My Own Work | >Re-PHOTO

Racist UKBA & 3 Cosas

Southall Black Sisters Protest Racist UKBA – Eaton House, Hounslow – Thu 24th Oct 2013

*Pragna Patel of Southall Black Sisters speaking in front of the Hounslow Reporting Centre*

Although I grew up in Hounslow, ten miles west of the centre of London, I’ve not often returned there in recent years, and the protest organised by Southall Black Sisters outside the Hounslow Reporting Centre on Thursday 24th October 2013 was the only one I’ve so far photographed in the town.

The UK Borders Agency reporting centre is at the western edge of the town, opposite Hounslow Heath where highwaymen once roamed and was the aerodrome from where the British Empire’s first scheduled daily international commercial flights took off in 1919. The large brick block once housed the UK laboratory and factory of US chemical manufacture Parke-Davis, once the world’s largest pharmaceutical company, now a subsidiary of Pfizer, who had set up a dyestuffs factory here before the first world war, though the Research and Administration building in front of which the protest was held only dates from 1954.

Southall Black Sisters (SBS) say that after the Refugee & Migrant Forum East London (RAMFEL) succeeded in its legal challenge over Theresa May’s Home Office advertising vans (which were also criticised by the Advertising Standards Authority) “the UKBA has shifted the ’Go Home’ message to reporting centres in Glasgow, Croydon and Hounslow.”

Their protest against the Government’s anti-immigration campaigns outside the Hounslow reporting centre stated “We will not tolerate underhand tactics used to instil fear and divide us. Let us return to the streets and make our voices heard. We need to fight for our rights.”

I joined the group of around 30 people, mainly SBS members, most wearing t-shirts with the message ‘Do I look illegal?’, but they were joined by others from Sol-Fed and other groups who had brought a large banner with the message ‘F**K ALL RACISM – NO ONE IS ILLEGAL’.

And no person is illegal, but those called it lack permission to be here, though many will in time be granted it. In France, such people are said to be ‘without papers’, but none of us in the UK needs papers to live here, so an appropriate but less biased term might be ‘without status’. The term ‘illegal immigrants’, a deliberately biased description of people who do not currently have a legal right to live in this country.

The protesters blew plastic horns and whistles and generally made a lot of noise, as well as shouting a number of chants including ‘Theresa May, drop the pretence, Go home vans cause offence’, ‘We are humans not illegal, We want justice for our people’ and ‘Money for jobs and education, Not for racist deportation.’

The protest was still continuing when I had to leave. You can see more about it on My London Diary at Southall Black Sisters Protest Racist UKBA.

3 Cosas Defy London University Protest Ban – Senate House, Thu 24th Oct 2013

The ‘3 Cosas’ campaign is for sickpay, holidays and pensions for all workers at the University of London, where many low paid workers are outsourced to companies who employ them often in the legal minimum wage and conditions of service, and also often employ bullying managers to overwork staff. They often fail to provide proper safety equipment to do the job.

The workers, many of whom are Spanish speaking, have for some years been demanding they should be directly employed by the university where they work rather than these contracting companies, and there have by now been many long and successful campaigns to achieve this.

The University management in 2013 had responded to their campaign with a ban of protests in and around Senate House, and threatened to bring police onto campus to prevent further protests and to bring charges of trespass against any protesters. This was seen by workers and staff and students as an attempt to prevent free speech and freedom of assembly at the university similar to that of of authoritarian regimes overseas, rightly condemned across academia and the rest of society.

On Thursday 24th October, staff students, the IWGB (Independent Workers of Great Britain) trade union which represents many cleaners and other trade unionists defied University management ban of protests by holding a noisy protest in and around Senate House.

After protesting on the streets around the Senate House, some of the protesters walked in around another building while others scaled the gates to protest at the bottom of Senate House. Eventually police came and tried to stop them walking out. But there were too few of them to be effective. The protesters walked out and ended their protest in front of SOAS.

More on My London Diary at 3 Cosas Defy London Uni Protest Ban.

St George’s, Camberwell, Absolutely Board & Alberto

This post completes my walk on 8th January 1989 which began in at he Elephant and took me through Walworth to end in neighbouring Camberwell – the first post on this walk was Elephant, Faraday, Spurgeon & Walworth Road.

It was almost two weeks before I was able to come out and take pictures again and my next walk began at Camberwell on Friday 27th January 1989. I’d been teaching all morning but had managed to arrange my college timetable so I was free from around noon and could rush out to catch a train into London. In return for this I was teaching an evening class on Tuesdays.

St George's Church, Wells Way, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-56 — *St George’s Church, Wells Way, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-56*

One of the ‘Waterloo’ churches, built 1824, architect Francis Octavius Bedford with seating for 1,734, enlarged in 1893 with an apse by Basil Champneys. Bedford, a distinguished church architect was the father of the notable photographer Francis Bedford (the two are sometimes confused.) It was Grade II listed in 1954 but in1972 was declared redundant, closed for worship and was deconsecrated.

A new St George’s Church was built as a part of the Trinity College Centre, a community centre in nearby Coleman Road which was dedicated in 1982. The old church was sold in very poor condition to the Celestial Church of Christ in 1977 and was broken into and vandalised on several occasions, before large parts were destroyed by fire in 1980 leaving an empty shell behind its fine portico. In 1993-4 the church was restored by St George’s Housing Co-operative as 30 one-bed flats.

