ePetition details
Stop spraying weedkiller containing glyphosate in the London Borough of Islington
Please sign my petition asking the London Borough of Islington
to stop spraying weedkillers containing glyphosate, now recognised
as a carcinogen, in parks, streets and communal areas.
In 2015 research by the World Health Organization’s
international agency for research on cancer (IARC) classified
glyphosate as ‘probably carcinogenic to humans’.
Usually sold as Round Up, glyphosate is produced by Monsanto, who
face paying billions of dollars in damages in three cases in the
USA, where juries have found the claimants’ cancers are
linked to their use of a weedkiller containing glyphosate.
A weed is simply a plant growing where we don’t want it, and
bare earth will always be taken over by ‘weeds’; some,
such as rosebay willowherb, creeping buttercup or herb robert, are
attractive and beneficial to bees, butterflies and insects. Many
cities, such as Strasborg and Copenhagen, have eliminated the use
of herbicides by simply encouraging their residents to see weeds as
wild plants, rather than the untidy result of neglect. (Damaging
plants, such as Japanese knotweed can always be controlled by the
injection of glyphosate rather than spraying.)
The London Borough of Islington has the lowest ratio of open space
to built-up areas of any London borough and, despite severe
financial pressures, it has done much to improve biodiversity in
the borough with its Biodiversity Action Plan, the Ecology Centre
and the establishment of a community plant nursery on a Tufnell
Park housing estate. Islington celebrates its limited green spaces
every year with Islington in Bloom, with awards for everything from
window boxes and treepits, to communal gardens and school
playgrounds, all of which provide essential habitats, food and
nectar for birds. bees, insects and butterflies. In 2018,
environmental chief, Cllr Claudia Webb, told participants:
‘From children carefully tending a tree pit near their home,
to groups of residents coming together to transform community
spaces bursting with flowers … your passion and dedication
makes our community a richer place...’
Islington undoubtedly values its precious green spaces, and its residents’ efforts to enhance them, so why does it endanger the health of workers, residents and wildlife by using a substance that the World Health Organisation classifies as ‘probably carcinogenic to humans’?
Please support this petition by signing it, and then sending the
link to people who live or work in Islington.
Thank you.
This ePetition ran from 15/07/2019 to 31/10/2019 and has now finished.
234 people signed this ePetition.