march | >Re-PHOTO

EDL March in Barking – 2012

EDL March in Barking: On Saturday 14 January 2012 around 200 EDL supporters gathered outside the ‘The Barking Dog’ Wetherspoons and marched from Barking Station to a rally outside the town hall, calling for an end to Islamic influence in England. Their protest was opposed by a smaller group of Unite Against Fascism supporters.

This pub had remained open while another nearby pub had closed, refusing to serve them. There was a large police presence watching them as well as journalists and photographers coming to record the EDL’s first march of 2012, organised by the Essex and Dagenham Divisions of the English Defence League.

Most of the marchers were keen to be photographed and posed for photographers, including one man who later pulled down his trousers to show the tattoos on his rear, while others joked and played up to the cameras.

The march organisers had been clear to stress that this was to be an entirely peaceful protest, and they made some attempts to curb the activities of their supporters, with stewards and others quickly stopping a small group who began an offensive chant about Allah. But there were plenty of other chants many of us find offensive.

Among those taking part were some who I recognised from earlier protests by racist organisations such as the National Front or BNP. Although the EDL claimed not to be racist it was hard to fine their claims in the slightest credible.

Police kept the marchers apart from a smaller group of counter-protesters, mainly from the local area, organised at short notice by UAF (Unite Against Fascism) who had only become aware of the EDL march two days earlier. They describe the EDL as “an organisation of racist and fascist thugs, who particularly target Muslims” and described the march through Barking as “as part of its attempts to stir up racism and division in the area.“

The EDL marched to a pen outside Barking Town Hall with another pen for the counter-protest some distance away, though the two groups were within shouting distance – and kept that up for most of the next hour and a half, with the UAF waving placards and the EDL making V signs and other gestures towards them.

A large crowd of perhaps a hundred police ensured that the two groups were kept apart. Police led away a couple of EDL supporters who made their way close to the UAF pen.

EDL leader Stephen Yaxley-Lennon (aka Tommy Robinson) was present but it was announced that he was not sufficiently recovered from the attack by “islamofascist thugs” to speak at the rally. The attackers were actually widely thought to be Luton Town football hooligans with whom he is associated. He talked with police for some minutes and then apparently asked them to escort him to his car.

At the end of the rally police escorted the remaining EDL supporters back to Barking station. Reports said that a group of them went on to Whitechapel where they had to be escorted out of the area by police for their own safety.

More about the event and many more pictures on My London Diary at EDL March in Barking.

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Epiphany Rising Against King

Epiphany Rising Against King: On Monday 7 January 1660 (1661 by our modern calendar – New Year back then was the 25th March) Samuel Pepys recorded in his diary “This morning, news was brought to me to my bedside, that there had been a great stir in the City this night by the Fanatiques, who had been up and killed six or seven men, but all are fled. My Lord Mayor and the whole City had been in arms, above 40,000.”

The Fanatiques – a term used to describe the Fifth Monarches (and other nonconformists) believed that the killing of King Charles in 1649 had brought to an end of the last of the four kingdoms mentions in the biblical Book of Daniel – considered as the end of the Empire of Rome (before that had come Babylon, Persia and the Greeks – though there were many other interpretations) and that the time was near for the second coming and the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth. Their uprising was against the re-establishment of monarchy in 1660.

Led by preacher and cooper Thomas Venner they marched from a religious meeting in Swan Alley to take forcibly the keys to St Pauls Cathedral which they then occupied for some hours. Here the band of around 50 men defeated a much larger body of troops sent to capture them, but then failed to decide what to do next, and went out into the woods at Kenwood north of London. Three days later on 9th January they came back to the City and first forced the soldiers sent to stop them to retreat but were finally defeated by a much larger body of soldiers. Twenty-six of them were killed and twenty soldiers also died.

Venner and around 50 others were arrested and tried. Venner was hanged, drawn and quartered on 19 January 1661. His head and those of 12 others were then displayed on London Bridge.

