G20 Protests - Best of British Democracy

It had all started with the simple Great British idea of going on a protest march. We wanted to express our views about how Gordon Brown and other world leaders have been running our world. So Gill and I caught the train from Northampton, met our friend Kathy at London Euston and headed to Liverpool Street for 11am. Some really bad financial decisions have been made over the last few years but at Euston I made a very wise investment – I spent 30p going for a single pee (now that’s inflation). It was a decision I would appreciate a few hours later.

FOUR HORSES OF THE APOCALYPSE

Liverpool Street was the starting point for one of four marches planned to leave from various parts of the City and converge on the Bank of England. Each march was to be led by one of the four horses of the apocalypse. From Moorgate, a red horse against war. From London Bridge, a silver horse against financial crimes. From Cannon Street, a black horse against land enclosures and borders (in honour of the Diggers). We’d chosen Liverpool Street so that we could follow the green horse against climate chaos. The sun was out, democracy was in full bloom, life felt good – and then the police turned up. And not the mythical local bobby who wants to help you find a local landmark or assist you as a victim of crime.

Within minutes of arriving, and along with all the other protesters on our side of the station, we were hemmed in by police and told we couldn’t leave. I wanted to know how they could tell which ones of us were the protesters as we weren’t all in fancy dress or carrying placards. One officer – the last to answer any of my questions for the next five hours – told me I wasn’t allowed out because I was wearing a badge and that made me a protester! I refrained from remarking that he was wearing a pointy hat but that didn’t make him a wizard.  The police informed us that we were going to be ‘helped’ with our march and, on reflection, I’ve rarely seen such an outrageous abuse of the English language. Eventually we were allowed to move at a snail’s pace towards our destination, still hemmed in behind and in front by our helpers.

POLICE INTIMIDATION AND SPIN

Thanks to the spin used by senior police officers (it will be “very violent” but we are “up for it”) and city bosses (dress down to come to work because the protesters are out to get you), normal staff in city firms were encouraged to see us as the enemy. Later in the day, I met a friend who works for a bank and he confirmed some of these messages. Classic divide and rule tactics. Let’s face it, a lot of poorly paid clerical staff in the financial sector are just as much victims of their bosses’ greed as the rest of us. Yes, we were angry at the inequality caused by huge fat cat salaries but we weren’t out to get anyone and few people have ever been assaulted by a whistle. The result was that people in offices were watching us out of their windows as if under threat from a barbarian horde. It was the police, however, who called their security operation Glencoe, in honour of a famous highlands massacre. Biased opinion from a protester? Then let’s take a look at what a couple of MPs were saying.......

David Howarth, the Liberal Democrat MP who was leading a parliamentary group of observers at the protests, said: "I am increasingly worried that what the police are saying about the protests will end up in a self-fulfilling prophecy. By talking up the prospect of violence they will put off peaceful demonstrators and start to attract other sorts."

Another MP, Andrew Dismore, Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, described police language in the days before the protests as "not very helpful". He went on to say, "The police have a duty under the Human Rights Act to facilitate protest and not frustrate it. If they act in a confrontational way and use confrontation language, they will start to provoke the kind of behaviour they are seeking to prevent. There may well be a fringe element that wants to incite violence. But that doesn't mean police should criminalise every protester."

These comments echo the findings of a report by Parliament’s Joint Select Committee on Human Rights*, which was published on 23 March (just nine days before the protests) and in which the committee set out its concerns at reports that the policing of protests has become increasingly heavy-handed, and about the misuse of legislation designed for other purposes – such as counter-terrorism – to restrict protest.

We were allowed to march at only a snail’s pace with endless unexplained stoppages but we kept in good humour. One marcher started off a chorus of “we want to move it, move it!” and thus a new movement was born – protest by cheesy dance songs made famous through kids’ films. Soon we’ll have the police begging for Disney and Pixar to stop arming rhythmic demonstrators or asking the Home Office to supply them with anti-cheese weaponry ........              