Christ, Arild Rosenkrantz, St George's Church, Wells Way, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-41 — *Christ, Arild Rosenkrantz, St George’s Church, Wells Way, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-41*

This war memorial statue by Danish artist Rosenkrantz was stolen in August 1991, but after a newspaper appeal by a local curate was discovered in a Brixton scrapyard two weeks later and returned to the site.

*Camberwell Rd, Bullace Row, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-43*

This block at 305-315 Camberwell Rd on the corner of Bullace Row looks very similar now except in better condition, though possibly significantly different behind the facade. Even some of the old shop fronts have survived though not with the same businesses. Bullace Row was at some time before 1912 known as Little Orchard Row, and almost certainly the name comes from the Bullace plum, similar to a damson. The shops with flats above are I think late-Victorian.

My walk on 8th January ended here on Camberwell Road from where I caught a bus to Waterloo.

*Camberwell Green, Camberwell Church St, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-44*

I jumped on my bike shortly after my morning’s teaching ended on Friday 27th January, pedalled the two miles home as fast as I could, dropped my bike, grabbed my camera bag and rushed to the station for a train to Vauxhall, where thanks to a 36 bus was in Camberwell by around 1.30pm. Days in January are short but I still had a couple of hours to take pictures before the light went. I got down to business straight away with this picture taken more or less from the bus stop, look east along Church Street.

*Gate, Camberwell New Rd, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-45*

I walked west, cross the junction with Camberwell Road and into Camberwell New Road along which my bus had come. This gate, with its wrought iron work matching the spirals at the top of both gate posts is still there immediately to the west of The Old Dispensary, the pub almost at the end of this road at Camberwell Green. The rather attractive building with the curved side is still present, as well as the pair of gate posts, only one of which is in my picture.

*Absolutely Board Ltd, Timber Merchant, Camberwell New Rd, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-46*

The timber merchant with the signs that caught my attention, particularly the bored looking man sitting on a branch next to a bird’s nest and projecting out from the building has gone long ago.

*Absolutely Board Ltd, Timber Merchant, Camberwell New Rd, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-31*

This business at 348A Camberwell New Road (street numbers here seem a little random) was replaced by a modern infill which for some years was the home of Southwark Reach. The property immediately to its west, a Tripe Dresser has the number 344 on the shopfront and has since had various identities including a property business and Merric Barbers, but now appears to be selling bikes ans scooters.

Alberto, Ladies & Gents Hair Stylist, Camberwell Rd, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-32 — Alberto, Ladies & Gents Hair Stylist, Camberwell Green, Camberwell Rd, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-32

I decided to leave Camberwell New Road for later and returned to the crossroads, going north up Camberwell Road, (here called Camberwell Green), where Alberto is still offering Gents and Ladies Hairdressing just few yards up the road at 14 Camberwell Green. The hairdressers is now only in the right hand part of the shop, with a money transfer business in the left part. There is still a single-storey small café next door, though now under a different name. At the left you can see the rather odd lighthouse of the The Old Dispensary public house. The sign on the front of the building above the hairdresser’s shop has gone and that on its side is now illegible.

Xenophobia, UKBA Raids & City Climate Criminals

Movement Against Xenophobia – Old Palace Yard, Westminster. Tue 22 Oct 2013

The Movement Against Xenophobia (MAX) was a new campaign aimed at countering the vicious anti-immigrant discourse of mainstream politics in the UK. The rally outside parliament was in protest against the Immigration Bill 2013 which was debated later in the day.

Speakers attacked the Bill, which removed the great majority of the grounds on which foreign nationals can lodge appeals against deportation, puts a requirement on banks and landlords to check immigration status of those setting up accounts or becoming tenants, increases the fines for employers who hire anyone without the right to work here, and includes new powers to check driving licence applicants are in the country legally. The bill also imposes a levy on temporary migrants to allow them access to free NHS care.

They also opposed the existing draconian restrictions on bringing spouses to this country that are splitting many families, with a minimum income level required that half the population cannot meet, causing real hardship and heartache for many.

Governments have competed with oppositions over the years to convince the right wing press that their party has a tougher line against immigrants, with the racist vans and e-mails sent by the then Home Secretary Theresa May being an clear example of how low our politicians will sink.

Report after report has shown that migrants make a substantial positive contribution to the economy, enrich Britain’s culture and improve the standard of its public services. MAX demanded that politicians and the media end the use of language that incites racism and xenophobia and for the political parties to reject the ‘numbers game’ politics of immigration and replace it with a fair system built on human rights and the needs of the UK.

MAX was a coalition of existing groups who have come together to challenge anti-immigrant discourse, such as the continual use of the term ‘illegal immigrant’. As they point out, no one is illegal, and these are more correctly people who do not have the legal right to live here – they are undocumented migrants. MAX and its supporters want to live in a civilised society where people, irrespective of background, are valued and treated with respect.

Movement Against Xenophobia

Chinatown Says ‘No Entry UKBA’ – Gerrard St, Soho, Tue 22 Oct 2013

In London’s Chinatown, virtually all restaurants and shops closed for two hours for a rally and march against frequent raids being carried out there by the UK Borders Agency who have entered premises and interrogated people inside demanding to see evidence that they have permission to live in the UK.

Many of those questioned are British citizens or have leave to stay, while others are here visiting relatives on valid tourist visas. A small number have been found to be without proper documentation but the raids appear to be carried out in a random fashion on the off-chance that there might be so-called ‘illegal immigrants’ working in the premises – ‘fishing raids’.

