The article makes the claim:
Oxfordshire County Council Pass Climate Lockdown 'trial' to Begin in 2024.
Residents will be confined to their local neighbourhood and have to ask permission to leave it all to 'save the planet' and goes on to list the ways in which this will be done.
Analysis:
Declaring a Climate Emergency.
Oxford City Council declared a Climate Emergency in 2019, and held a Citizens Assembly on Climate Change. Their declaration states: "In January 2019, Oxford City Council members unanimously declared a climate emergency and agreed to create a citizens assembly in Oxford to help consider new carbon targets and additional measures to reduce emissions."
(A citizens assembly is an idea created by Extinction Rebellion founder Roger Hallum.)
Climate Action Plan.
In conjunction with City councillors; Oxfordshire County Council created a Climate Action Plan to 'Tackle the Climate Emergency' This includes the head of the County Council stating: "There will be significant challenges to our ambitions. It requires rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society and a strong lead from national government. But we are experiencing a moment in time at which our pace of learning and appetite for change is rapid. We have adopted new skills and adapted how we live and work. It is this ingenuity that we will draw upon as we address the climate emergency. We will ‘build back better’ for a zero-carbon, resilient economy, strong communities and a healthy place to live."
"The future we will create will not be based on business-as-usual decision making."
Declaration.
The action plan states Oxfordshire County Council are: a Climate Active Council, that Oxford is a 'Living Laboratory' for its experiments and that the council intend to 'design-out energy inequality' whilst also declaring that 'electric and active travel as the new normal' see here: https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/sites/default/files/file/about-council/OCC_Climate_Action_Framework2020.pdf
Awarding themselves extra powers.
In declaring a 'Climate Emergency' Oxford Councils afforded themselves new powers including what they call ETROs (Experimental Traffic Regulation Orders)
The powers Oxfordshire County Council awarded themselves were over and above their constitution enabling the council to implement the plans that they otherwise would not have the powers to do.
15 Minute City Plan
Oxfordshire County Council have passed a plan to divide the city into 6 Zones. with Its 150,000 residents being allowed to use their cars as much as they like 'within their district'. However, those 150,000 residents will only be able to drive outside their allotted zone a maximum of 100 occasions a year. Private cars are the entire focus of these strict new plans.
Under the new proposals, if any of Oxford’s 150,000 residents drives outside of their designated district more than 100 days a year, he or she will be fined £70 for each breach of the rules.
Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras will be installed to monitor vehicles going through the traffic filters. Traffic signs will identify the location of each traffic filter, including operational hours and vehicles that are exempt to travel through.
Duncan Enright, Oxfordshire County Council’s cabinet member for travel and development strategy, explained the authority’s traffic filter proposals in an interview in The Sunday Times.
In the interview Enright claimed that Road blocks stopping most motorists from driving through Oxford city centre will divide the city into six “15 minute” neighbourhoods.
Enright also said that the plan "will go ahead whether residents like it or not."
Forcing residents to stay in an allotted zone or face fines in the name of a climate emergency is a form of climate lockdown.
Oxfordshire County Council is planning to introduce "climate lockdowns" and have past a series of measure to this effect. So called 'fact-checkers' and activists claiming to be journalists have deliberately misinterpreted the article to push their various agendas whilst the inevitable straw-man argument about conspiracy theorists is trotted out about the authors rather than putting a robust argument about the original article, which they have not read.
Verdict: TRUE
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