I think this was built as the church hall for Trinity Presbyterian Church. The church was founded in 1863 and the hall was built the following year, the church coming later in 1870. The church closed in 1941 and both church and hall were used as factories. The church burnt down in 1953. This building was certainly still in use by Dossetter in the 1970s but since I photographed it has been replaced by flats. The block at left is still there.
Leytonstone Rd, Maryland, Newham, 1989 89-9a-61
Another view of the former church hall. The road layout was altered at least twice sinc I made this pictre and there is now a pedestrianised area with a 10m spiral tower by Malcolm Robertson carrying a clock.
Maryland Station was opened as Maryland Point Station in 1873 by the Great Eastern Railway, 34 years after the line was built. It was renamed as simply Maryland in 1940 and the new buildings were built during the war years in LNER Art Deco style, designed by Sir Thomas Penberthy Bennett, then Director of Bricks at the Ministry of Works. Later he was to be the main architect for Crawley New Town and Stevenage. Network SuuthEast, created in 1982, later added their sign which I think fits reasonably well with the rest.
I could not walk by Scorchers, a 24hr Ironing Service without photographing their signage. I think their 24hrs was the turnaround time rather than suggesting people might have an urgent need for some ironing at say, 3am which they would rush to deal with, though I did have a vision of a van with flashing blue lights and an ironing board rushing through the streets. I cannot now find the exact location and think these buildings may have been on a side street and have probably since been demolished.
I wouldn’t normally post this in these posts as it is only a very slight variation on an image from my previous post. I’d turned around and taken the pictures above and then came back to this place to make a further six frames – a very unusual thing for me, but I was determined to get this exactly as I wanted it. And here it is with the text that came with it on the web site for my ‘1989’ project.
This splendid building is still there just a little off Leytonstone Road in Thorne Close and was built as the Board Room block for the West Ham Union Workhouse around 1870. In 1930 West Ham Borough Council renamed it the Central Home Public Assistance Institution and it was again renamed when it became art of the NHS as Langthorne Hospital. It continued to specialise in geriatric care and had the motto ‘fiat jucunda senectus’ – let there be the delights of old age. It was finally closed in 1999. The older buildings on the site are all Grade II listed.
Langthorne Health Centre, Langthorne Rd, Leytonstone, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-41
The Langthorne Health Centre is still at 13 Langthorne Road, though it appears now to be run by L L Medical Care though still giving NHS treatment.
Another from the web site – though these images without the text are on Flickr. Here I’m presenting the images in the order they were taken, but in the book and web site they were thoughtfully sequenced – and perhaps make a little more sense. The book preview shows around half of the book’s 20 pictures.
Palestine, Orange Order, Naked Cyclists & RFH: On Saturday 9th June 2007 I photographed a protest against the occupation of Palestine,the Orange Order celebrating 200 years of parades, the London World Naked Bike Ride and the re-opening of the Royal Festival Hall.
End the occupation – Palestine
The largest of these events was part of an international day of action marking the 40th anniversary of the 1967 six day war which had ended in complete and massive military victory for Israel, and a shameful defeat for not just the Arab nations but also the UN and the rest of the world.
And, as I commented then “in the longer term it is proving a disaster for Israel too, chaining them to a policy of brutal oppression of their Palestinian neighbours.” I continued; “Over the past few months, reading and hearing eye-witness reports of life in the occupied areas have shocked me, just as the reports from South Africa under apartheid did. And just as in South Africa, in time these things must come to an end with peace and reconciliation. War doesn’t settle things, it just prolongs the agonies.”
Seventeen years later we are seeing things that are orders of magnitude more shocking still happening in Gaza, witnessing the genocide of the Palestinian people.
Two members of the Palestinian government who had been invited to speak at the event were unable to come as they in jail in Israel. As usual until recently there was little coverage of this event or Israels apartheid policies in the UK media. Now their is considerable international interest in what is happening in Gaza but reporting is severely hampered as the international press are not allowed access other than in a few very limited Israeli army led tours.
Orange Order celebrates 200 Years of Parades – Park Lane
The Grand Lodge 200th Anniversary Parade marked 200 years since the first recorded Orange Parade by the Portadown Lodge of the Orange Order, Loyal Orange Lodge No. 1 (LOL 1), on 1 March 1807.
Although King William III, Prince Of Orange had successfully invaded England in what was later known as the Glorious Revolution in 1688 and the first Orange Association was founded a few days after his landing in Brixham when he reached Exeter, organised parades are only known to have started 119 years later.