Pepys has a longer entry in his diary for the 9th January about the insurrection – and on seeing everyone else carrying arms he went back home “and got my sword and pistol, which, however, I had no powder to charge” but after taking a walk into the city he “went home and sat, it being office day, till noon.” Later he was persuaded to go out, but then went home and played his lute then went to bed “there being strict guards all night in the City, though most of the enemies, they say, are killed or taken.”

In January 2013, Ian Bone and Class War collaborated with film-maker Suzy Gillett to film a re-enactment of the events of 1661, including a number of speeches and performances about the original events before setting off behind a banner made for the occasion led by a young woman playing the role of Baptist visionary prophet Anna Trapnel, a Fifth Monarchist best known for her 1653 tract ‘The cry of a stone” which recorded her speaking in a trance in Whitehall at great length, in particular berating Oliver Cromwell who many felt was by then setting up a new monarchy. In it she said “the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus is at hand, all the Monarchies of this world are going down the hill: Now is a time that thine should look off from the fethings, and lift up their head, for their Redemption draws near.”

You can read an account of what happened in 2013 on My London Diary at Epiphany Rising Against King or another account by another of those taking part, Paul Brad, also illustrated by my photographs.

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My 2024 in Photographs – Part4

My 2024 in Photographs: The fourth and final part of my selection of images from 2024.

London, UK. 26 Oct 2024. As the end of the peaceFul march against extreme right hate came into Trafalgar Square, a group behind a black banner ‘NO TO TOMMY ROBINSON – NO TO FASCISM’ turned off the route towards the Mall and made a halfhearted rush towards a police line, with a small group trying to push their way through – most just stood watching. Police pushed back and the two groups faced each other. A few minutes later one man was pushed out of the crowd and through the line by a small police squad.

London, UK. 26th October 2024. The letter to Starmer. The annual remembrance march by the United Families and Friends Campaign (UFFC) from Trafalgar Square could only go a short distance down Whitehall and held their rally at the Cabinet Office. Speakers from families whose relatives killed by police and in penal, mental health and immigration detention called for justice and proper investigations of the officers.

London, UK. 28 Oct 2024. Men in oilskins carry a pink inflatable dinghy. Extinction Rebellion marches to stages theatrical flooding scenes outside insurers in the city to show how insurers are green-lighting fossil fuel crooks to flood our homes and our lands. They hope to stop insurance for new fossil fuel projects; flooding due to global warming is already common and threatens us all.

London, UK. 30 Oct 2024. Reading The Crimes outside insurers MarshMcLennan. Extinction Rebellion ended their 3 days of protests at Insurance Companies in the City with a Zombie protest, predicting the social collapse with wars, famine and floods that will happen if CO2 levels and the climate chaos they cause continue to increase. They protested with zombie dancing, die-ins and speeches outside some of the worlds major insurance companies based in London urging them not to insure fossil fuel projects.

London, UK. 2 Nov 24. Health Care Workers. After a die-in by some at Downing St, many thousands marched in a massive PSC National Demo to a rally close to the US Embassy in Nine Elms calling for urgent action by the international community to end brutal attacks on civilians, hospitals and schools in Gaza and an end the deliberate starvation of Palestinians. All arms supplies to Israel should end, with an immediate permanent ceasefire, the release of hostages and negotiations for a two state solution.

London, UK. 2 Nov 24. Jeremy Corbyn. After a die-in by some at Downing St, many thousands marched in a massive PSC National Demo to a rally close to the US Embassy in Nine Elms calling for urgent action by the international community to end brutal attacks on civilians, hospitals and schools in Gaza and an end the deliberate starvation of Palestinians. All arms supplies to Israel should end, with an immediate permanent ceasefire, the release of hostages and negotiations for a two state solution.

London, UK. 3 Nov 2024. Marches wear blue for water flood the streets from Vauxhall on route to a rally in Parliament Square called by River Action. They demand a review of Ofwat and the Environment Agency, an immediate end to industry polluting our waters for profit and greed – particularly sewage discharges, for laws on water pollution to be enforced and for all industries to invest in better use of water.

