ministry for peace - Diana Basterfield, Co-Founder of the ministry for peace interviewed by Tree Staunt

Diana Basterfield, Co-Founder of the ministry for peace interviewed by Tree Staunton,
Editor of Transformations - The Journal for Psychotherapists and Counsellors for Social Responsibility
Summer 2004

Where did the idea come from?

I went to the enormous Stop the War March last February; it was fantastic, I've never seen so many people and such diversity on a march - Asian women, babies in buggies, all age groups, people from all backgrounds. What I sensed was that people were not just marching against this specific war but were expressing their opposition to the strategy of using state violence to achieve political ends. It was as if we had made a leap of political maturity.

Around this time I had an email from the Global Renaissance Alliance - co-created by Marianne Williamson, Neale Donald Walsh and Thom Hartmann - saying that US Congressman Dennis Kucinich was trying to set up a Department of Peace at Cabinet level in the States. I had a look at the website www.dopcampaign.org and found that back in 2001- even before 9/11 -he'd put a motion to Congress which had so far gathered 48 signatures. It is a very comprehensive policy and includes a peace education programme. He'd even set a budget - 3% of the current defence budget. I was very impressed. Then one day it suddenly occurred to me - if they could have a Department of Peace so could we. But let's call it a Ministry to distinguish between the two.

My mind was racing. How to proceed? I spotted an advertisement for a Labour Against the War conference, and went along and asked the last speaker, Tony Benn, for ideas on how to promote the idea of a Ministry for Peace. He suggested that I write an article for Tribune and Labour Left Briefing. This I did and also sent the article to the MPs who had organised the conference asking if I could meet them. John McDonnell, (Hayes and Harlington) replied and was very helpful in getting the articles into the magazines. He also agreed to meet me and from that we decided to organise an initial meeting at the House of Commons.

I had recently started going to a Peace Circle - an initiative started by the Global Renaissance Alliance - where up to ten people meet and support one another's initiatives for peace. By happy coincidence Marianne Williamson's UK agent is also a member of the group - and through her I found out that Marianne was coming over to give a workshop in London in July. As Marianne was working very closely with Dennis Kucinich - a Democratic candidate for US President - I suggested to John that we ask her to be the keynote speaker: he agreed.

So on 1st July 2004 fifty four people came along to one of the committee rooms looking out over the river. Marianne's talk was very well received and everyone agreed to meet up again in September after they'd had a chance to go back to their groups and see how much interest there was. Marianne then left for a holiday in Italy and a few days later she rang to say that she'd told Dennis about the meeting and he was so excited by it he had asked her to return to London on her way back to the US to see how, together, we could turned this into a global Department/Ministry for Peace movement.

How did you go about introducing legislation?

John McDonnell applied for a Ten Minute Rule Bill. This is a backbencher's opportunity to put forward a proposal for legislation where the proposer speaks on the floor of the House of Commons for ten minutes and, if unopposed, the bill goes through to the next stages. If there is an opposer they can also speak for ten minutes and then there is a vote. By the time of the second open meeting in mid September he'd been given 14th October for the debate and now, suddenly, we had to write a parliamentary bill in less than a month! A Steering Committee was quickly set up specifically to write the bill and publicise it. Through a Quaker participant, we were able to have free use of a meeting room at Friends Meeting House on the Euston Road and two members of the group, one a barrister, anglicised Dennis's DoP bill with further help from a city lawyer.

The big day came and eight of us went along to watch from the public gallery. John made a very good speech - it's on the website - and no-one objected, which surprised him, so the bill was passed. Unfortunately there was no way it could become law because there was no time for it to have a second reading since the parliamentary session ended on 21st November. This is not as disappointing as it sounds. Having a TMRB means that for some weeks the name and date of the bill is publicised in the parliamentary timetable so MPs cannot fail to notice the title, plus there is the debate which in this case was fairly well attended as Sarah Teather, the new Lib Dem MP for Brent was sworn in just before John got up to speak. In addition, the Stationery Office publishes the Bill free of charge so there is a record there too. The aim now is to get an Adjournment Debate in the current session and a bill proposal through the House of Lords. John has been assured by the Whips that he will be given another TMRB date in the next session of Parliament - after November 2004.

What happened next?

We have developed a pattern of holding public meetings roughly once a month in what we have now begun to consider "our room" - the Grand Committee Room, just off the historic Westminster Hall. As John said at one of the meetings, he plays the most important role in the ministry for peace - he books the room! At the October meeting we asked for volunteers to join a new Steering Committee - twenty five people signed up - and then followed a frantic couple of months with almost nightly meetings building the organisation.

The first major question was to decide what kind of organisation we should be to best persuade the government to introduce a new ministry - a campaigning group, a confrontational anti-government group or a quiet 'whisper in influential ears' group? I'm an NLP Master Practitioner and know that real influence comes through building rapport with people. Others on the Committee disagreed and wanted nothing to do with government. The argument went back and forth for a while and then finally it was agreed that we would be most effective if we developed a dialogue with government and civil servants and were non-confrontational. I heaved a mighty sigh of relief! It was also agreed that there should be an independent, civil society Commission for Peace. This would empower us, the people, and also play an audit role akin to that the Audit Commission plays in relation to the Treasury in ensuring that it keeps to its brief.