This anniversary event was an impressive display with several thousand marching including lodges from all our major cities. The Orange Order still has a strong following in some former protestant working class areas but as I commented, despite “own protestant roots … such sectarian solidarity now seems a relic of ancient enmities, a throwback to a less civilised age.”
I arrived in Hyde Park a little late but was able to photograph the riders setting off on their ride around London and went with them along Piccadilly before taking the tube to wait for them to reach the Houses of Parliament at Westminster.
You can read my thoughts about the ride which I think rather fails to get its message across although causing a great stir on the busy streets it goes through, as few of the riders have anything on their bodies or bikes to state its purpose on My London Diary.
For most who see it, this is simply an unusual spectacle of nudity, and an illustration of the great variety of the human form rather than the very limited body types which we see on advertising hoardings and other images of the fully or partly unclothed om the press or elsewhere.
This was the one event of those I covered that was widely covered in the media, making the national news that evening, though I think there was little attention to why the ride was taking place.
The Southbank centre was staging a weekend of events across its site marking the reopening of the Royal Festival Hall after a considerable refurbishment which began in June 2005 and I managed to take a few photographs of these across the day.
The foyers inside the building were opened up more but I think the main purpose was to provide more commercial space to provide an income for the centre. The Royal Festival Hall was built as part of the Festival of Britain in 1951 and was funded and managed by the London County Council and their successors, the Greater London Council until that was abolished by Thatcher in 1988.
The Southbank Centre states on its web site that it “does not receive any funding from the Government to run and maintain its 11-acre national heritage site. All essential repair and maintenance work to our buildings and site has been funded from our own commercial revenues or from fundraising.“
Slaughterhouses & Naked Cyclists: Five years ago today on Saturday 8th June 2019 I photographed a march by vegans through the West End, leaving them at their rally in Soho Square and photographing people taking part in the London World Naked Bike Ride on my way back to Waterloo Station.
Close all Slaughterhouses
Vegans were marching in London calling for an end to the breeding, fishing and slaughter of animals.
I’m not a vegan, and as my comments on My London Diary make clear I do not find some of the arguments that they make so forcefully to be well-founded or convincing.
As I state there, “Of course I’m against cruel farming practices, and much is wrong in various ways about some modern farming, but keeping animals and killing them for food or milking them can be done in a decent and humane way and one that has an important contribution to our environment.“
But I am an unrepentant what they call ‘speciesist’, believing that although other animals share many of our characteristics they are not as these vegans were chanting “just like us” and that our species is in important respects different.
But vegans are a good thing in that a plant-based diet certainly does make lower demands on the environment, and I’m happy to eat vegetarian food several days a week, though not to be either a vegetarian or a vegan.
Given the way things are going with a failure of societies around the world to respond adequately to the increasing climate chaos it seems quite likely that our species will become extinct. And the farmed animals which appear on many of the posters carried in this and other vegan protests will also die out. They are the product of centuries and more of breeding by us and most could not survive in the wild. Farm animals rely on farmers as much as farmers do on their animals.
But there is certainly no doubting the sincerity, anger and dedication of these vegan protesters and this is reflected in the many posters and placards and the anger of their protests which I think comes through in my pictures. I just wish more of them would show the same support for protests over human rights abuses too.
The World Naked Bike Ride says it is a global protest movement with rides in cities around the world, raising awareness of issues such as safety of cyclists on the road, reducing oil dependence and saving the planet. They say “Let’s make the planet great again!”
And although for some it clearly is a protest, for many I think it is, as I wrote “more a fun ride for people who want to ride around London with no or very few clothes on.” And I can see nothing wrong with that as “For those of us watching on the streets it is certainly unusual and entertaining, and I think very few could be seriously upset by it. The normal response seems to be a lot of pointing and laughing.”
There were around a thousand cyclists “in various states of undress, some with face or body paint or slogans on their bodies” in the ride, having started from several places some miles away who converged on the South Bank to ride together past St Paul’s Cathedral and then to Buckingham Palace before finishing the ride at Hyde Park Corner.
The great majority of the riders were men. My pictures concentrate on those people who stood out because of their body paint or slogans which included a considerably larger percentage of the women taking part – and I think most of the men who had these were taking part with their female partners.