These raids had no proper legal status in the UK as we are not required to carry ID and can simply refuse to answer questions and walk away. There was no requirement to give our name or address as a flier that was being handed out advised.

As the start of the two hour protest approached, more and more shops and restaurants turned customers away and put up signs in windows and doorways stating ”No Entry to UKBA fishing raids’ and there was much furious blowing of whistles. A small group protested noisily for a few minutes outside the only business still open on Gerrard Street, but soon moved away to the rally by the Two Lions statue.

Leading members of London’s Chinese community spoke at the rally against the UKBA raids. Some also made clear that there need to be easier ways to bring workers skilled in Chinese cooking to this country if they were to maintain their traditional practices which are vital to keep Chinatown truly Chinese.

After a number of speeches there was then a march around Chinatown before returning to continue the rally, though some workers were leaving to prepare for the reopening of businesses at the end of the two hour closure.

Chinatown Says ‘No Entry UKBA’

Fossil-Free London Lobby Tour – Bank & Stock Exchange, Tue 22 Oct 2013

Climate campaigners from People & Planet and 350.org toured some City sites which lock us into a fossil fuel dependent economy, stopping to make brief speeches and perform poems and songs. They carried balloons to represent carbon dioxide, which had all been intended to be black, but they couldn’t find enough black balloons so had to use some purple ones as well.

Police talked to them at the start of tour, and seemed happy with the tour, though they continued to follow them on the tour, which began in front of the Bank of England (and the Royal Exchange, now just expensive shops.)

From there they walked to the Stock Exchange, stopping first at the entrance on Newgate Street for a short rally before walking around to the main entrance in Paternoster Square.

Here there were more speeches and another song – ‘Buddy Can You Spare a Dime’ – and the balloons were popped as a small group of police and a security officer from the Stock Exchange looked on from a few yards away.

The tour then moved off to visit other ‘carbon criminals’ in the City, but I left them on the corner of Gresham St to go home.

Fossil-Free London Lobby Tour

Ricky Reel, Democracy Camp & Zane

Candlelit vigil for Justice for Ricky Reel – New Scotland Yard, Tue 21 Oct 2014

On Tuesday 21st October 2014, eight years ago, I photographed the vigil 17 years after the body of 20-year-old Ricky Reel, an Asian student was found in the River Thames, seven days after he went missing following a racist attack in Kingston upon Thames.

In 2014 evidence became public that the police had failed to take his disappearance seriously and rather than investingating and pursuing his attackers had spent time and resources on undercover agents investigating Ricky Reel’s family. Even after his body was found they failed to treat him as the victim of a racist attack.

Even now, 25 yearsafter Ricky Reel’s death, the Metropolitan Police are in denial over the incident, and in the last few weeks have issued a statement that the family was not spied on, despite the family, their MP and a public inquiry having been shown the evidence. In 2014 there were 77,000 signatures calling on then Met Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe to formally apologise and for a robust independent and transparent Public Inquiry into police spying on family campaigns. It didn’t happen.

*Suresh Grover of the Southall Monitoring Group*

I first met and photographed Ricky’s mother at the front of a protest at Downing St, fighting for justice back in 1997, and she continues her fight. Recently her book ‘Ricky Reel: Silence Is Not An Option‘ was published and she appeared on BBC News with Tish Reel to continue to seek justice.

The Police Complaints Authority investigated the case in 1998 and reported that weaknesses in the police organisation had led the investigating officers to neglect the case. But their report remains unpublished, although MP John McDonnell used parliamentary privilege to reveal its findings in the House of Commons soon after its completion – and you can read these in the Daily Mirror which also gives more details of the failures.

John McDonnell was one of the speakers at the 2014 vigil, along with others including Sukhdev Reel, Stafford Scott of Tottenham Rights, Suresh Grover of The Monitoring Group, Helen Steel, an activist who was deceived into a two-year relationship by an undercover police officer, a speaker from the Newham Monitoring Project, and Liz Fekete of the Institute of Race Relations.

You can hear more about the case in a YouTube video, Silence is not an option which includes contributions from Sukhdev Reel, John McDonnell, Suresh Grover and others. The recently appointed Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley has stated he wants to deal with racism and eliminate it from the force, and how he deals with this case will be an important indicator of whether this is just an empty promise.

Candlelit vigil for Justice for Ricky Reel

Democracy Camp Fenced Out – Parliament Square, Tue 21 Oct 2014

Earlier in the day I’d called into Parliament Square where I found the Democracy campers had been removed from the central grass area which was now surrounded by fencing. A few people were still being arrested for being on the grass, but I could only photograph them through the fence.

Earlier, police had taken away the blue tarpaulins that protesters had been using to sit or lie on the wet grass, leading to the Democracy Camp gaining the name ‘Tarpaulin Revolution’ – #tarpaulinrevolution.

One enterprising protester had gone up to join Chuchill on his plinth shortly before I arrived, with a banner which read: ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Confiscated – #tarpaulinrevolution Parliament Square’. Rather to my surprise he was still up there when I returned briefly after attending the vigil for Ricky Reel.

Democracy Camp Fenced Out

Staines march for flood victim Zane – Staines, Spelthorne. Tue 21 Oct 2014

Before coming to London I had photographed a protest in Staines on what would have been Zane Gbangbola’s eighth birthday. The protesters demanded that Spelthorne Council test the landfill site next to his home which they believe generated the hydrogen cyanide gas that killed Zane when it was flooded earlier in the year.

