TRAKNAT was formed in March 2012, with the initial aim of inviting people to sign a petition to be presented to Vince Cable MP at a public meeting at which the other local MPs would also speak. We collected about 1000 signatures, and presented them to Dr Cable at a public meeting on 29 November 2012. Unfortunately Dr Cable was the only MP able to attend.

We held a separate meeting with Zac Goldsmith at the Houses of Parliament on 13th May 2013.

Subsequently we exchanged several letters with Dr Cable and his department to try to improve the transparency of arms export controls, and met with officials from the Department for International Development.

[For the record, here's the notice for the public meeting held on 29 November 2012.]

We are delighted that our local Member of Parliament Vince Cable MP (Liberal Democrat, Twickenham) has agreed to speak and answer questions at a public meeting on Thursday 29 November 2012 at 7pm at Duke Street Church, Duke Street, Richmond, TW9 1DH at 7pm. Admission free, all are welcome.

Zac Goldsmith MP was also invited and accepted, but we are sorry that he is not able to attend after all — it turns out that he had already agreed to give a keynote speech for a charity fundraising event which had failed to be entered into his diary.

The petition will be presented to Vince Cable at the meeting. The names of those who signed the web site petition by 10.00am on November 29th will be printed out and included along with the paper signatures. We have about 1000 altogether.

Dr Cable has been invited to consider how, in an export led recovery, Britain can ensure that human rights and environmental protections can be safe-guarded, and also that weapons are not supplied to repressive regimes nor to those countries where such sales would cause resources to be diverted from health and development programmes.

TRAKNAT, (Twickenham, Richmond and Kingston Network Against the Arms Trade) on behalf of member groups and local supporters, will make a presentation on our concerns about the impact of UK Arms Sales on Human Rights and Poverty. Dr Cable will be invited to respond, followed by questions from the floor.

As Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, Dr Cable is responsible for the licensing of weapons exports and also (jointly with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office) for the government agency that promotes arms exports, the UK Trade & Investment Defence & Security Organisation (UKTI-DSO).

The title of the meeting is “The Arms Trade and its impact on Human Rights and Poverty”, and it will be held at Duke Street Church, Duke Street, Richmond, TW9 1DH at 7pm. Admission free. All are welcome.

If you are on Facebook, there is a Facebook event which you can share with your friends.

Also there is a flyer on our Resources page which you can print and display. Please cross out Zac Goldsmith’s name — we will not be updating it at this late stage.