Tent City

“Tent City“, the occupation of the Wembley Sports Ground in opposition to the building of a city academy on the site was finally brought to an end early last Friday morning, when specialist bailiffs acting for Brent Council turned up and removed Hank Roberts, the local secretary of the two major teaching unions, the NUT and the ATL who had locked himself to the flagpole on the top of the changing room block.

Hank Roberts (left) talks to another protester on the roof – with Wembley Stadium in the background

Although I wasn’t there for the eviction, I had climbed the ladders up to the roof to talk to Hank and some of the other protesters on Wednesday, when he was continuing the protest despite a court injunction against him personally and the protest in general. The fight to stop the academy will continue, but the plans to house 200 children in portable classrooms on the site for next September now seem likely to go ahead, despite the poor educational experience this seems almost certain to provide.

I also wrote a complaint to the BBC about their biased reporting of the occupation, which highlighted the comments of a Brent Council representative and failed to mention the educational reasons for the action or that Roberts was a teacher and union secretary. As yet I have not received a reply.

I was very glad I could climb down after half and hour or so, as I have no head for heights, perhaps because my father used to take me up on roofs that he was repairing. Our ideas about ‘Health & Safety’ were very different then and there were times when he had to look after a small child and earn a living.

You can read more about the ‘Tent City’ protest and see more pictures on My London Diary