The protesters marched the few hundred yards from Staines Leisure Centre to the Spelthorne Council officers to hand in a 38 Degrees petition. Council officers came to take the petition and express sympathy with Zane’s parents, both of who were also affected by the gas, his father being left a paraplegic.

So far investigations have failed to provide a conclusive answer for the cause of Zane’s death, with the pathologist later blaming carbon monoxide from a petrol-driven pump used to clear floodwater from the house. But his parents say it was never used inside the house. Surrey Police are reported to have submitted information regarding the faulty pump and the hire company which supplied it to the Crown Prosecution Service.

Staines march for flood victim Zane

Kwasi Kwarteng, Cuts & Paris, New York, London

Wednesday 20th October 2020 was a rather different day for me. I started photographing speakers at an indoor rally, something I rarely do, went off to meet with my MP in a pub, then photographed a march against cuts in welfare and the loss of public sector jobs, ending the day at the opening of a show featuring myself and two other photographers, one of whom, Paul Baldesare took two of the pictures in that section of today’s post.

Jesse Jackson & Christian Aid Lobby – Westminster, Wednesday 20 October 2010

I was one of the 2,500 or so Christian Aid supporters who came to Westminster to lobby their MPs on 20.10.2010, asking them to press for transparency and fairness in the global tax system and for action on climate change.

The day started with a rally in the Methodist palace of Westminster Central Hall, opposite Westminster Abbey, the hall where the inaugural meeting of the United Nations General Assembly took place in January 1946. The Methodists had then moved out for a few months to allow this to take place, and special seating, translation booths installed, along with extra lighting to allow the event to be photographed and televised. But I think that lighting must have been removed as it was pretty dim inside for me to photograph the speakers. But I and a small group from my constituency were fortunate to be inside as there wasn’t enough room for all who came.

*Supporters outside Methodist Central Hall*

There were speakers from this country and abroad, but the star of the event was undoubtedly the Rev Jesse Jackson, a noted US civil rights and political activist, president and founder of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988.

After the rally and a hurried lunch a small group of us from his Spelthorne constituency met with our then recently elected MP, Kwasi Kwarteng, who suggested we find a place in the St Stephen’s Tavern to talk rather than have to go through the tedious business of queueing to go through security to meet inside the parlimentary offices. Although he was still relatively unknown it was rather easy to find him, as there are relatively few extremely tall black male MPs. Though rather more share his educational background of prep school and Eton.

Since then his rise to fame has been rapid, though after his recent sacking after only 38 days as Chancellor of the Exchequer, perhaps that should be notoriety. He has only visited his constituency on fairly rare occasions and I’ve yet to meet him again, though have seen him from a distance outside parliament.

He listened – or at least stayed fairly quiet – while my wife and others talked about the campaign for tax justice and the need for reforms to stop the various forms of tax dodging by major companies robs poor countries of more than $160bn a year, while climate change and the natural disasters it is bringing have a vastly greater impact on the poorer countries who are most vulnerable, despite their much lower per capita carbon footprints. They suffer from the results of our high dependence on fossil fuels.

But his response to the lobbying was perhaps best described as ‘mansplaining’; we were not at the time aware of his work as a consultant for the Odey Asset Management hedge fund or the recent allegations by Private Eye that he has continued to receive undeclared contributions from them. Certainly his activities as Chancellor have resulted in them and other hedge funds who bet against the pound making millions.

More at Jesse Jackson & Christian Aid Lobby.

March Against Spending Cuts – Malet St & Lincolns Inn Fields, Wed 20 Oct 2010

This was the day that the government announced the results of their comprenhensive spending review (CSR) which involved considerable cuts in welfare benefits and the loss of many public sector jobs as services are cut. The deficit left by the outgoing New Labour government had given the Tories in the Con-Dem coalition a perfect excuse to slash the public sector and privatise services in a way they would never have dared before.

More than a million public sector jobs were expected to be lost, with some being replaced by private sector workers on lower wages, fewer benefits, lower standards of delivery and safety and higher workloads. There will be more cases of people suffering as private companies expand into healthcare, putting profits before the needs of people, and similar changes in other areas.

The Coalition of Resistance who called the protest say the £83 billion to be cut from public services will plunge the economy into a slump. Rather than cutting jobs, pay, pensions, benefits, and public services that will hit the poor ten times harder than the rich, they urge the government to cut bank profits and bonuses, tax the rich and big business. Rather than contract out the NHS, they should axe Trident and withdraw from Afghanistan.

I had to leave before the rally at the end of the march at Downing Street to prepare for the opening of an exhibition I had organised in Hoxton.

March Against Spending Cuts

Paris • New York • London Opening – Shoreditch Gallery, Hoxton Market. Wed 20 Oct 2010

Together with two photographer friends I had put on the show Paris • New York • London at the Shoreditch Gallery which was attached to a cafe in Hoxton Market, a small street just off Great Eastern Street, close to Hoxton Square. Rather confusingly this is not where the actual Hoxton Market is now held which is in Hoxton St.

*Me in a red jumper at the opening © Paul Baldesare, 2010*

The show was a part of the East London Photomonth annual photography festival, and over the month it was on attracted a decent number of visitors and comments. My section was Paris, and I’d ordered a decent number of copies of my book, Photo Paris, still available at Blurb, most of which sold at the show. Unfortunately I think it now costs around twice as much as I was able to sell it for then.

