A group of people calling themselves the 'New World Alliance' has booked Totnes Civic Hall to 'bring to light the true mechanisms of this pandemic', asking people to abandon measures against Covid-19 such as vaccinations and face masks. People associated with these ideas have recently accosted local school children, telling them that parents and teachers are putting their lives at risk. They have driven vulnerable people from the High Street with anti-mask campaigns. Their ideas have led to attacks on health workers. They are causing distress and division in our town.

This petition is not calling for any ideas to be no-platformed. But the New World Alliance has several well-funded platforms, online and in the real world. We are asking that Totnes Town Council does not lend them the legitimacy of our most  respected public venue.

We understand that the pandemic has left people bereaved, distressed, and vulnerable. But no solutions are offered by the speakers at this event. They include Gareth Icke, a climate change denier and Covid sceptic; Patrick Heningsen of Infowars and the holocaust-denying website globalresearch.ca; Shelley Tasker, a QAnon promoter, accused by the NHS in Cornwall of 'spreading lies dangerous to people's health'; Zac Cox, who has compared public health efforts against Covid to the Nazi regime; Sandi Adams who claims climate change and Covid are hoaxes designed to bring about a 'world government'; and Anna de Buisseret, filmed screaming 'you’re  murdering children' outside a vaccination clinic. The 'New World Order', promoted by many of these speakers, is an anti-semitic conspiracy theory associated with neo-nazi groups. 

We call on the Town Council to reconsider its decision to offer this event a high profile venue in our town, enabling the 'New World Alliance' to raise money, to further promote their conspiracy theories, and to sell more fake 'solutions' to vulnerable people.