At the October meeting someone came up and offered to set up a website for us. I asked Christopher Titmuss - the Buddhist writer and Dharma teacher - who has supported us from the beginning, to write something about what the culture of an organisation such as ours should be. He wrote an excellent piece, it's on the website, and this included the concept that the means and the end should be the same. This concept was agreed by the Steering Committee - after all, if we are advocating a Ministry for Peace we should walk our talk. (I have to say that this is easier said than done when a group is made up of passionate, articulate peacemakers!) A few of us got together a 'culture of the organisation group' and concluded that what was needed was an away weekend to look at developing a 'walk the talk' culture and also give us time to give to put together a purpose statement and agree an organisational structure. At the end of January thirty three mfp-ers went out to the Teikyo Centre in Buckinghamshire with two expert facilitators, David Wasdell and Masana da Souza who generously donated their time.

What did you decide about a work programme for the Ministry for Peace?

It would have been very difficult to create a programme from the diversity of attitudes towards peace both within mfp and ideas suggested in response to the questionnaire we had up on the website for several months last year. By great good fortune I came across David Gray at a peace conference in Norwich and he spoke about UNESCO's work on a Declaration and Programme of Action of a Culture of Peace. In 1999 this was sent up to the UN and all 191 members of the General Assembly voted for it. Soon after they also voted for a Decade of a Culture of Peace for Young People to run from 2001-2010. We set up a small group to draw up a purpose statement and my contribution was to propose that we adopt the UN 1999 Declaration as the Ministry's work programme. It was accepted and then ratified by the Steering Committee.

The declaration covers eight action areas:

Since April there have been eight groups whose co-ordinators form the National Co-ordinating Committee. The groups have a fair degree of independence but send controversial issues up to the NCC for ratification. We are now also a membership organisation - £10 a year - and members can attend NCC meetings and speak but cannot vote. We have also set up a limited non profit company and have five directors to regularise our governance arrangements. We would like to apply to become a charity but are not eligible to do so under the current Charity Commission legislation.

Glad you asked that. We consider that in addition to pursing the route of legislation we have a duty to inform the public and ourselves about progressive peace ideas. In January we had Kai Brandt-Jacobsen from Transcend talk to us about the Iraq war and how it could have been handled differently using their methodology. We were so impressed that we have asked Kai to run a five day training specifically for us. The first three days would be looking at Transcend's overall approach and the last two would specifically cover the 1999 UN Declaration's eight action areas and aim to come up with concrete proposals for each of them that we would put to government. In April we organised a one day conference on the theme: Peace builder or warmonger? Britain's role in the 21st century. Speakers included Lord Ahmed, Scilla Elworthy, Tony Juniper, Kierra Box, Christopher Titmus, Paul Ingram, Steve Woolley, John Randall, MP and of course, John McDonnell MP and myself! We also showed Movement for the Abolition of War's new film and Professor Ian Hall organised and conducted a superb lunchtime multi-cultural concert for us all. It was a packed day!

Since then we held a meeting in May on a UN theme with Malcolm Harper, Director of the UK United Nations Association; then in June, Marshall Rosenberg, creator of NVC (Non Violent Communication) spoke to us about his work across the world. We now have a specific proposal to â€œfoster a culture of peace through educationâ€ and that is to get NVC introduced into all educational establishments.

To finish off this parliamentary session we had a packed house on July 14th for a panel conversation on 'Defensive Defence' followed by an inspiring talk and question and answer session with Marianne Williamson who was visiting us again.

Outside meetings we get invited to speak at various events and John McDonnell and myself both spoke at the recent Glastonbury Festival - he had five minutes on the Pyramid Stage! I've been up to Edinburgh and spoken to MSP's - this resulted in a debate on peace education in the Parliament at the end of June. I also shared a platform with Bruce Kent in Totnes who was most generous towards our young organisation.

People can become members by going to the website, www.ministryforpeace.org.uk or they can join at our open meetings. These are also advertised on the website. Meetings are free of charge and usually there is no need to book although it is advisable to turn up about fifteen minutes early to get through the House of Commons security system.

How long do you think it will take to get a Ministry for Peace and a Commission?

This very much depends on all of us. To persuade the government, any government, to introduce new legislation, it must be convinced that the public want it and that they might not get re-elected unless they introduce it. The quickest way would be for a small number of people in each constituency - probably no more than 10 - 15 - to go and see their MP and persuade them of the benefits of the proposal. Millions on the street marching is oddly less effective than speaking to an MP face to face. Once the message gets back to Westminster that all over the country people are calling for a Ministry for Peace and a Commission for Peace the government will sit up and take notice. Our main task over the coming months and years is to encourage people to do this.

Absolutely. The pace is really hotting up. The number of people visiting our website has increased by 60%. More and more people are signing up for the newsletter and becoming members on line. Good news, too, on the financial front. A potential funder has offered to support an application for up to £15,000; this would not only make such a difference to what we can do but would also give confidence to other potential funders. We are also being approached with offers of help relating to PR, fundraising and introductions to influential people. Last week we met a very senior Conservative member of the House of Lords who has offered to help; and at the other end of the political spectrum, Tony Benn and Tony Woodley, General Secretary of the TGWU - the largest union in the UK - have agreed to speak at our fringe meeting at the Labour Party conference in Brighton in September. Lastly, in a private meeting with Marianne Williamson, just before she returned to the US, we agreed to jointly organise an international conference next March in London with groups from the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere who are also aiming to set up similar structures in their own countries. A global movement for Ministries for Peace is our next stop!