Re-photo

Those t-shirts reading ‘#STOPUNIVERSALCREDIT’ that I’d photographed earlier at Tate Modern were again on display outside Parliament later in the day, though there were some different messages before everyone got sorted out and in order, and I took advantage of this. Of course the full message does also contain a number of three letter words, ‘TOP’, ‘PUN’, and ‘RED’ as well as ‘EDIT’ (and I suppose some might count ‘UNI’.)

But even when it was all sorted out, I didn’t manage to make much of a picture, perhaps partly because there were other photographers crowding round which meant I wasn’t in the optimum place, but more because I didn’t really think there was a decent picture possible.

Red isn’t my favourite colour for photography, and I think is best used more sparingly. It seems somehow less subtle than other colours in its photographic rendition, and often needs a little darkening and ‘de-hazing’ to restore gradation. Fortunately not all those taking part were in red, nor were the banners.

Another problem with ‘#STOPUNIVERSALCREDIT’ for photographers is simply that it is 20 characters long, and the message itself will occupy a rather narrow strip across any picture. Banners are often rather long, and I seldom like to photograph them in their entirety from directly in front, preferring to work fairly close to one or other end, and gaining some interest from the people nearest to the camera.

The march which followed, through Parliament Square to Caxton House was more to my liking in terms of photography, enabling me to hide much of the red and also to concentrated on some of the protesters.

The protest which followed in front of Caxton House was also photographically interesting, though the very limited space and crowding made it hard to work.

Universal Credit is almost universally recognised to be a disaster, causing a great deal of hardship – and even some deaths – among both the working poor and those who are unable to work. Delays in payment and reductions in benefits have led to many being evicted from their homes and a dramatic rise in people needing the support of food banks and the demand on street kitchens. The government are pressing ahead with the programme despite the growing evidence of its terrible consequences, with some ministers clearly gloating over its effects on the poorer members of our community.

Although the aim of simplifying and unifying the benefits system was laudable, Universal Credit was designed and is being implemented by people who simply are incapable of understanding how most ordinary people live with little or no financial resources. No money in the bank (if they have an account), no savings, no wealthy friends or family who can help them out if they are short at the end of the week or month.

It could perhaps have worked, had it been combined with a true living wage and a proper transition that didn’t leave people without money for weeks or months. But that would have needed more money to implement. It would also need a system that didn’t feel so obsessive about over-payment and possible benefit fraud. The rich who avoid or defraud the tax system on a huge scale get away with it most of the time, and the government makes surprisingly little effort to stop this (even admitting that in some cases they haven’t taken action as it would ‘damage the reputation’ of those concerned) and the losses there are hundreds or thousands of times greater than any loss over benefits. We have a benefits system – with excessive use of ‘sanctions’, taking away benefits for up to three years – that is clearly designed to publish the poor, and reports have shown to cause many deaths – according to some estimates one every 33 minutes.

More pictures at Universal Credit rally & march

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My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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Sometimes space in photographs can be very important, and this picture of protesters in the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern in London is I think a good example. But it isn’t without its problems, and as this small reproduction shows one of them is that we really can’t read the message on the t-shirts unless the image is used on a rather larger scale.

The picture is one of around a dozen taken of the group of protesters, and actually one of them is missing. In this picture it reads STOPUNIVERSALCREDIT and there should have been a ‘#’ at the left. But the ‘#’ was talking to and delaying the security man who was trying to stop the protest, and a later picture shows running to join the protest with security runinng after him.

I was standing on the bridge across the hall, I think at the same level as the horizontal beam along the wall at the right, and hoping that there were going to be no security officers trying to stop me taking pictures – and fortunately there wasn’t. And I was able to take a series of pictures before the security officer rather got in the way of the message, some of which were more legible in small reproduction.

As well as making the message more legible, the larger scale also makes the reflection on the rear wall stand out more, helped by a little massaging in post-production. I’ve also done a little tweaking to make the inside walls of the building more or less vertical as intended, which is a lot easier on the computer than when we had to tilt the easel holding the paper under the enlarger.

I’d started taking pictures of the group earlier, at the riverside outside Tate Modern, and we had to start with the protesters with their back to us as they didn’t have quite enough people to wear the full set. Then they managed to persuade a person (or was it two) walking by to make up the numbers for a full frontal image by the river and then on the Millenium bridge before a couple of late-comers made it. It needed the 16mm fisheye to get in the whole group on the bridge with the former power stationi behind them.

But I think the pictures I like most from the riverside are those where you can’t read the message at all, or only the odd bit of it – and the tape which says ‘Beware Hostile Environment’.