The WNBR dress code is ‘as bare as you dare‘ although footwear is obligatory for safety reasons. I don’t have a problem with nudity, but am aware when photographing this event that many publications would not use more revealing images, and try and ensure that at least some pictures have strategically placed handlebars or other objects. But my pictures of the WNBR from earlier years did get complaints from some American educators who blocked my site from their students. And on the front page for June 2019 I includeD the warning “These pictures involve nudity. Please do not click on the link if you may be offended or if you are in a place where others may be offended.”
Die-in against Greenwich cycle deaths: On Thursday 7th Jun 2018 Cyclists staged a die-in outside Greenwich Council offices in Woolwich Town Hall after three cyclist were killed by vehicles in the area in recent weeks, two by HGV(Heavy Goods Vehicles) trucks on the notoriously unsafe Woolwich Rd.
Cyclists are vulnerable road users – as also are pedestrians. But while almost everywhere at least in urban areas we have separate pavements for pedestrians, most of the time cyclists have to share roads with cars and lorries. While all road deaths are tragic its important to keep things in proportion.
Official statistics shows 462 pedestrians were injured by cyclists in 2022, compared to 437 in 2021 when one person is recorded as dying, and 308 in 2020, when four people were killed. The figures relate to deaths on roads and there are some other deaths and injuries on footpaths, cycle paths and elsewhere which are not included but the numbers are relatively small.
Similar figures for pedestrians killed by cars have in recent years been between 346 and 470 with between 4 and 7,000 serious injuries. While around a hundred cyclists are killed by cars and over 4,000 seriously injured.
The differences in numbers are huge and depend on various factors. But simple physics plays a part with the extra mass of cars and higher speeds of travel making them on average around 60 times more lethal than bicycles in collisions, and much more where traffic is fast moving and vehicles heavier.
Where pedestrians and cyclists share paths or other spaces there are still differences, but on a lesser scale, with cyclists typically only having around 15 times the energy of pedestrians due to their greater speed.
The government fact sheet states “Pedal cyclists are one of the vulnerable user groups. They are not protected by a vehicle body in the same way car users are, and tend to be harder for drivers to see on the road. They are, therefore, particularly susceptible to injuries.”
And it also notes that the figures for non-fatal casualties involving “pedal cyclists are amongst the most likely to be under-reported in road casualty data since cyclists have no obligation to inform the police of collisions.” Certainly the two incidents I can remember where I was knocked flying by cars whose drivers had failed to see me and where I clearly had right of way were not reported.
The greatest risk of cyclists being killed comes in collisions with HGVs. Reported collisions involving one car cause around four times as many deaths but there are roughly there are roughly 50 times as many as with HGVs and those with HGVs are roughly 15 times as likely to kill cyclists.
One of the speakers at this event in Woolwich spoke about the research he was involved in 37 years earlier on designing safer lorries. Few of the suggestions from this have been implemented, although things are slowly changing. But most HGVs are still unsafe with limited visibility and huge blind spots.
Other speakers talked about the failure of Greenwich Council to support the plans for Cycle Superhighway 4, allegedly because of the personal antipathy of the former council leader to Boris Johnson’s former cycling commissioner Andrew Gilligan. Since 2018 some progress has been made on what is now called Cycleway 4, though it still ends short of Woolwich. And others pointed out that air pollution, much due to road transport was a huge killer in London, causing an estimated over 9,000 deaths a year. We don’t just need safer roads but need to find ways to reduce vehicle usage.
Swanscombe Peninsula Kent: I visited and photographed the Swanscombe peninsula in the 1980s as a part of an extensive project along the south bank of the River Thames east of London, returning occasionally over the years, particularly in the 2000s when I documented the building of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link which crosses under the river here.
Back in the 1980s there was still a large cement industry here. But it was here that Portland Cement became the centre of the UK cement industry, with huge quarries digging out the chalk, often 100ft thick here, leaving huge gaps in the landscape. But most of these quarries were now worked out and the industry was fast declining and has now all gone.
On my 2015 post Swanscombe on My London Diary you can read more about the industry. The Swanscombe cement plant was the l argest in the UK from 1840 until 1930, but was largely derelict when I took pictures in the ’80s though it only finally closed in 1990. That at neighbouring Northfleet, was only fully developed in 1970, although cement production had begun there in 1796. That site, the last working cement plant in the area, closed in 2008 was cleared and its landmark chimneys demolished in 2009-10.
Chalk had been quarried to within a few feet of the main A226 London Road and in some places on both sides of the road, leaving it running on a narrow spine of chalk.
