Sack Parliament 2006 and the Finish of Freedom

Sack Parliament on Monday 9, and occasion to mark the return of MPs to Westminster, was after all solely ever an amusing concept reasonably than a severe probability of a Ukrainian-style Orange Revolution. As the massive press turnout confirmed, it was one which had caught the eye of the media (Mondays maybe are typically slack) however sadly not that of the demonstrating courses.

It bought off to a nasty begin with the deliberate ‘Important Mass’, which didn’t collect greater than a handful of cyclists. Closely outnumbered by the police bike posse, they pale away, a pair biking down the facet of the Nationwide Theatre and the opposite 3 or 4 carrying their bikes up the steps to Waterloo Bridge.

At Parliament Sq., issues had been little higher. On the marketed begin time, other than the conventional Parliament Sq. Everlasting Protest there have been maybe 25 demonstrators and reasonably extra press, together with what should have been round a thousand police, counting these sitting in vans across the space in addition to the spectacular quantity standing round.

Twenty minutes later the numbers had been greater than doubled, primarily by the arrival of a bunch dressed largely in black. And shortly after they made a cost on the police line into the street in the direction of the Homes of Parliament.

From the beginning it appeared a pointless gesture. The road held, and pushed them again, and shortly the 2 sides had been standing a couple of toes aside and evident at one another. After a couple of extra makes an attempt to push via the police, the demonstrators ran again onto the grassed space of the sq. the place they had been surrounded by a cordon of police.

One of many photographers, an NUJ member I’d been speaking to a couple minutes earlier, was apparently pushed by police as they rushed the demonstrators. He fell and acquired a neck harm which left him with no feeling from the waist down. Police medics had been readily available to offer him first help and to name an ambulance. Later I used to be happy to listen to he had been allowed residence from hospital, and the accidents had been apparently much less severe than we feared.

I used to be contained in the cordon to start out with, however the police made no try and cease me as I made a decision to stroll out, not even asking to see my press card (that they had checked it earlier.) Across the sq., small groups of police had been rounding up anybody trying vaguely like a punk or a hippy and dragging them contained in the cordon. A few of these they picked on appeared genuinely to haven’t any reference to the protest. Finally there have been maybe round 150 in there, together with fairly a couple of press, together with a couple of who clearly had little concept what the entire thing was about.

Apparently others who appeared like potential demonstrators had been stopped and arrested in Whitehall, or turned again on different roads approaching the sq..

Exterior the cordon, the conventional demonstrations within the sq. went on, with the occasional interruptions by the police, nit-picking about the place the demonstrators are allowed to face and being largely ignored or abused.

Often there have been scuffles contained in the cordon as demonstrators made an try and breach the police line, or police groups moved in to seize people. There have been additionally occasional arrests across the sq., together with a few of those that protested loudly they had been merely bystanders.

At 14.13, roughly 40 minutes after the protesters had been imprisoned within the cordon, Police Superintendent Peter Terry (answerable for the taking away and destruction of most of Brian Haw’s property from the sq. and alleged by demonstrators to have lied in court docket) learn from a handwritten assertion telling the protesters that they had been being detained within the sq. as a result of he believed that their continued presence within the space would result in a severe breach of the peace!

Round 15.00, police started to distribute notices to these exterior the cordon warning them “we consider that you could be be, or are about to be, concerned in an illustration situated inside an space topic to the provisions of the Severe and Organised Crime and Police Act 2005” and transferring press and spectators properly again from the cordon. There gave the impression to be little probability of getting additional pictures, so I went to get on with work elsewhere.

In response to a press report later within the night, there have been 38 arrests made. These caught within the cordon who weren’t arrested on the occasion had been apparently required to offer proof of id and tackle earlier than being allowed to go away. SOCPA continues to be a blot on human rights on this nation, and this protest, regardless of its obvious pointlessness and lack of help has underlined this level.

I’m one among a technology who grew up believing in British justice and a way of honest play. We had been rightly appalled at these international locations the place protest was banned, and demonstrators may very well be arrested. It sickens me to see this occurring in entrance of what was once a strong image of freedom, the Homes of Parliament.