Justice & Peace Group, Tring

Our history by Michael Demidecki

The very first meeting of the Justice & Peace Group was held in Corpus Christi Parish Hall on 16 June 2004 and from the minutes of that meeting I can see that twelve parishioners attended. At the meeting we deliberated among other things about trade justice and Fairtrade. We had strong aspirations and thought that our church could aim to become a Fairtrade Church and that we could even try to make Tring a Fairtrade Town!

Later in 2004 I spoke at a committee meeting of Churches Together in Tring about trade justice and Fairtrade, and the church representatives seemed interested in joining with us where appropriate in any event that we might plan in the future. Subsequently (in 2006) our Group became affiliated to Churches Together in Tring. On 25 May 2005, at our eleventh meeting, we were pleased to welcome two members of the parish of St Peter and St Paul, and from then onwards our group became ecumenical, and meetings began to be held in our different churches or church halls in Tring. The group soon had membership representing all the churches of Tring; one of the aims, to become ecumenical, had now been achieved!

On 1 July 2005, having gained permission from the Town Council, we organised an event in Church Square, Tring to mark International White Band Day. We stretched out and held for all to see a giant ‘white band’ some 40 metres long which we had borrowed from CAFOD and to which we had pinned a large ‘Make Poverty History’ banner. People sounded their car horns in acknowledgement as they drove by and there was a report and even a full-colour photograph later on the front page of the Gazette! By the end of 2005, 31 million people from 84 national coalitions around the world had united in a Global Call to Action against Poverty. We were glad to have been a part of that call.

During the early years we prioritised our Fairtrade campaign, aiming to achieve Fairtrade Town status for Tring. We targeted Tring Town Council, local retailers and churches to use and stock Fairtrade products. We promoted Fairtrade at events and stalls. We also established the ‘Margaret Demidecka Fairtrade Award’ for young people (an annual UK-wide competition for primary and secondary schools managed in conjunction with the Fairtrade Foundation) which ran from 2009 to 2014.

We produced our first Fairtrade Where You Can Buy guide in 2007 and this later became the guide to Fairtrade and Locally Produced Food and Drink in Tring and District. This guide continues to be produced and is available on our website. We were ready to leap into action when Covid hit by adapting the guide to be a listing of local businesses who were able to deliver goods during lockdown. This was widely downloaded and shared during the pandemic.

Fairtrade Town status

Eventually we achieved all the goals we needed to become a Fairtrade Town and we were very proud when the then Mayor of Tring, Councillor Nick Hollinghurst, was presented with a Fairtrade Town Certificate for Tring by Hannah Reed of the Fairtrade Foundation on 27 October 2007.  The event took place at the special Farmers’ Market held on that day. The Fairtrade Town status of Tring has been regularly monitored and promoted by our Group ever since, and has been successfully renewed over the years with the Fairtrade Foundation.

Assistance for the needy

Fundraising has been a part of our activities from the early days. In 2007 the late Father Geoffrey Eneh, a Catholic priest who had served Corpus Christi Church as an interim priest, had reported that in January 2007 in his own village in Enugu State, Nigeria, many had died as a result of an outbreak of an epidemic disease causing sickness and diarrhoea. The problem was contaminated water, which was all that many of the local people had to drink, and poor sanitation. Our Group held two successful fundraising events here in Tring and members of St Matthew’s RC church, Northwood (where Father Geoffrey also served) raised funds too. All this resulted in enough money to provide for a borehole to be sunk and fresh water and sanitation to be provided for the village.

The Justice & Peace Group has also raised funds for worthwhile projects at its Christmas Community Concerts, held each year from 2011 to 2017 in the Victoria Hall. For very many years these concerts were organised by the Salvation Army but when their citadel closed the Justice & Peace Group stepped in to maintain this Christmas tradition in our town. Funds were raised at our first three concerts for, respectively, a housing project in southern India (the money raised being sufficient for building two houses), the St Francis Hospice in Berkhamsted and a primary school in Uganda (the money raised for this project in 2013 enabling solar panels to be purchased to supply electricity to the school).

With the concerts and other fundraising events, since 2011 we have raised nearly £11,000 for worthwhile causes.

Respect for the environment

The Justice & Peace Group began the ‘Make Tring a Bee Town’ campaign in 2020 and what started out as a few lone voices has turned into a huge community effort with many different initiatives to make more pollinator-friendly spaces in our town and the surrounding villages. We held stalls at regular Tring events where we gave out wildflower seeds, promoted No Mow May, built bug hotels and provided leaflets with planting ideas for the garden. Through collective community action, the status of Bee Friendly Town was granted by the Bee Friendly Trust in May 2022, Tring being one of six towns to receive the accolade nationally. Our current Bee Friendly Town activity now focuses on our Say NO to Pesticides campaign (please see another article!) as well as holding developers to account and fighting for changes in cutting regimes to encourage verges to be left wild for wildlife.

Celebrating 20 years

We have chosen to celebrate 20 years of Tring’s Justice & Peace Group at the Tring Summer Carnival on Saturday 29 June from 12 Noon. We do hope you will join us by coming along and saying hello – have your face painted or buy a raffle ticket! And of course, we’re always happy to welcome new members so if you’d like to lend a hand, please don’t hesitate to contact us.