And there was even a role for that over-zealous security officer when the protesters went to pose on the tarmac outside the building and he came to insist that they go completely off the property. But the logo on his jacket enabled me to take a photograph showing clearly where the protest was taking place. I’ve put the image on the web without cropping, but should really have cropped the group tighter, taking out the woman in blue at the left and a little of the foreground.

Universal Credit is now pretty universally admitted to be a disaster, but the government is refusing to halt its roll-out, creating greater hardship to so many, leading to evictions and suicides as well as a huge degree of deprivation and misery. If we lived in a society that was truly just, Iain Duncan Smith would be in jail and the whole programme scrapped.

The action at Tate modern was a prelude to other protests in London and elsewhere on a day of action against Universal Credit, of which more later. But its also a set of pictures, a little over 30 in all, which show very clearly how I was working that day, about the closest I like to get to studio photography.

Universal Credit protest at Tate Modern

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There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, a small donation – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

To order prints or reproduce images

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Very little progress appears to have been made in finding homes for those displaced by the terrible fire at Grenfell Tower, and in April little or no progress appeared to have been made in the official investigations, either by police or others. There seems to have been a great deal of deliberate delay, one of the usual tactics of the establishment under threat, giving time for that grass to grow long.

But I think it is clear that the Grenfell community will not give up its demands for Justice, with these monthly marches keeping up the pressure for action, even if so far little has resulted. One thing that many were discussing before the silent march began was whether something more active was needed.

Moving the march to start at Kensington & Chelsea Council’s offices just off Kensington High Street certainly make it more visible, with the march holding up traffic on one of London’s busiest streets, still full of shoppers and normally busy with traffic in the rush hour. Marching around Ladbroke Grove close to Grenfell Tower obviously was significant but could go almost unnoticed in the rest of London and the country.

Not only was the march more visible, the event was more audible too. The march remains silent but the United Ride 4 Grenfell by bikers from the Ace Cafe on the North Circular Rd, which included Muslim bikers Deen Riders, riding to Parliament and then coming to Kensington Town Hall was definitely very noisy. The silent marchers waited by the side of the road at the Town Hall as they went passed, then moved onto the road to start the silent march.

I didn’t find it easy to photograph the bikers. The glare from their powerful front lights as the came down the slope towards the town hall was overpowering, and the first of them were past fairly quickly. Fortunately they had to wait for some of the group to catch up, and then for the traffic lights at Kensington High St, so I was able to take a little more time. There wasn’t a great deal on many of the riders or their machines to show their support; a few had flags on their machines or labels on their clothing, one or two with Grenfell t-shirts visible. I took most of the pictures opposite the marchers waiting to leave so their banners and hearts appeared in the background.

Grenfell silent walk – 10 months on
Bikers for Grenfell

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There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, a small donation – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

To order prints or reproduce images

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I first met Hizb Ut-Tahrir in 2004 and have photographed a number of their protests since then. There are often some at them who are not very happy about being photographed, though mainly it is a few men who are unhappy about the women on their protests being photographed. Of course they have staged women’s protests – such as one at the French embassy in 2010, but at most the women are relegated to an area well away from the speakers. At least at this one there were powerful speakers so they could hear what was going on, but at least while I was there, no women spoke.

The organisation was started in 1953 in Jerusalem by a Sunni Muslim scholar and aims to restore the Khilafah Rashidah, the “Rightly Guided” rule of the four caliphs who succeeded the Prophet in a 30 year reign when Muslim armies conquered much of the Middle East. They would sweep away the more recently created states such as Turkey which they accuse of complicity in handing Syria back to Assad in accordance with colonial interests.

While many Turks and Kurds condemn Erdogan as a dictator who is increasingly moving the country toward an Islamic regime, they condemn him as a secular leader, and in particular for his strengthening Turkish military and economic ties with Israel – which they do not recognise. The protest called on all Muslims to support the brave people of Palestine who “are raising their voices to speak out and protest against the illegal occupation, as they are mercilessly killed by the Zionist regime.”

Hizb Ut-Tahrir is banned in many countries, including, according to Wikipedeia, “Germany, Russia, China, Egypt, Turkey, and all Arab countries except in Lebanon, Yemen, and UAE.”
There were moves to ban it in the UK after the London bombings and again around the 2010 election but it remains legal here as there is little if any evidence of them being actively involved in any terrorist activities here. The organisation was given a huge boost by the invasion of Iraq in 2003 but numbers of supporters have declined in recent years.

More at Hizb Ut-Tahrir protest against Turkey.

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There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, a small donation – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

To order prints or reproduce images

________________________________________________________