London, UK. 30 Nov 2024. As the death toll from Israel’s attacks in Gaza is now over 43,000 and many now face starvation with every hospital having been bombed and with virtually no medical supplies, with the UK is still complicit in the genocide, thousands including many Jews, marched in yet another entirely peaceful mass protest in solidarity. They call for an immediate ceasefire with the release of hostages and prisoners and for negotiations to secure a long-term just peace in the area.

London, UK. 14 Dec 2024. Hundreds of BMX riders dressed as Santa, Elves, Snowmen, Christmas Trees and Reindeer set off from the graffiti tunnel at Leake Street Waterloo for the 10th annual Santa Cruise around central London, a fund raising event for the charity Evelina Children’s Heart Organisation. BMX Life raises money for ECHO through sponsorship on these rides and two major raffles each year and has so far raised over £180,000 for ECHO.

London, UK. 14 Dec 2024. Tenants organised by the London Renters Union march demanding urgent action on city’s spiralling rents, which are tearing London apart – the average rent of £2,172 is now more than the pay of many vital workers such as teaching assistants and care workers, forcing many into cramped temporary accommodation. The scrapping of rent controls in 1988 and the mass sell-of of council homes have prioritised landlord profits and Labour’s current housing plans are based on private developers profits rather than providing social homes.

You can double-click on any of the images to see them larger and you can see many more pictures from these and other events in 2024 and earlier years in my albums on Facebook.

My 2024 in Photographs – Part 3

This the third page of a selection of my work in 2024. Not my “best pictures” but some of my better images, all I think pictures that worked well and told the story I was trying to tell. Captions are those I wrote in haste on the day they were taken.

London, UK. 6 July 2024. A health worker holds a white smoke flare. Many thousands marched through London to call on the Labour Government to end its support for Israel’s continuing genocide in Gaza and the UK arms sales which support it and to call for an immediate ceasefire and a huge increase in humanitarian aid. They called for a political solution based on international law to with freedom for Palestine. A few counter protesters on Waterloo Bridge were met with angry shouts and derisive gestures.

London, UK. 18 July 2024. John McDonnell was among those at the rally Disability rights campaigners came to Parliament Square for ‘Disabled People Demand’, presenting the new Labour government solutions to the many crises faced by disabled people across the UK caused by cuts in resources and services under previous administrations and celebrating the the music, art and poetry of disabled people.

London, UK. 20 July 2024. Local protests around the country including this march from Edmonton Green to Silver Street call for the UK to halt arms supplies to Israel which are being used in the genocidal assault on Palestinians which have so far killed over 39,000 people. Yesterday the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel’s presence in the Palestinian occupied territories is “unlawful” and called on it to end as rapidly as possible.

London, UK. 27 July 2024. People met at the Cuban Embassy before marching to Oxford Street to protest against collaboration by British banks with the attacks on the Palestinian and Cuban peoples. UK banks such as the HSBC have implemented the US blockade of Cuba for 62 years since the revolution and back the occupation of Palestine by investing in the arms trade and Israeli business deals with the UK.

London, UK. 27 July 2024. Thousands met outside the BBC at Langham Place to march to Hyde Park Corner in the sixth Trans Pride March, taking place after a year of increasing anti-trans media campaigns, hate attacks and the Cass report which raised questions about the future of trans healthcare. They called for trans rights and proper healthcare including ending the ban on puberty blockers.

London, UK, 3 Aug 2024. A Trans Strike Back rally and march in Parliament Square called for an end to the ban on prescribing puberty blockers to trans kids. Proven safe for kids over many years the ban only applies to trans kids and appears to be the result of an ill-informed transphobic campaign and it will endanger the lives of trans kids. They also call for the rejection of the Cass Report and demand a trans led structure of their healthcare.

London, UK, 3 Aug 2024. A rally in Parliament Square by Extinction Rebellion, Defend Our Juries, Just Stop Oil and Fossil Free London called for an end to the jailing of non-violent protesters and an end to the gagging by judges of those who try to argue that the climate crisis is a “lawful excuse” in our courts. Jurors should hear the whole truth of the cases. Around 200 people have been jailed for peaceful protests since 2019 and widely criticised draconian sentences were given to the ‘Whole Truth Five’.