*Jiro Osuga, Townly Cooke, my book and Me © Paul Baldesare, 2010*

Paul Baldesare’s pictures of London and pictures taken by John Benton-Harris in New York completed the show and you can still see the work online on a small web site I wrote for the event. Thanks to Paul for some pictures taken at the opening where I was too busy talking to use a camera.

Paris • New York • London Opening

International Rescue, Olympic Park & Daily Mail Transphobia

October 19th seems to be a good day for protests, and looking at My London Diary before I began writing this post I found something in most years I could chose to write about. It could be the last day of a trip to Paris, calling on Lord Browne, the chair of fracking company Cuadrilla to ‘Frack Off’, a protest against atrocities in Congo, Uganda and Rwanda as battles continue for their mineral wealth, a call to make caste discrimination illegal in the UK, AxeDrax protesting against generating electricity from biomass and coal, a student rent strike and so many more.

In the end it was a fairly random decision to pick Friday October 19th 2018, perhaps because it my day then began with someone I photographed a couple of days ago at Westminster, Neil Godwin.

BEIS refuse International Rescue climate help:
Dept Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Friday 19th October 2018

International Rescue, Olympic Park & Daily Mail Transphobia

‘Commander Neil Godwin Tracy’ of International Rescue came from Tracy Island carrying his ship Thunderbird 2 to the Dept for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) in London to offer his organisation’s assistance to produce policies which which recognise the desperate need to cut carbon emissions to avoid disastrous global warming and climate change by banning all fracking.

London, UK. 12 Oct 2022. Charlie-X who protests in Chaplinesque mime was with Steve Bray’s group of pro-Europe protesters on the refuge facing the Houses of Parliament in a protest against the Tory government and its energy policies which will result in average energy bills of around £3,000 this year. Peter Marshall/Alamy Live News

Last week I photographed Neil as his alter ego, Charlie-X, holding up a picture of the Tory Party as a steak with maggots crawling out of it on a crossing refuge close to the Houses of Parliament.

Security at the entrance to BEIS prevented Commander Tracy from entering the building in 2018, and making his offer to the minister concerned. Police weren’t happy about his pasting a poster to the wall either, but he managed on his second attempt to paste one up for long enough for me to take a few pictures. We would all be in a better place had his magnanimous offer been taken up, and it seems to me four years later that our government (if we still have one by the time this post appears) is sadly in need of International Rescue to drag it out of the chasm of its own making.

BEIS refuse International Rescue help

Olympic Park walk – Stratford to Hackney Wick, Friday 19th October 2018

I’d been invited to photograph Commander Tracy at lunchtime and after this had a free afternoon before an early evening protest I wanted to attend. I decided to make another visit to what had before its Olympic destruction been one of my favourite areas of London and see how the new Olympic park was developing, and took the Central Line to Stratford Station.

I walked through Stratford Westfield which my caption described as “21st century version of Hell” and is a place where security take a dim view of photography and emerged into a new landscape from where a bridge took me towards the park.

Parts of the park are beginning to look quite attractive with water and trees, but much is still irredeemably arid, with extensive gravelled walkways with views of dull built boxes in the middle distance. You can see a little of these in my pictures though I tried hard to make the sow’s ear look at least mildly attractive.

But it came as something of a relief to walk across the new footbridge over the Lea Navigation and into Hackney Wick. The buildings here aren’t great architecture but at least they are more varied and most now visually relieved by graffiti – as the strapline across the top of a former pub reads ‘MEANWHILE IN EAST LONDON LUNACTICS DECORATE A BUILDING’ and there had been no shortage of lunatics, some more skilled than others.

The Olympic Nazis had cleaned much of Hackney Wick’s finer decoration and it was good to see and photograph this resurgence. I walked across the footbridge to Fish Island, where there were also new buildings, but much of the older remaining, then on and across the long bridge over the A12 East Cross Route (a part of London’s ruinous motorways built before the overall scheme was abandoned) to Old Ford Road and a bus stop. For once the bus windows were clean and I took a few more pictures as it went along Roman Road.

More pictures at Olympic Park walk.

Mail group end your transphobic hate – Daily Mail, Kensington, London. Fri 19 Oct 2018

Thousands had complained about articles in the free daily newspaper The Metro which had published articles demonising trans people, particularly trans women and had carried an advertising campaign for a transphbic group who call themselves ‘Fair Play for Women’.

The protest was organised by Sister Not Cister UK. Protesters say that these attacks on the trans community will hurt the most marginalised – trans women, working class trans people and trans people of colour – who are also the most likely to be in need of the services that such hateful campaigners seek to deny them.

More people were arriving to join the protest as I left, but I felt I had taken enough pictures which gave an clear idea of the event, and was feeling rather tired and hungry. Living as I do on the edge of London meant it would take me an hour or more to get home, with two journeys on the Underground and then then a train.

More at Mail group end your transphobic hate.

Democracy, Wages, the Blessed Sacrament & Class War

Saturday October 18th 2014 saw a huge march organised by the TUC calling for a pay rise for workers as Britain is recovering from the financial crash and bosses were getting big increases in earnings and bonuses but the workers were still suffering.

On my way there I called in to Parliament Square where Occupy Democracy who I had been with the previous evening were still attempting to take over the area – and I went back again after the TUC march.