DISPROPORTIONATE & ILLOGICAL POLICE TACTICS

Finally, we arrived by the Bank of England where the police decided to detain several thousand demonstrators for almost four hours. Welcome to the world of ‘kettling’ or ‘corralling’, a relatively new police tactic which has recently been judged lawful by the Law Lords who dismissed an appeal in Austin v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, a case which followed an even longer forced detention in May 2001**. What this means in practice is that a large number of people are detained, against their will, in an area designated by the police, for the purpose of crowd control. What was weird in this particular case was that two other similar demonstrations in London on the same day were allowed to take place without such disproportionate measures. 

Our plan had been to attend the protest at the Bank of England at 12, then join the Climate Camp in Bishopsgate at 12.30 and finally attend the anti-war demonstration at the US Embassy or Trafalgar Square around 2. I’m sure the vast majority of our fellow detainees had similar plans. Instead we were kept in a small area with no access to food, water or toilets (30p well spent) while hundreds of police, many of them on horseback and a large number in full riot gear, attempted to wear down our enthusiasm and put us off protesting. In addition to the aggressive ground forces, there was ongoing video and photographic surveillance from the steps of the Bank of England and the roof of a neighbouring building. Finally, in case they missed anything, there was a helicopter constantly hovering overhead.

FUNK, FRUIT, FLAGS , F-WORDS & FLYING HELMETS

We were initially contained in the area close to the RBS building which would have its windows smashed later in the day. It’s worth noting that there were loads of windows in the area where we were detained, including several large shop windows, but none of these were damaged during our stay. It’s a shame that the manipulative media, on the prowl for trouble to report, insisted on showing ad nauseam the same shot of the RBS windows being smashed rather than reporting on the untouched windows and the impromptu party community which sprang up within the police cordon.

For half an hour or more, some protesters tried to breach the police lines, first by polite requests and then by force of numbers and occasional surges. All attempts failed and the worst things we saw were a couple of policemen hit by UFOs (unidentified fruit-based objects) and a couple of helmets released from captivity and passed back through the crowd. Some people climbed up buildings and ontp bus stops but their only other crimes were wearing balaclavas and waving flags. In comparison, the riot police wore balaclavas and helmets and waved truncheons. I am pleased to report that I saw no police officers lobbing random pieces of fruit. That would have been too surreal.

There was one unfortunate incident for our friend who unwisely answered a call from her son’s school. She attempted to have a conversation with a teacher while mayhem reigned all around. Near the end of her conversation, a loud chant went up from the crowd. “F*ck the police! F*ck the police!” It was made even worse by the fact that the bloke chanting the loudest was standing right behind her with his mouth less than a foot from her mobile. Oh well, parents’ evening will be interesting next time........

As we slowly realised that we were there for the duration, we moved back into the centre of the cordoned area, in front of the Bank of England. We could see that all other exits had been similarly blocked. It was time for the party to begin. A man dressed in historical military gear climbed the statue in front of the bank where someone had written the word ‘mine’ on the horse’s bum. We were treated to live music from drummers, buskers, rappers and a sound system disguised as a wheelie bin. One bloke scaled the columns of a building in acrobatic fashion to hang a couple of banners. People were dancing on the roof of the entrance to Bank tube station.

MATURE & MIDDLE-CLASS REVOLUTIONARIES

I spoke to quite a few of our fellow protesters and it was clear to see that the vast majority were very ordinary people who were just mightily pissed off with a government which has taken us into illegal wars, allowed unregulated capitalism to bankrupt the economy, has contradicted its green policies with stupid decisions (Kingsnorth and the third runway at Heathrow) and has contributed to global poverty through the World Bank and the IMF. I met two or three older ladies who were on their first protests. They were pleased to have finally taken some action but were all distressed by the police tactics. I met a middle-class mother and daughter from Tunbridge Wells in Kent, hardly a bastion of anarchism (you can get arrested down there for asking for a copy of the Guardian in a paper shop).

Many people were in fancy dress and using impressive creativity to get their message across. Bizarrely, the traffic lights throughout the area continued to operate the whole time. The only real purpose they served was to hang the effigies of fat cat bankers or as supports for a makeshift hammock. At one barrier, two protesters stood with their backs to the police and sipped from china cups. With impeccable timing, the woman’s mobile went off and she answered it, “hallo, darling, I’m just having a cuppa on the front line”. Everyone apart from the storm troopers thought it was funny!

We did read reports of trouble later in the evening but, in addition to those MPs who suggested that police language and tactics almost encouraged violence, one journalist observed quite drily that the problem with kettles is that they tend to come to the boil. Exactly.