London, UK. 3 Aug 2024. Thousands march through London to Downing St calling on Starmer to end arms sales to Israel and for a ceasefire to end the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Schools, hospitals and homes are continually being bombed and people are dying from starvation and a lack of clean water. A Lancet study suggests that by now 180,000 Palestinians may have died in Gaza, far more than the official figures.

London, UK. 10 Aug 2024. Several thousand crowded the area opposite the Reform Party address in Westminster for a lively rally against the extreme right following the thuggery encouraged and promoted by Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson. Speakers included Weyman Bennett and Louise Raw. They called on everyone to take a stand against racism in workplaces and elsewhere and for politicians to end scapegoating immigrants and their racist anti-migrant speeches and policies which have emboldened the extreme right.

Part 4 follows tomorrow. You can see many more pictures from these and other events in my albums on Facebook.

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My 2024 in Photographs – Part 2

What you see here is just the second page of a selection of my work in 2024. Not particularly my “best pictures” but all I think pictures that worked well and told the story I was trying to tell. Despite getting out rather less often than in some previous years, particularly pre-Covid, I think it has been quite a good year for my photography even though I’m getting older, lacking stamina and generally taking things much easier.

Most of my pictures have been from protests over the genocide being carried out by Israel in Gaza but other campaigns have continued, and I’ve been able to photograph some of their action. You can see more pictures from all the events I’ve photographed in around 70 albums from 2024 on Facebook – together with a few from my summer holiday in Wales. They are here in roughly the order they were taken – those from January and February are in the previous post.

London, UK. 20 April 2024. Witnesses call for the man to be released as they say the police officer was accidentally hit.A funeral procession in Ilford carries small coffins mourning the death of over 34,000 Palestinians, more than 13,000 children, with over 8,000 missing probably buried under rubble in Gaza. It ended with a rally outside Barclays Bank which campaigners say funds Israel’s genocidal assault on Palestinians.

London, UK. 20 April 2024. Piers Corbyn hands out leaflets for his London Mayoral campaign. People march to a rally in the centre of Lewisham to demand an immediate ceasefire and an end to UK arms sales to Israel. This was one of many local actions around the country.

London, UK. 27 April 2024. Latin Americans stand with Palestine. Many thousands march peacefully through London from Parliament Square to Hyde Park in another huge protest demanding an immediate permanent ceasefire and an end to British arms sales to Israel, calling for a free Palestine. Many carried posters identifying themselves as Jewish. Israel is using British weapons, surveillance technology and military equipment in the attacks which have devastated Gaza and killed over 34,000, including more than 14,500 children.

London, UK. 27 April 2024. Many thousands march peacefully through London from Parliament Square to Hyde Park in another huge protest demanding an immediate permanent ceasefire and an end to British arms sales to Israel, calling for a free Palestine. Many carried posters identifying themselves as Jewish. Israel is using British weapons, surveillance technology and military equipment in the attacks which have devastated Gaza and killed over 34,000, including more than 14,500 children since October 7th.

London, UK. 1 May 2024. Several thousands met at Clerkenwell Green on May Day for the International Workers Day March to Trafalgar Square. Those taking part included many from London’s various ethnic communities – Turkish, Kurdish, Latin American, Phillipine, West Indian, Indian, Sri Lankan, Tamil, Iraqi, Iranian and more as well as many from UK trade unions, communist and anarchist groups. Many showed their support for Palestine and other international issues.

London, UK. 11 May 2024. London CND supporters protest at the US Embassy in Nine Elms as part of a national day of action against US nuclear weapons coming to Britain which would make us a target for nuclear attacks. Many sat well back under trees in the shade to listen to speakers and singers.

London, UK. 18 May 2024. People pose with giant keys. Many thousands march through London on the 76th anniversary of the ethnic cleansing of 750,000 Palestinians by Israel. Marchers demanded an end to the current genocide, an end to arms sales to Israel and the apartheid regime and for the opening of crossings for urgent humanitarian aid to Gaza. Many carried large keys symbolising the right for Palestinians to return to their homes.