Then for something completely different I went to Westminster Cathedral to photograph the start of the Procession of the Blessed Sacrament from there to Southwark Cathedral.

Finally there was a Poor Doors Saturday Night Special at One Commercial St, Aldgate, where Class War’s ranks were augmented by activists who had been attending the Anarchist Book Fair earlier in the day.

Democracy Camp takes the Square – Parliament Square

I had come the previous evening with Occupy Democracy for a rally in Parliament Square where they hoped to set up camp, but police and heritage wardens had kept them off the grass, and they were still on the paved areas when I visited them on Saturday morning, with a large police presence still managing to prevent them setting up camp.

Many had left the square to take part in the TUC march, and like me returned after the marchers had gone on their way to Hyde Park. Others arrived too, including a group from UK Uncut who walked in with a sound system. There were tense moments as police and Westminster Council officials tried to take this from them, but eventually they were allowed to leave with their equipment with the warning that they had to take it away from Parliament Square or it would be taken from them.

Shortly after more people arrived including those who had been carrying two large wood and fabric towers, one with the words POWER and OCCUPY and the other the word DEMOCRACY. Together with other protesters they ran onto the grass square and raised the towers, with police unable to stop them. Others followed them onto the grass and began a rally, with speakers including Labour MP John McDonnell, Occupy’s George Barda, environmentalist Donnachadh McCarthy and Russell Brand.

Police reinforcements began to muster around the square and it seemed a battle was inevitable. But suddenly the police disappeared, probably realising that the presence of Brand in particular would would have generated massive and largely negative media coverage. Much better to come back late at night and do it after the mass media had left (which they did.)

Many more pictures at Democracy Camp takes the Square.

Britain Needs A Pay Rise – Embankment

Over 80,000 marchers had come to call for workers to share in the economic recovery where company chief executives now earn 175 times the average worker, and nurses, teachers and others in the public and private sector are £50 a week worse off than in 2007.

I don’t often bother to photograph ‘press calls’ but I arrived just in time for this one well before the march started, with Frances O’Grady in a bright red dress in front of the main banner with people holding up the figures 1, 7 and 5. And I stayed in front of the march to photograph the leaders holding the banner until it set off.

I stopped a few yards along the route where the light was better and photographed group after group of marchers, including many from the NHS and other public service unions whose members have been particularly badly treated by the government’s pay freezes.

Pat Arrowsmith

Towards the back of the march were many more radical groups, including those I’ve photographed often at other protests, with many familiar faces. In particular I was pleased to have a short talk with veteran peace protester Pat Arrowsmith of CND who I’d several times walked beside on the way to Aldermaston.

As the end of the march went past me I left to cover other events. There would be long speeches at the rally in Hyde Park!

Britain Needs A Pay Rise

Procession of the Blessed Sacrament – Westminster Cathedral to Southwark

I waited outside Westminster Cathedral for people to emerge after the blessing of the sacrament as no photography was allowed inside.

The procession was led by a group mainly in white tops, some carrying lighted altar candles and a man with a crucifix on a stick and I photographed them as they waited for the procession to form up behind them. The wind soon extinguished their candles.

Some way back in the procession were more people wearing clerical dress with one in more ornate robes carrying the Blessed Sacrament, holding it in his cape and another holding an offi-white umbrella over him and the sacrament.

Two African women in ‘Sacred Heart of Jesus’ dresses carried a banner with an unlikely looking Jesus, but most of those that followed were in more normal dress. Some seemed rather unhappy or suspicious about being photographed.

I went with the procession to Lambeth Bridge and then returned to Parliament Square and the Democracy Camp.

Procession of the Blessed Sacrament

Poor Doors Saturday Night Special – One Commercial St, Aldgate

Protesters lit by the headlights of the cars they were blocking

Class War who had been holding regular weekly protests for several months against the separate doors for rich and poor residents at One Commercial St, Aldgate, had called a special protest as the Anarchist Book Fair had been taking place earlier just a short distance away.

Quite a few of those who had travelled to London for the Book Fair came down to take part in the protest. It made my photography a little more difficult as the pavement was rather crowded, and there were many taking part who didn’t know me – and some anarchists are keen not to be photographed.

It was good to see a few new banners – including one from the Durham Miners Association – and the protest was enlivened with samba from Rhythms of Revolution and some songs from Cosmo, who got a Class War sticker added to the others on his guitar, as well as some rousing speeches.

There were rather more police around, including a group of seven guarding the poor door, probably becuase residents from the rich side of the building were having to use this as the protest blocked the rich door. There were enough police there as well to stop the protesters getting into the building when they made a brief rush at one point.

The protest ended with everyone surging onto the busy Whitechapel High St and blocking it for around ten minutes – unfortunately as my flash unit decided to go into erratic mode. Fortunately the headlights of the cars stopped by the protest provided some lighting when the flash failed to do so.

Poor Doors Saturday Night Special

Palestine, NHS & Cleaners in the Barbican

I photographed three quite different protests in London on Saturday 17th October 2015

End the killing in Palestine – Israeli Embassy

Palestine, NHS & Cleaners in the Barbican

October 2015 saw the start of a wave of uncoordinated knife attacks on Jews in Jerusalem, mainly be individuals acting alone, probably enraged by increasing restrictions on Palestinian access to the holy area called by Muslims al-Haram al-Sharif and by Jews the Temple Mount, while at the same time Jewish activists were given greater access.