From the road the Pilgrims Road leads down steeply to Swanscombe marshes, with some industrial developments in the former chalk pits on both sides.
Kent Wildlife Trust describe the marshes as “Home to a remarkable mosaic of grasslands, coastal habitats, brownfield features, scrub and wetland” and I certainly found it a remarkable area both in the 1980s and in later visits – the last a year or so ago. My pictures more reflect an interest in industrial archaeology rathe than nature.
In 2012 plans were announced to turn 216 hectares of this site into a theme park, at first with the support of Paramount Pictures who withdrew their support for Paramount Park in 2017 with the proposed park being renamed London Resort. Paramount are also taking London Resort to the High Court over a financial deal after the London Resort was in danger of going bust, although they still apparently have an interest in providing content based on their block-buster films.
In 2015 it looked likely that Paramount Park would go ahead in the relatively near future, prompting me to get on my bike and revisit the area. In the post on My London Diary I give some details about my route. I think all of the site is privately owned but back then much was still open to the public to wander around. Since then there have been more fences and notices restricting public access but there is also a new section of the England Coast Path opened at the start of 2022 through here.
The English Resort plans are still in limbo and the planning permission has lapsed, although the company still believe they will go ahead at some time, others feel the project is dead. Development of the site became more complicated when it was declared as an SSSI on account of its jumping spiders in 2021, and its financial prospects are threatened by Universal Studios consideration to build a rival resort in the former brickworks near Bedford. And its unclear if there would be the money to go ahead.
Dartford Council has withdrawn its support for the project, as has the local MP, but it remains to be seen what attitude a new government will take towards the plans. Campiagners against it, including the council have called for it to lose its Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project status which would almost certainly be its death knell.
Of course this doesn’t mean that this remarkable piece of nature is safe from development, and if London Resort is ended parts of the area are likely to be developed for housing as prime riverside sites, though hopefully much will remain.
Maryland My Maryland, Stratford 1989: It was not until the beginning of September 1989 that I found time to return to London, starting my walks there again on Sunday 3rd September at Stratford in East London and walking from the station towards Maryland.
Tom Allen Centre, Grove Crescent Rd, Stratford, Newham, 1989 89-8p-21
Nobody is absolutely sure why Stratford has an area called Maryland but it could be that this is an unusually named after Maryland Point on the Potomac River in Virginia. Richard Lee (1617-1664) emigrated to the then colony around 1640, making a fortune as “a tobacco planter, trader, an owner and trader of slaves, and an employer and importer of English indentured servants.” Returning to England in 1658 he bought land in Stratford and owned a large house there. The name Maryland Point is first known to have appeared on a map in 1696.
Trinity College Oxford set up a College Mission “in connexion with the Great Eastern Railway Works at Stratford le Bow” around 1890 and it continued there until destroyed by a German air-raid in 1941.
Tom Allen came to work at their mission in Bermondsey while still studying at Trinity in 1909 where he obtained a “Fourth in History” and a Rugby Blue. From 1911 to 1914 he was Warden of the Stratford mission but when the war broke out enlisted as a private in the Grenadier Guards, but was soon offered a commission in the Irish Guards. The following February he went to France “where less than one month later, in the firing trenches near La Bassée he was killed instantaneously by a shell.” He was only 27. The centre named for him was built in 1957.
It is now The Sanctuary, home to The Redeemed Christian Church of God.
Maryland Works, Grove Crescent Rd, Stratford, Newham, 1989 89-8p-22
I can’t make out the name of the company once engraved on the building of the Maryland Works at 20/22 Grove Crescent Road as it is partly covered by the later sign board for ( I think) ‘MTM ties around the world of B J Bass & Co Ltd.’ It and the offices beyond are long gone, replaced by blocks of flats, backing on to the railway.
The Grove Picture Theatre, The Grove, Maryland, Stratford, Newham, 1989 89-8p-23
Built in 1910 by Frazzi Fireproof Construction Ltd of Whitechapel the Grove Picture Palace later became a billiards hall. Although unused and in a rather poor stage it still retained its original decoration and railings in 1989, though its signage above the ground floor had gone. The sign ‘READ GOD’S WORD THE BIBLE’ was on the wall belonging to the Central Baptist Church next door,
The Grove Picture Theatre, The Grove, Maryland, Stratford, Newham, 1989 89-8p-24
Leytonstone Road starts at the north end of The Grove after it crosses the railway and runs parallel to the tracks to Maryland Station before turning north.