CLIMATE CAMP IN THE CITY

When we were finally able to leave the area shortly before 4pm, we made our way straight up to the Climate Camp in Bishopsgate. Here, in the middle of a normally bustling city street, campaigners had erected a sea of tents and were busy enjoying workshops, sharing food, protesting peacefully and generally chilling out. There were hot drinks too but, unsurprisingly, I didn’t hear anyone say, ‘can you put the kettle on?’ It was near the camp that we finally caught up with my friend who works in a bank. He appeared round the corner in ‘plain clothes’ and we decided to go for a coffee with him rather than string him up from the nearest lamp post. I got in big trouble with Gill when my friend paid for the coffees because I stuck my head out of the door of the café and shouted, “hey, he’s spending his bonus!”

As we parted company with a promise to catch up soon, we crossed to the bollards which were halfway between the police lines and the camp. A policeman told us that we couldn’t stand there but that we’d have to decide which side we wanted to be on. I’ve got to be honest, it wasn’t the hardest decision I’ve had to make in my life......

GET CAPE. WEAR CAPE. PROTEST....

We couldn’t afford the early train to London in the morning so we’d missed breakfast at Pure Groove record store in Smithfield where there had been a pre-protest event with performances by artists including Kate Nash and Get Cape Wear Cape Fly, and speakers from Oxfam and Hope Not Hate. Sam from GCWCF sent out an email the following day with his thoughts on the protests: “the area around the Bank of England felt more like a carnival than a riot, despite the reports from our sensationalist media. Although windows got smashed and there were moments of rioting, I feel considering there were 20,000+ people surrounded by the police for 3 hours, everybody did really well to curtail their anger and turn it into song/dance. Please note this is not a knock on the police, I’m just reporting what I experienced. It will be interesting to see what the G20 summit throws up, but one thing I am sure of is that this will not be the last time people take to the streets in protest, let’s just hope we’re one step closer to firming up African aid commitments, dropping the debt and curtailing climate change and not just dancing around the issue.”

“JUST DOING THEIR JOB”

In correspondence with respected friends since the day of the protests, we have debated the role of the police. It was pointed out that we don’t know if officers volunteered for duty or were simply chosen, although we do know that all police leave was cancelled. It was suggested that some officers might have been in sympathy with our cause but unable to express an opinion. Surely the police were just “doing their job”. I listened carefully to the various arguments but I think that there must come a time when ordinary rank and file police officers have to leave their jobs when they are asked to enforce increasingly oppressive and undemocratic laws or use disproportionate measures to prevent lawful protest. I also think that the type of policing which we experienced last Wednesday works directly against the government’s policy of reducing radicalisation.

V FOR VENDETTA OR A FOR APATHY?

A few days after the protests, another friend sent me the following quote from one of our favourite films, V for Vendetta.....

“Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn’t there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who’s to blame? Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense."

Those famous words of Edmund Burke also spring to mind. “All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing.” The evils that we see around us are economic recession caused by greed, the raping of the planet for profit and a trade system that keeps the developing world in poverty. We reserve the right to protest against these evils rather than watch Eastenders, kettles or no kettles.

I’ve still got a job, we’ve still got a roof over our heads and food on the table. We won’t be the first to suffer the effects of climate change. But we do have a responsibility to stand up for the poorest and most vulnerable members of the human race. I’ll finish this piece with the words of the German anti-Nazi activist, Pastor Martin Niemoller, spoken around fifteen years after the end of World War Two. Hopefully they will be a reminder of the importance of community, co-operation and solidarity, those precious things which have been devalued and diluted in our society by people like Thatcher and her illegitimate sons, Blair and Brown:

In Germany they first came for the Communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant.

Then they came for me —
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

LINKS

Climate Camp in the City

G20 Meltdown in the City

*Human Rights Joint Committee Report

**Law Lords Ruling on police ‘kettling’ on 1 May 2001

LINKED ARTICLES ON TAKE THE RED PILL

Climate Camp 2008

Climate March 2008

The Great Carbon Conscience Con

Jobs, Justice, Climate......Put People First!

Licenced To Kill

Plane Stupid – Gordon Goes Ga Ga and Lizzie Loses the Plot