Greenpeace ‘shuts down’ Volkswagen UK HQ with anti-diesel protest

It wants VW to stop selling new diesel cars – and go 100 percent electric

Greenpeace protests at Volkswagen UK HQGreenpeace UK is staging a protest outside Volkswagen Group UK’s Milton Keynes headquarters, which it claims has blocked more than 800 staff from starting work this morning.

The environmental organisation is demanding Volkswagen stop building new diesel cars and switch to 100 percent electric.

Volkswagen fined in Germany for dieselgate

Mel Evans is Greenpeace’s clean air campaigner and said that, as the UK’s biggest seller of new diesel cars, “Volkswagen is complicit in an air pollution crisis that’s filling up emergency departments and GP surgeries.

“Volkswagen sold us a lie about diesel being clean. Its diesel addition is seriously harming people’s health.”

The firm, she claimed, “won’t meet with us and won’t listen. So today we’ve brought the truth about diesel to its doorstep”.

The Greenpeace demonstration, which went live at 7am, mocked up a hospital with “a diesel pollution clinic outside to offer advice”. Greenpeace also has medics in attendance; it is offering heath checks to staff and members of the public.

The protest, added Greenpeace, was a peaceful one, aimed at securing a meeting with Volkswagen Group UK MD Paul Willis.

Doctor in respiratory medicine, Arash Saleh, was at the protest. “Diesel pollution is causing horrendous suffering acrosss the UK and storing up a lifetime of troubled health for our kids. If you could see it, diesel would be banned tomorrow.”

“Volkswagen is aware of a protest at its Blakelands premises this morning,” said a spokesman for the firm.

“The safety of our employees is our principal concern and so the matter is now being handled by the police.”

In response to Greenpeace’s claims and demands, they added: “The Volkswagen Group has launched the most comprehensive electrification initiative in the automotive industry with “Roadmap E”. This will bring an additional 80 new electric vehicles to the Volkswagen Group model range by 2025.

“Roadmap E brings a 20 billion Euro investment to electric vehicle technology with the goal of 25 per cent of Volkswagen Group vehicle production comprising electrified vehicles by 2025 and 50 per cent by 2030.”

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Richard Aucock
Richard Aucockhttps://www.richardaucock.co.uk/
Richard is director at Motoring Research. He has been with us since 2001, and has been a motoring journalist even longer. He won the IMCO Motoring Writer of the Future Award in 1996 and the acclaimed Sir William Lyons Award in 1998. Both awards are run by the Guild of Motoring Writers and Richard is currently vice chair of the world's largest organisation for automotive media professionals. Richard is also a juror and Steering Committee director for World Car Awards and the UK juror for the AUTOBEST awards.

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