These buildings at 7-13 Leytonstone Road are still there but a little altered with the roof of Bacchus’s Bin (now BAR ONE and Thailander Restaurant) having had its gables and the half barrels and sign at first floor level removed. The Chevy Chase pub at No 11 closed in 2010, was until 2014 a restaurant and after being empty for a couple of years is now a solicitors.
Church, Francis St, Maryland, Stratford, Newham, 1989 89-8p-12
This is Emmanuel Hall and is now the Without Borders Church. It has lost its large cross and most of the row of windows along its side since I made this picture.
This picture on the corner looking north where Leytonstone Road turns north with the tower block of Henniker Point in the distance was the first image in the body of my Blurb book, ‘1989’, ISBN: 978-1-909363-01-4, published in 2012 and still available both as softcover or PDF. I had previoiusly published the work on the web in 2006 and it was exhibited in the 2010 London International Documentary Festival – I think the first occasion on which this festival featured still photography.
This is one of only two books of mine which are image/text pieces, though others have some separate texts. For the text I misappropriated the name ‘Upton Sinclair’, an American write and political activist who died in 1968, but I was thinking of nearby Upton Park and the well-known psychogeographic writer Iain Sinclair whose works on London I had long admired. After all there are hundreds if not thousands of us ‘Peter Marshalls’ so why not one more Upton Sinclair?
The blurb on Blurb about ‘1989’ states: ” ‘1989′ claims to be Chapter 1 of a book based on the notes made by the photographer on a walk through the streets of north-east London with a well-known author of ‘psycho-geographical’ works.
But the author is entirely fictional, and the notes, written in 2005, after his death and sixteen years after the pictures were taken are in part a gentle spoof on psycho-geography but more importantly a reflection on photography and the documentary process.”
Parts of it I still find quite funny and it really is one of my favourites among my books.
G4S Abuses, The Line & Barking Creek: My day on Thursday 4th June 2015 began with a protest outside the AGM of G4S on the UN International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression, after which I took a walk around the Royal Victoria Dock looking at the three sculptures then on London’s meridian sculpture trail before going for a longer walk around Barking Creek on this fine early summer day.
G4S AGM Torture Protest, Excel Centre, Custom House
I travelled out to the Royal Victoria Dock in Newham for a protest outside the Excel Centre where G4S was holding its AGM. It was the UN International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression and protesters were there as G4S runs the Israeli prisons where Palestinian children are held in small underground cells in solitary confinement, often for many days.
An Avaaz petition with 1,792,311 signatures had called on G4S to stop running Israeli prisons and Inminds had held regular protests outside the Victoria St head offices of the company.
Some had bought shares in 2014 so they could attend the AGM and ask questions, and there were angry scenes inside the AGM as they were forcibly ejected. In 2015 there were also shareholder protesters, but security for the meeting was tight and mobile phones were prohibited and press were very definitely not allowed access.
As the protest outside continued, some of those who were ejected this year came and spoke about what had happened when they tried to ask questions, and the general feeling inside the AGM, which appeared to be one of some despondency.
Security at Excel made attempts to move the protesters further away from the building. Eventually a request was made to reduce the noise as there were students inside taking an exam and after some discussion the protesters moved back
G4S also runs immigration detention centres in the UK where various human rights abuses have been disclosed by reporters.
I left the protest and took the opportunity to walk across the high level bridge over the dock, taking a few pictures, and then along the path around the dock to the DLR station at Royal Victoria.
As on other occasions I found the views from the bridge stunning, and those at ground level were also interesting.
By the time I came to the first of the three sculptures on London’s sculpture trail on the Greenwich meridian the first two of these seemed extremely underwhelming. All have now been replaced by other works in a trail that regularly changes.
The only one I found of any interest was ‘Vulcan’ (1999), a 30ft-high bronze figure by late Scottish artist Eduardo Paolozzi, now in Edinburgh, close to his home town of Leith. You can see pictures of the other two on My London Diary. The Line – Sculpture Trail
Barking Creek
It was a fine afternoon and I decided to return to Barking, hoping to go along the path on the west bank of Barking Creek to the hames, marked on my OS map as a traffic-free cycle route. But as in the previous year I found it fenced off and with a locked gate.
Instead I made my way north along Barking Creek, past Cuckold’s Haven to the Barking Barrage, a half tide barrier opened in 1998, going across this and returning alongside the east bank of the Creek to the A13, where I took a bus to Beckton and the DLR.
