Press Releases - ABLE

SUPPORT MESSAGES ‘EXPOSE THE FEAR CAMPAIGN’ SAYS COMPANY
17/11/03

With messages of support flooding in from both public figures and individual members of the public, Able UK said today (November 17th) that the campaign against their contract to recycle redundant vessels at its Graythorp facility was ‘now exposed as a failed attempt to use fear instead of facts.’

Managing Director Peter Stephenson was speaking as the company released a selection of the hundreds of messages it has received, together with comments from local MPs and media figures.

Said Mr Stephenson “There is no doubt that Friends of the Earth and others attempted to create a firestorm of fear, with a campaign of misinformation and manipulation which claimed to be concerned about the environment but in reality could only have about maximising their media profile.

“What is clear is that their tactics have rebounded and that day-by-day more and more people are seeing through their smokescreen of scaremongering and headline-line grabbing phrases such as ‘toxic ships’ and ‘floating timebombs.’

“We now see key public figures such as local MPs Peter Mandelson ,Frank Cook and Middlesbrough Mayor Ray Mallon being joined by a leading environmental journalist and a local newspaper editor in exposing the Friends of the Earth myth machine and underlining the benefits which our contract can bring to both the local economy and the environment—and what is equally impressive is the very many members of the general public throughout the country who are contacting us to express their support for what we are trying to achieve—and their anger at how our efforts have been misrepresented.

“As one member of Friends of the Earth stated—disgusted at the organisation’s antics—expressed its people are ‘appalled at the level of misrepresentation being peddled as fact and the lack of objectivity in dealing with arguments for a legitimate piece of business which has been tendered for and won by a reputable, properly-regulated British company.’

“I hope that those who have been swayed by the glib phrases and the ‘disaster’ predictions—including I have to say some elements of the media—will now start to recognise that it is time to concentrate on facts rather than fiction.”

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