The Land is Ours is a British
land rights
Land law is the form of law that deals with the rights to use, alienate, or exclude others from land. In many jurisdictions, these kinds of property are referred to as real estate or real property, as distinct from personal property. Land use a ...
campaign advocating access to the land, its resources, and the planning processes set up in 1995 by
George Monbiot
George Joshua Richard Monbiot ( ; born 27 January 1963) is a British writer known for his environmental and political activism. He writes a regular column for ''The Guardian'' and is the author of a number of books.
Monbiot grew up in Oxfordsh ...
and others.
History
Their first campaign was the occupation of the disused
Wisley Airfield
Wisley Airfield is a former wartime airfield located in the Parish of Ockham near Wisley in Surrey, England. Originally a grass airstrip, the runway was converted to tarmac in 1952 and used to test aircraft built at Weybridge by Vickers. Flying ...
in
Surrey
Surrey () is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county, non-metropolitan counties of England, county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant ur ...
by 400 people in 1995, from which there was a live broadcast on the BBC's ''
Newsnight
''Newsnight'' (or ''BBC Newsnight'') is BBC Two's news and current affairs programme, providing in-depth investigation and analysis of the stories behind the day's headlines. The programme is broadcast on weekdays at 22:30. and is also availa ...
'' programme.
Nearby
St. George's Hill
St George's Hill is a private gated community in Weybridge, Surrey, United Kingdom. The estate has golf and tennis clubs, as well as approximately 420 houses. Land ownership is divided between homes with gardens, belonging to home owners, and the ...
is symbolically significant as the site of a 1649 protest, when the
Diggers planted vegetables on the
common land
Common land is land owned by a person or collectively by a number of persons, over which other persons have certain common rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect wood, or to cut turf for fuel.
A person who has ...
there.
Throughout the summer of 1996, the group set up Pure Genius!!, an
eco-village
An ecovillage is a traditional or intentional community with the goal of becoming more socially, culturally, economically, and/or ecologically sustainable. An ecovillage strives to produce the least possible negative impact on the natural envi ...
on a derelict former distillery site owned by
Guinness
Guinness () is an Irish dry stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness at St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland, in 1759. It is one of the most successful alcohol brands worldwide, brewed in almost 50 countries, and available in ov ...
in
Wandsworth
Wandsworth Town () is a district of south London, within the London Borough of Wandsworth southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London.
Toponymy
Wandsworth takes its nam ...
,
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
.
The
squatted community was evicted the day before the
London Wildlife Trust
London Wildlife Trust (LWT), founded in 1981, is a local nature conservation charity for Greater London. It is one of 46 members of the Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts (known as The Wildlife Trusts), each of which is a local nature conservatio ...
were meeting to officially designate it as a conservation site containing many species of flowers and birds classed as extremely rare in London.
On 1 April 1999, on the 350th anniversary of
Gerrard Winstanley
Gerrard Winstanley (19 October 1609 – 10 September 1676) was an English Protestant religious reformer, political philosopher, and activist during the period of the Commonwealth of England. Winstanley was the leader and one of the found ...
and the Diggers' occupation of the same hill, ''The Land Is Ours'' organised a rally, then occupied land at St. Georges Hill near Weybridge, Surrey.
In April 2004, ''The Land Is Ours'' occupied
Castell Henllys
Castell Henllys (Welsh, "castle of the old court") is an important archaeological site in north Pembrokeshire, Wales, on the A487 road between Newport and Cardigan, in the parish of Nevern.
The Iron Age hillfort has been the subject of an ...
, a tourist site with reconstructed
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly ...
roundhouses, in protest at
Pembrokeshire Coast National Park
Pembrokeshire Coast National Park ( cy, Parc Cenedlaethol Arfordir Penfro) is a national park along the Pembrokeshire coast in west Wales.
It was established as a National Park in 1952. It is one of three national parks in Wales, the others ...
's decision to demolish
That Roundhouse
That Roundhouse is a roundhouse sited in woods within the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park near the town of Newport in Wales. It was constructed without planning permission during the winter of 1997/1998 by Tony Wrench and Jane Faith and hel ...
at nearby
Brithdir Mawr
Brithdir Mawr is an intentional community in Pembrokeshire, South Wales.
Community
The community is based on an farm. It is currently home to 10 adults and 7 children who live in individual family flats around the farmyard. The land is farmed o ...
.
Influence
In 2009, a group inspired by The Land Is Ours opened
Kew Bridge Eco Village, a squat on land owned by property developers
St George
Saint George ( Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldier ...
; this was evicted on 27 May 2010.
The Land Magazine
''The Land Magazine'' is a magazine, published by ''The Land Is Ours'', about landrights, at
Monkton Wyld Court,
Dorset
Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset. Covering an area of , ...
.
See also
*
Commons
The commons is the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Earth. These resources are held in common even when owned privately or publicly. Commons c ...
*
Freedom to roam
The freedom to roam, or "everyman's right", is the general public's right to access certain public or privately owned land, lakes, and rivers for recreation and exercise. The right is sometimes called the right of public access to the wilderness ...
*
Public land
In all modern states, a portion of land is held by central or local governments. This is called public land, state land, or Crown land (Australia, and Canada). The system of tenure of public land, and the terminology used, varies between countrie ...
References
External links
The Land is Ourswebsite
The Land is Ours email listThe Land Magazine
*https://tlio.gn.apc.org/contact-chapter-7/
TheLandIsOurs
yahoo groups
Yahoo! Groups was a free-to-use system of electronic mailing lists offered by Yahoo!.
Prior to February 2020, Yahoo! Groups was one of the world's largest collections of online discussion boards. It allowed members to subscribe to various group ...
Diggers 350
UK Squatting and Land Rights email information/article sharing and discussion service list, began in 1999
The Story of the Land
on George Monbiot
George Joshua Richard Monbiot ( ; born 27 January 1963) is a British writer known for his environmental and political activism. He writes a regular column for ''The Guardian'' and is the author of a number of books.
Monbiot grew up in Oxfordsh ...
's website.
Video from Pure Genius campaign
{{DEFAULTSORT:Land is Ours
Environmental organisations based in the United Kingdom
Land rights movements