Barking in the nineteenth century claimed the world’s largest fishing fleet, with 220 commercial boats, going out into the North Sea fishing grounds, and fishing was the major industry of the town. But in the 1860s the fleet moved out to Gorleston in Suffolk and Grimsby in Lincolnshire, both much closer to the fishing grounds.
Until then the fish had been kept fresh by ice, gathered on Barking marshes in the winter and stored in large ice houses until taken out in the boat, or stored live, swimming in sea water tanks inside the boats. A fast schooner was used in the heyday to bring the catch from the fleet back to Barking so they could continue fishing for up to a couple of months. Once in Barking the fish was then well-placed for the London markets.
The coming of the railways meant that fish from Gorleston or Grimsby could be taken rapidly to London for sale, and the industry in Barking collapsed almost overnight. There are still a few boats moored on the river at Roding, but the only fishing is a few mainly elderly men sitting by the river with rod and line, who I’ve never seen getting a bite. And it would certainly be a brave man who would eat anything out of the Roding or Thames.
But fish is now coming back to Barking, or at least nearby Dagenham Dock, under a City of London Scheme, but although this has received planning permission it apparently still needs an Act of Parliament. Progress on this was halted by the dissolution of Parliament on 30 May 2024.
DPAC v Theresa May in Maidenhead: In June 2017 we were also in a General Election campaign after Theresa May called a snap election. Labour would have won back then, but for the deliberate interference by the party right who sabotaged their efforts in some key seats to stop a Corbyn victory. Instead we got another 7 years of Tory blunders and incompetence. May, Johnson, Truss, Sunak…
Even now I wonder when Labour seems to be in a commanding position in the opinion polls whether Labour will somehow manage to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory. They are certainly doing their best at the moment to alienate party workers in many constituencies by barring their choice of candidates and imposing often quite unsuitable (and sometimes unspeakable) people in their place.
Theresa May was standing in the safe Tory seat of Maidenhead and was re-elected with a majority of over 26,000 over Labour and in 2019 again with almost 19,000 more votes than the then second place Lib-Dem. This time May has retired but it may well be a close run thing with both Reform UK and the Lib-Dems taking votes from the Tories.
DPAC were not fielding a candidate or supporting one of the other twelve in the 2017 race but were there to protest against the Tory government, the first in the world to be found guilty of the grave and systematic violations of disabled people’s human rights by the UN.
They stated that Tory cuts since 2010 had 9 times the impact on disabled people as on any other group, 19 times more for those with the highest support needs. Tory polices are heartless, starving, isolating and finally killing the disabled who they view as unproductive members of society – and by ending the Independent Living Fund they have has actually stopped many from making a positive contribution.
The Tory Government rejected the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities findings in 2016, which had found failures in the right to live independently and be included in the community, to work and employment, and to an adequate standard of living and social protection across all parts of the UK. A further report by the committee in 2024 found that there had been “no significant progress” since 2016 in improving disabled people’s rights and that there were signs that things were getting worse in some areas.
The 2024 report concluded that the UK has “failed to take all appropriate measures to address grave and systematic violations of the human rights of persons with disabilities and has failed to eliminate the root causes of inequality and discrimination.” Labour has yet to announce anything likely to improve the situation.
A couple of buses took me slowly to Maidenhead where I met the group from DPAC who had come from Paddington in a quarter of the time. They marched to the High Street with a straw effigy of ‘Theresa May – Weak and Wobbly’ and the message ‘Cuts Kill’. After a hour of protest with speeches, chanting and handing out fliers calling on Maidenhead voters to vote for anyone but Theresa May they returned to the station.
Although it looked to the police who had followed them closely as well as to some of the photographers who had travelled down from London that the protest had come to an end I knew that DPAC would not leave without some further action.
They waited on the pavement close to the station until most of the police had left – and most photographers had caught a train – and then moved to occupy one of the busiest roads into the town. The police came running back and began to argue with the protesters to get them to return to the pavement.
Police find it hard to deal with disabled protesters, especially those in wheelchairs and mobility scooters, and they were rather confused (as I was) by the arguments of ‘General William Taggart of the NCA‘ who claimed a military right to block roads. DPAC told the police that they would leave the road after having made their point for a few more minutes, but the police wanted them to move at once.