An Israeli intelligence service report blamed the Palestinian “feelings of national, economic and personal deprivation” while others suggested that Palestinians were responding to what seemed to them and human rights organisations as summary executions being carried out by Israeli forces against Palestinians involved in incidents.

According to Wikipedia, in October 2015 Israeli security forces killed 51 Palestinians in the West Bank and 18 in the Gaza strip. While the killing of Israelis makes the BBC news headlines, the deaths of Palestinians at the hand of Israeli security forces, illegal settlers and other Jewish extremists is seldom mentioned.

More pictures at End the killing in Palestine

Junior Doctors protest to save the NHS – Waterloo Place & Whitehall

Junior doctors met for a rally in Waterloo Place to protest the changes to NHS contracts that will mean working more unsocial hours at standard rates, remove safeguards that stop hospitals overworking doctors, and penalise those volunteer for charities, have families or carry out research.

The new contracts are aimed at making the NHS more profitable for private companies to take over NHS activities and many mainly Tory MPs have interests in private healtcare companies. But overwhelming doctors who work in the NHS want to see it kept as a serrvice dedicated to the public good rather than working to make profits for shareholders at the expense of both healthcare workers and the treatment given to patients.

*A banner covered in names of doctors who were on duty so couldn’t attend*

After a number of speeches in Waterloo Place, thousands of junior doctors and their supporters marched to sit down briefly outside Downing St before continuing to a final rally in Parliament Square.

*Graffiti artist Stik (Centre) stands under two of the placards he designed against privatisation of the NHS*

More pictures at Junior Doctors protest to save the NHS.

Cleaners protest in Barbican – Barbican Centre

I met the cleaners outside the main entrance to the Barbican in Silk Street, where thee United Voices of the World held a noisy rally with a few speeches. They were here after the Barbican management had ignored requests to talk with the UVW union over failing to pay the living wage until 6 months late, contractual sick pay, and cleaners were being victimised for their for trade union activities. They were also protesting the use of unpaid ‘Workfare’ in the centre.

After a while a small group from the UVW , led by UVW General Secretary Petros Elia, ran inside past security staff and made their way to the middle of the arts centre to protest there. The Barbican was holding an event called ‘Battle of Ideas’ which had a large banner ‘Free Speech Allowed’ but Barbican security were not happy with free speech from Petros, despite which he was able to finish the protest, receiving a round of applause from Barbican customers.

Soon police arrived and there was a fairly friendly discuss in which the UVW agreed to leave the building in a few minutes without any trouble. They did so, and continued the protest outside the entrance in Silk Street. I took a few photographs and then left for home as it had been a long day and I wanted to get back and have my dinner.

Cleaners protest in Barbican

Police Ban London Protests – 2019

After a week of protests which brought much of central London traffic to a standstill in October 2019, the Metropolitan Police, egged on by Tory politicians, announced a ban on any Extinction Rebellion protests anywhere in Greater London under Section 14 of the Public Order Act 1986. This draconian measure across the whole of London meant that any two or more people coming together anywhere across London to protest over the climate crisis would form an illegal assembly and would be subject to arrest.

XR continued to protest and also began legal action challenging the ban which was later ruled illegal; the police probably knew that this was the case, but also knew they could put it into effect and use it until the court came to its decision in a cynical but rather typical misuse of their powers.

XR did continue their planned ‘No Food No Future’ protest on Tuesday 15th, immediately after the illegal ban was announced, and there were a few arrests, and the police began clearing the XR camp at Vauxhall. At short notice the Green Party organised a protest in Trafalgar Square against the ban where speakers included Labour MP David Drew, Green Party co-leader Sian Berry, peace activist Angie Zelter and Extinction Rebellion’s Rupert Read as well as three British Green MEPs and an Irish and German MEP.

A couple of hundred XR protesters also came to the square and took part in this protest, clearly in breach of the Section 14 Order, but while police watched and photographed the event they made no arrests. But XR’s big emergency protest against the ban came following day,

XR defies protest ban – Trafalgar Square, Wednesday 16th Oct 2019

Police came and warned some of those sitting in the square before the start of the event that they were committing an offence and might be arrested, but I saw no actual arrests, though police did come and take away a tent from one man as carrying camping equipment is banned in Trafalgar Square and Parliament Square under laws made against Brian Haw’s protest and the Occupy Movement.

There were speeches, speeches and more speeches to a crowded audience in Trafalgar Square, with speakers including XR members, prominent environmentalists, politicians and a former police Chief Superintendent and Green Party MEP Ellie Chowns who had been arrested defending the right to peaceful public protest in Trafalgar Square the previous day.

The XR ‘Red Brigade’ made a spectacular entrance during the speeches, making their way slowly up through the crowd to stand at the top of the steps where they remained for some time responding to the occasion.

In his speech George Monbiot expressed his resolve to get arrested when the protest and XR General Meeting which was to follow it ended. He invited others to join him then and walk into the road in Whitehall and sit down.

Monbiot carried out this intention and was arrested by police along with a number of others including the Green Party Mayor of Woodbridge Eamonn O’Nolan who had worn his Mayoral robes for the event.

More on My London Diary at XR defies protest ban

XR demands Murdoch tell the truth – London Bridge Wednesday 16th Oct 2019

The same evening Extinction Rebellion continued with their planned vigil at Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp HQ at London Bridge demanding that his papers tell the truth about the climate crisis.

