
- Irish Times August 30th 2005.

Shell to Sea thinks the Corrib deal should be negotiated for the benefit of the the people of Ireland. We admire the way that the Norwegians have managed their own natural resources. However we're not very happy that they are allowed to take ours too, without giving us anything in return.

Please come along and join in our peaceful demonstration to show the world that we're unhappy with the way our government is giving away our resources for nothing. We'd be better off applying for Norwegian citizenship.

Call Tadhg for details of the protest- 087 618 1620.