Eventually having blocked the road for around 15 minutes the protesters were told they would be arrested unless they moved and slowly began to do so. I left rather more quickly as my bus to Windsor was coming and if I missed it I would have to wait two hours for the next one. I arrived at the stop as it was coming in.
My journey home was not an entirely happy one. There was the usual walk between stops and wait for another bus to take me close to home. I got off, walked a short distance down the road, felt in my pocket for my phone and found nothing – I had left it on the bus, which was by then disappearing around the corner. Fortunately the bus driver later found it and handed it in at the depot and two days later I was able to cycle to Slough and retrieve it.
Brian Haw, Democracy, Cabs, Colombia & Israeli Atrocity: Six protests on Wednesday 2nd June 2010.
Brian Haw & Democracy Village – Parliament Square
It was 9 years since Brian Haw had begun his peace protest in Parliament Square and police marked the occasion by serving a summons on his fellow protester Barbara Tucker for using a megaphone. An officer writes out the details as I take photographs (more online.)
The previous week both Brian and Barbara had been arrested and held for 30 hours while the Queen came for the state opening of Parliament – as usual others in the campaign continued the protest during their enforced absence.
The arrest had come after Brian had objected to police carrying out a search of his home – a tent in Parliament Square – without a warrant – the 13th or 14th illegal search police have made as a part of the continual campaign of harassment against him over the years.
Still also in Parliament Square were the tents of the separate peace campaign Brian and Barbara label as the Police Camp, Democracy Village, there since the May Day protest a month ago.
A handful of those from the camp were protesting outside the railings around Parliament with banners demanding peace and questioning the authority of Parliament. Police generally left them along apart from telling some to climb down from the wall.
Several thousand ‘black cabs’ had come to Aldwych with a number of ‘knowledge boys and girls’ on scooters currently training for the job, causing considerable disruption and delay to London traffic. They claim they are unfairly victimised by Transport for London, the Public Carriage Office and Westminster city council.
Many non-cabbies feel that these cabs are an outdated relic from the era of the hansom cab and that their operations in ‘plying for hire’ lead to unnecessary congestion. Minicab drivers feel that they are discriminated against in favour of the cabs and arguably have a rather stronger case.
Black cabs are largely used by a relatively small and well-off section of the community and we could surely have a better public transport system for the majority without them. But in my post on My London Diary I have a longer description of their grievances as well as reporting how police attempts to control the protest multiplied its effectiveness.
BP Picket for Colombian Oil Workers – St James’s Square
The Colombia Solidarity Campaign held a picket outside BP’s HQ in support of Colombian oil workers who have occupied a BP plant on the Cusiana oilfield and are stopping building works there while allowing normal work at the plant to continue.
On My London Diary you can read a lengthy piece on the dispute in an area of Colombia under military occupation and where peaceful protesters occupying the plant were attacked by armed commandos from the Colombian Army together with BP’s private security personnel.
Among the speakers at the picket was Jim Catterson of the ICEM, the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Worker’s Unions, ICEM, which represents more than 20 million workers around the world, and was calling for international solidarity with the oil worker’s union (USO) and the Movement for the Dignity of Casanare in the fight against BP.
Protest for Murad Akincilar – Turkish Embassy, Belgrave Square
A protest at the Turkish Embassy called for the release of trade unionist Murad Akincilar arrested the previous September while on extended holiday in Turkey and still in prison in Istanbul. Lack of medical care in prison has resulted in serious eye damage and partial blindness. His case was due to come to court again the following day.
Based in Switzerland where he works for trade union Unia, Akincilar had studied in London for a Masters degree at the LSE 18 years earlier and was known personally to some in the protest organised by Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! and Gikder to support the campaign being organised by the Swiss trade union Unia.
The Zionist Federation together with members of the English Defence League demonstrated opposite the Israeli embassy in support of the Israeli Defence Force killings in the attack on the Gaza aid flotilla.
A few Palestinian supporters had come to oppose this protest but the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign and Stop the War had decided not to support the counter-demonstration to avoid conflict.
On My London Diary I quote statements by the World Zionist Orgainsation and the World Jewish Congress (WJC) expressing regret at the loss of life that occurred, but the mood of this pro-Israel protest was very different, “one of a gloating triumphalism that seemed entirely inappropriate to the situation“, and I state I was “sickened when at one point a large group of the demonstrators began chanting ‘dead Palestinian scum‘.“
I also recorded “I had been appalled to find that this was to be a demonstration jointly with the Zionist Federation and the English Defence League, some of whose members many of us have seen and heard chanting racist slogans on our streets. It seems unbelievable that a Jewish organisation should align itself – even if unofficially – with people like this.” Few EDL actually turned up.