London, UK. 25 May. Poppies labelled with the names of children killed. People meet in Peckham to march to a rally in Camberwell as part of a weekend of local protests across the country calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza and UK arms sales to Israel which make our government complicit in Israel’s war crimes. They demand a huge increase in humanitarian aid to be allowed into Gaza to avoid famine, and call for an end to Israeli apartheid, and freedom and justice for Palestine.

Part 3 follows tomorrow. You can see many more pictures from these and other events in my albums on Facebook.

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My 2024 in Photographs – Part 1

My 2024 in Photographs – Today I set out on the impossible task of summing up the photographs I took over the year. It’s something I find very hard to do not least because I’ve taken so many pictures. But here is the first of a four-part presentation of some I’ve taken – though on any other day I might have chosen completely different pictures – with the often rather generic captions written in haste on the day they were taken. So its perhaps more a cross-section than a selection.

London, UK. 13 Jan 2024. Hundreds of thousands march in London in a global day of action for a full ceasefire in Gaza, an end to the genocide and a political solution to bring peace and justice to Palestine under international law. Israeli forces have killed over 23,000 people including more than 10,000 children, with many bodies sill under the rubble. Bombing has made humanitarian aid and medical treatment impossible and widespread deaths from disease and starvation now seem inevitable.

London, UK. 22 Jan 2024. A large crowd outside Twickenham Rugby Stadium protested against the arms fair attended by companies supplying Israel with armoured vehicles and other weapons used in its devastating assault on Gaza and used to repress, terrorise, abduct and kill civilians and children in Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Yemen and elsewhere around the world. They called on the Rugby Football Union to end hosting arms sales.

London, UK. 27 Jan 2024. A march from Edmonton Green to a rally at Silver St demanded Israel ends its genocidal attack on Gaza, calling for an immediate ceasefire and an urgent programme of humanitarian aid to end famine and provide shelter, medicine and water. They praised South Africa for taking Israel to court for genocide and called for a just peace with freedom for Palestine.

Making the selection was a fairly long job. There are a little over 22,000 RAW images stored in my 2024 folder at the moment – those I thought worth saving from the rather more I actually made.

London, UK. 3 Feb 2024. Hundreds of thousands march from the BBC to Downing Street calling for a full ceasefire in Gaza where Israeli forces have now killed over 27,000, mainly women and children, and are ignoring last week’s ICJ ruling to prevent acts of genocide. Humanitarian aid and medical treatment is largely impossible and widespread deaths from disease and starvation are inevitable. They call for restoration of funding to UNRWA and a political solution to bring peace and justice to Palestine.

London, UK. 3 Feb 2024. A dove with a key. Hundreds of thousands march from the BBC to Downing Street calling for a full ceasefire in Gaza where Israeli forces have now killed over 27,000, mainly women and children, and are ignoring last week’s ICJ ruling to prevent acts of genocide. Humanitarian aid and medical treatment is largely impossible and widespread deaths from disease and starvation are inevitable. They call for restoration of funding to UNRWA and a political solution.

London, UK. 10 Feb 2024. A rally outside Ealing Town hall was one of many local protests around the country calling for an immediate ceasefire and an end to the genocide in Gaza which has now killed 28,000 mainly women and children and severely injured around 68,000. The entire population of Gaza is now living in desperate conditions with constant threat of bombing, shelling, famine and disease. They condemned the failure to respond to the ICJ ruling to prevent acts of genocide.

London, UK. 17 Feb 2024. A huge march to the Israeli Embassy demands a full ceasefire in Gaza and an end to genocide. Israeli forces have now killed over 30,000, mainly women and children, are ignoring the ICJ ruling and launching a brutal assault on Rafah. Humanitarian aid and medical supplies are desperately needed to avoid mass deaths from disease and starvation and UNRWA funding is essential. Protesters demand a political solution to bring peace and justice to Palestine.

London, UK. 17 Feb 2024. Movement for Justice. A huge march to the Israeli Embassy demands a full ceasefire in Gaza and an end to genocide. Israeli forces have now killed over 30,000, mainly women and children, are ignoring the ICJ ruling and launching a brutal assault on Rafah. Humanitarian aid and medical supplies are desperately needed to avoid mass deaths from disease and starvation and UNRWA funding is essential. Protesters demand a political solution to bring peace and justice to Palestine.