Much to their surprise this XR protest turned out to be legal as the blanket ban imposed by the Metropolitan Police on protests by XR across London only applies to public places and not to the private area here in front of the offices.

They came to protest here as the Murdoch press has a particularly bad record of climate denial and the support generally of fossil fuel interests.

Speakers called on the press to end its support of fossil fuel extraction, climate deniers and unnecessary consumerism and instead actively promote lifestyle changes to combat the climate emergency.

More at XR demands Murdoch tell the truth.

Clubland, Electrical Supplies & Addington Square

This continues my posts on my walk in Walworth on 8th January 1989. The previous post was Walworth Road, Harker’s Studios & John Ruskin.

From John Ruskin Street I walked back to Camberwell Road and turned south to walk the short distance to the next turning on the west side, Grosvenor Terrace

*Clubland, Grosvenor Terrace, Walworth, Southwark, 1989 89-1c-13*

Clubland, designed by Sir Edward Maufe was opened in 1939 as “the most celebrated and controversial venture in church youth work of the 20th Century“, launched by the Reverend James Butterworth (1897-1977) as ‘a house for friendship for boys and girls outside any church’. The old Wesleyan Methodist Church on the site whose small congregation mainly drove in from the suburbs was pulled down and replaced by this ‘Temple of Youth’. After bombing in the war, the building was rebuilt and reopened by the Queen Mother in 1964. It now has the message ‘METHODIST CHURCH’ above the door as well as the CLUBLAND’ sign.

*Walworth Methodist Church, Camberwell Rd, Walworth, Southwark, 1989 89-1c-14*

Although the Clubland entrance remains the same, there is now a new Methodist Church here and this part of with its mission statement ‘CLUBLAND – LOYALTY & SERVICE’ as well as the dove dive-bombing the illuminated METHODIST CHURCH sign have gone. The boards showing the activities offered by the church include the Freddie Mills Club and Wesley Guild as well as services and youth club meetings. Both the sign in Japanese and the Bethel Apostolic Church and Calvary Healing Temple reflect the multicultural nature of the area.

*Camberwell Rd, Walworth, Southwark, 1989 89-1c-15*

These well-proportioned large Georgian terrace houses are still there on Camberwell Rd, most now divided into a large number of flats. The terrace of 15 houses is on the west side of the road south of Urlwin St opposite the end of Burgess Park. Most are now residential and one has been restored with the ground and basement floors and “a new rear extension to become an enterprise workspace for architecture and planning”.

*Range Electrical Supplies, Camberwell Rd, Walworth, Southwark, 1989 89-1c-16*

This large property at 86 Camberwell Road is now at least 19 flats. According to the Survey of London, “No. 86 Camberwell Road and the buildings forming the entrance to the yard next to it were erected in 1814–15 (as No. 16 Grosvenor Place) for Messrs. Garland and Fieldwick, masons and builders. The firm continued to occupy the premises until 1869.” A plate shows a 1951 photograph when the buildings were occupied by a number of businesses, including one with ‘Branches Over South London ‘ selling ‘Gold Medal Poultry, Dog, Pigeon & Bird Food’ with the decorated building selling what appears to be ‘Feather Flake Flour’.

*Range Electrical Supplies, Camberwell Rd, Walworth, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-66*

Although these finely decorated buildings are still there on the Camberwell Rd they have been smartened up and altered. The carriage entrance in the central section has disappeared and the smaller window above it replaced and this section of the building made symmetrical. There are also now two windows in the right hand section making this also symmetrical; both windows are new, but a reasonable match with the previous window. A discretely set back floor has been added on the right two-thirds of the building. There is no longer the large sign on the left wall of the front yard of the property which rather attracted me – and the wall has been replaced by a fence. It’s a decent conversion but I preferred the rather more quirky version in my pictures.

*Fowlds & Sons, Manufacturing Upholsterers, Addington Square, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-51*

Since 2014 the ground floor of 3 Addington Square has been Fowlds Cafe, on the corner of Addington Square and Kitson Road but the upholstery business, a family business since 1926, apparently continues upstairs.

*Addington Square, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-53*

The rather curiously shaped Addington Square was developed between 1810 and 1850, and I think this at 13-16 was probably one of the fairly early groups of houses. The railings in front were only added around 1960 but are also included in the Grade II listing. Possibly they were a replacement for some removed for wartime metal appeal. I think all the houses in the central part of the square are listed.

*Addington Square, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-1d-54*

At the north side of the square was the Camberwell Basin of the Royal Surrey Canal, completed in 1810, and the first houses to be built in the square, now 47 and 48, were for its engineer Nathaniel Simmonds. In 1820 one of south London’s first swimming baths opened beside the canal and a second came later. There were ambitious plans for the canal to continue, at first to Mitcham and further afield, but it never crossed the Camberwell Road. There were wharves for stone on the canal bank, with a small dock.

At the right of the picture where the baths and canal once were is now park. The baths had become very much out of date towards the end of the nineteenth century and had been converted into a laundry, but were demolished by Camberwell Council in 1901 for the site to become a refuse depot. In 1938 this became one of many parks created across the country as a memorial to King George V, and in the 1970s became a part of the Burgess Park. The square was in such a dilapidated state in 1970 that it needed a public campaign to stop the GLC demolishing it to become part of the new park that now surrounds it.

To be continued. The first post on this walk was Elephant, Faraday, Spurgeon & Walworth Road.