One placard read ‘Peace Activists don’t use weapons’ but as I pointed out on My London Diary the the photographs on the WJC web site show “almost entirely exactly the kind of tools that would be expected to be found on any ship in its galley and for general maintenance, as well as items being taken for building work in Gaza” with the exception of “a few canisters of pepper spray, some catapults and what looks like some kind of ceremonial knife.“
As I also pointed out in my report, the “the actions of the state of Israel in their attacks on Gaza, their disruption of everyday life for the Palestinians and the blockade is making the possibility of peace much more distant. I’m not a supporter of Hamas, but Israel needs to ask why Hamas enjoys such support in Gaza and to change its own policies which have led to this. Like other conflicts, resolution depends on winning hearts and minds and this can’t be done with tanks and bulldozers.”
I had few problems covering the protest but other press were less fortunate. Four “were surrounded and chased by a an angry group of threatening Zionist demonstrators at the end of the protest, before police eventually stepped in to protect them.”
Fight the Height, Walthamstow: Sunday 1 June, 2008
In 1999 Waltham Forest council demolished a large site at the east end of Walthamstow High Street and on Hoe Street. An arcade of shops was built through the block between the two streets in the 1960s and the site was known as the Arcade site.
The area had been heavily bombed in the war and the post-war buildings on the site were of no particular architectural merit but they were home to many small local shops remembered fondly by local residents, as well as some council flats on the second and third floors above them. Waltham Forest council are blamed for failing to properly maintain the properties resulting in their deterioration.
When demolition took place in 1999, the council announced their intention to put the site to cultural use and benefit the community – a new leisure centre, library and arts centre together with social housing. But for some years this was an empty square with a path across. But developer St Modwen published its proposals for the site in 2008 they appeared to be dominated by commercial interest and to have little regard for local needs.
The Arcade site was at the east end of Walthamstow’s famous street market, claimed to be the longest in Europe which began in 1885 and attracts shoppers from across London and tourists from around the world. St Modwen’s plans included a large Primark supermarket which would threaten the future of the market and many of the shops along the high street.
Then there was the Vue multiplex cinema which would put an end to any chance of the restoration of the Grade II* listed 1930 high Art-Deco Moorish style former Walthamstow Granada a few yards away on Hoe Street.
In the 2008 plans was an 18 storey tower block, quite out of scale with the surrounding area, with its terraces of two storey housing and small scale developments. It was this that led those protesting to call their campaign ‘Fight The Height‘.
Flats in this tower block would be highly attractive to well-paid city workers, just a short walk from Walthamstow Central station with its 4 trains an hour to Liverpool Street in 17 minutes as well as a frequent Victoria Line service to the West End.
Considerable thought had gone into the protest to attract publicity for the campaign. There were three characters representing the tower block, Vue cinema and Primark who bravely stood in front of the hoardings with the large coloured computer generated images of the proposed development as the protesters pelted them with over-ripe tomatoes donated by market stall-holders. And it made the TV news.
There were also many large placards with adults and children carrying them, and local boy William Morris (1834-1896) born here in and celebrated in his childhood home now the William Morris Gallery in Lloyd Park) also put in an appearance. Morris in 1877 was one of the founders of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, often known by its nickname Anti-Scrape, a charity whose purpose remains ‘Heritage protection’.
And “local artists and non-artists” founded the Antiscrap campaign “against against the attacks on our culture by the local authority.” Originally formed to fight cuts in museum fnding, on their web site you can read more about the Arcade campaign and other campaigns about out-of-character local developments.
Protests like this one were probably important in leading St Modwen to revise their plans for the Arcade site.
Here is a post from Antiscrap on Thursday 22 November 2012:
The shocking news about the new Arcade site plans is that they’re not bad. No, really. Opinions differ as to whether it’s appropriate to build 120 new homes and a nine-screen cinema there at all. But the plans have been thoughtfully designed with good attention to detail and far less negative impact on central Walthamstow than previous plans.
But as a short visit to Walthamstow will show, some other campaigns in the area have met with rather less success, though the Granada has been saved and now hosts a theatre. There are now tower blocks clustered around various areas of the town – largely in easy walking distance from its stations – and the Ensign camera factory has been replaced by flats rather than rediscovered under its ugly 1980s cladding.