London, UK. 24 Feb 2024. Women with flower head dresses leading the march. Two years after the Russian invasion thousands march from Marble Arch to a vigil in Trafalgar Square in solidarity with the Ukrainian resistance and to show opposition to Russian aggression and war crimes. Russia has occupied parts of Ukraine since 2014. The event was organised by the British-Ukrainian community in London and the wider UK.

This is too many for me to look through, so I made this selection to the roughly 2,000 that I posted on Facebook over the year. In the end I gave up trying to cut down my selection to only the dozen or so I could show in a single post here, so this is the first of four daily posts of my pictures from 2024.

London, UK. 28 Feb 2024. Poice arrested one man on the march. Extinction Rebellion protesters marched from Trinity Square to a festival outside the Lloyds insurance building, some in business attire. They demand the insurance industry refuses to provide cover for fossil fuel developments as these are risking our future. 40% of the world’s fossil fuel production is insured by Lloyds. The peaceful protest included music, speeches and dancing.

London UK. 29 Feb 2024. Extinction Rebellion artivist troupe Red Rebel Brigade in front of the march to protest for climate justice and solidarity with Palestine at AXA Insurance which is insuring new oil and gas fields and investing in companies creating illegal Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine. They demanded AXA divests from Israel’s genocidal actions and end its investments in new oil and gas. The protest in heavy rain remained entirely peaceful.

London, UK. 4 March 2024. Mary Ellen is surrounded by police as they clear wheelchair protesters from DPAC block of Victoria St after protest at the DWP in a National Day of Action before the budget against proposed brutal and horrific social security reforms which will cut benefits for hundreds of thousands of the disabled and give new powers to work coaches in Job Centres. A 2020 UCL report found almost 150,000 had then died as a direct result of Tory cuts and welfare reform policies.

Part 2 follows tomorrow. You can see many more pictures from these and other events in my albums on Facebook.

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Santas, Sardines & Earth Strike – 2019

Santas, Sardines & Earth Strike: On Saturday 14th December 2019 the Santas were on BMX bikes raising money for charity, Italians were supporting a spontaneous Italian anti-fascist movement and Earth Strike, a small group of anti-capitalist and anti-imperialists against environmental destruction held their first protest in Brixton.

Santas BMX Life Charity Ride

If you are in London today look out for the 10th BMX Life’s Santa Cruise riding around the capital in a charity ride raising money for the Evelina Children’s Heart Organisation, ECHO. There is a link for donations on the page linked.

The ride begins as it did five years ago in the graffiti tunnel under Waterloo Station and 10.30am and the dress code is Santa, Elf, Snowman,Christmas Tree or Reindeer.

So far by these rides and a number of raffles BMX Life have raised over £180,000 for ECHO and they hope that this year’s ride will be bigger than ever. When I took these pictures in 2019 there were around 700 riders.

From Leake St they moved off to Forum Magnum Square where some santas demonstrated their riding skills before the group left to ride around London.

More pictures on My London Diary at Santas BMX Life Charity Ride

‘6000 Sardines’ London protest – Parliament Square

The Sardines movement was a grass roots political movement which began in Italy in November 2019 after a flash mob in Bologna opposing right-wing leader Matteo Salvini packed the main square in Bologna “like sardines”.

People were appalled at the rise of Salvini because of his anti-immigrant policies, hate speech and Euroscepticism and the movement prompted other ‘sardine’ protests across Italy and by Italians elsewhere, with demonstrations, flash mobs and online actions.

14th December was declared ‘Global Sardine Day’, with similar rallies across Europe and in the USA as well as in many towns and cities in Italy. All of the speeches while I was at the event were in Italian.

The movement ended with the elections in January 2020 in the Bologna region of northern Italy, which resulted in a resounding victory for the centre-left who almost doubled the vote they had received five years earlier.

More pictures ‘6000 Sardines’ London protest.

Earth Strike South London – Brixton

The protest by Earth Strike South London began ther protest against environmental destruction with speeches and handing out fliers at a street stall on the corner of Coldharbour Lane and Brixton Rd, where members of the Revolutionary Communist Group taking part were also selling their newspaper.

The fliers pointed out that many companies who trade on our high streets are still making a huge contribution to global warming and environmental destruction and they went on to march up Brixton Road stopping for speeches and to protest at some of the major culprits.

They began by going into Barclays Bank who still have huge investments in fossil fuels and are major backers of fracking in the UK. They ignored bank staff who told them they could not protest inside but handed out leaflets and made a speech about the bank’s activities before leaving after a few minutes.

Next stop was H&M where they pointed out he fashion industry is the second largest producer of greenhouse gases, emitting 1.2 billion tons a year and textile manufacture creates 20% of all water pollution. They stood outside and ignored a security man who told them to go away.

A couple of police officers arrived and talked to the protesters who assured them that their protest would be peaceful. The officers then went away.

The protesters moved on to EE where they pointed out mobile phones and other similar electronic produces all need minerals such as Coltan, and the fight for these is behind the horrific wars that have taken place in the Congo region. Mining companies are also huge exploiters of African labour, create large amounts of pollution. lay huge areas to waste and evade taxes on a huge scale.

Further along the road they stopped briefly to point out that Boots avoids paying taxes in the UK, cheats the NHS and sells palm oil products made by clearing forests, destroying ecosystems. They make huge profits from the NHS, and are said to have charged charged them £1500 for pots of cream they sell for £2, as well as selling palm oil products grown on land cleared from ancient forests, disrupting ecosystems and resulting in the loss of species including orangutans.

At Sainsbury’s they reminded customers that it sells many products that harm the environment and lead to global warming, including beef that comes from ranches made by burning the Amazon Forest, destroying ecosystems and displacing indigenous tribes.

They held another protest outside Vodaphone, also a tax avoider and as well reliant on those minerals fuelling wars in central Africa before walking on to Brixton Police station.

Here they held a brief vigil for those killed by police in Brixton, including Ricky Bishop and Sean Rigg who was beaten to death inside the police station in 2008.

I left the group here as they were to continue their protest at shops on the opposite side of Brixton Road.

More pictures at Earth Strike South London.

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Fathers, Turkey, Routemasters, a Christmas Market and Ethiopia – 2005

Fathers, Turkey, Routemasters, a Christmas Market and Ethiopia: Text and pictures from a busy day in London on Friday 9th December 2005, exhumed, corrected and slightly polished from the depths of ‘My London Diary‘ with links to the many more pictures of each event there.

Fathers4Justice: 24 Days of Christmas Chaos – Westminster

Fathers, Turkey, Routemasters, a Christmas Market and Ethiopia - 2005 — *Santas and Mama Santas protest at Church of England and Dept of Education & Skills, Westminster*

I’ve photographed Fathers4Justice on several previous occasions. Today they were taking advantage of Christmas and the Father Christmas idea to protest against the Church of England. Being on a Friday, there were rather fewer father and mother Christmases (and Santa’s little helpers were mainly at school, though some of their dads behind the whiskers were pulling a sickie.) It was still an arresting sight to see so many figures dressed in red on the street, including some rather inflated figures in inflatable suits.

After rather a slow start events warmed up a bit outside the offices of the Church of England, and, a few yards down the road, the Department for Education and Skills. Of course our ‘serious crimes’ law now forbids the use of amplified sound in demonstrations, so the Fathers simply had to shout rather loud. The next place for a stop was of course opposite Downing Street, where there were more shouted comments. I left the march as it turned down Whitehall Place on its way to the Law Courts on Strand.
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Free Mehmet Tarhan – Turkish Airlines, Pall Mall

Outside Turkish Airlines at the bottom of Haymarket there was a picket protesting against Turkish imprisonment of protestors, in particular Mehmet Tarhan, a gay conscientious objector. Recently, his 4-year sentence for refusing military service was overruled on procedural grounds, and he is to be retried for ‘insistent insubordination with the intent of evading military service.’

London Transport – Last day for the Routemaster

The last proper bus service to use London’s signature Routemaster double-decker buses, route 159, ceased today, with its buses being replaced by more modern designs. I caught one of the last to run to take me down to Westminster, then photographed it. Although the official ‘last bus’ had already run, there were several others following on, with the final pair passing Big Ben 28 minutes after I made my picture.

Transport for London continued to use a few Routemasters running in London on two special short ‘heritage routes’ both running past Trafalgar Square, thus retaining one of our tourist attractions.

[Routemasters were first introduced in 1956 and the two ‘TfL heritage routes’ were ended in 2019 though you still see them operated by private companies in a variety of guises. Routemasters jolt, rattle and jerk on London’s streets but I do very much miss the ability to jump off and board them at the many halts and delays in the increasingly congested streets.]
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Victorian Christmas Market – Chrisp St, Poplar

*Hat Trick – Jim and Bev James Singing Chimney Sweeps*

Chrisp Street Market was part of an early post-war public housing redevelopment, the Lansbury Estate, built for the 1951 Festival Of Britain in a Docklands area that had suffered considerable bomb damage. Fifty or so years later it was beginning to show its age and there has been some tidying up and its pedestrian precincts are now rather tidier than a few years ago.

The market is bustling with life, more so than usual when I visited, as there were two days of a special Victorian Christmas event. There were various special stalls in the market, and also entertainers wandering around and performing on a small stage. Kids from two local schools had also come to perform but unfortunately I had to leave before they had really started.

I’d hoped to return on the following day, Saturday, when things would have been livelier, but in the end i just couldn’t make it.
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The Ethiopian Tragedy – Stop UK Support – Marble Arch

At Marble Arch there was a crowd gathering of Ethiopians from across Europe, come to protest at the British government’s support of an oppressive communist regime in their country. [Others describe Ethiopia as an authoritarian regime with poor civil and human rights.]

More than 70,000 people are detained by the regime, being tortured and dying in concentration camps. Britain is spending £30 million of our money to support the regime that is violating human rights there. The protestors want the British public to urge their MPs to support motions on the situation in Ethiopia and demand an end to these crimes.
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Marine A, Mandela, CPS Failures, Cops off Campus – 2013

Marine A, Mandela, CPS Failures, Cops off Campus: On Friday 6th Decemeber 2013 some very varied events were taking place in Central London. Here they are in the order I photographed them.

EDL Protest Supports Marine A – Downing St

Marine A, Mandela, CPS Failures, Cops off Campus - 2013

The EDL had called for a major protest at Downing Street on the day that ‘Marine A’, Sergeant Alexander Blackman, was to be sentenced, but only around 50 supporters were there when I arrived.

Blackman was being tried for the murder of a wounded Taliban insurgent in Afghanistan in contravention of the Armed Forces Act 2006, and became the “first British soldier to be convicted of a battlefield murder whilst serving abroad since the Second World War.“

I commented “I doubt if there are many serving soldiers who would wish to see the Geneva conventions disregarded, and wonder what support if any this protest would have from serving soldiers, many of whom have condemned strongly the cold-blooded killing of a prisoner by Marine A and called for an appropriate sentence.“

However many did feel when later that day he was sentenced to “life imprisonment with a minimum term of ten years and dismissed with disgrace from the Royal Marines” he had been treated harshly, and in 2014 the sentence was reduced to eight years, then after a public campaign overturned on appeal and reduced to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility. Given the time he had served he was released in April 2017.

EDL Protest Supports Marine A

Tributes to Mandela – Parliament Square & South Africa House

Nelson Mandela, the “Father of the Nation” who had become the first president of a new post-apartheid South Africa from 1994-1999, having previously spent 27 years in prison before his release in 1990, had died the previous day, 5th December 2013.

People brought flowers to the Nelson Mandela statue in Parliament Square and to South Africa House in Trafalgar Square, where a long queue waited patiently for several hours to sign a book of remembrance in the High Commission.

Tributes to Mandela

Bereaved protest at CPS Failure – Southwark Bridge

*Marcia Rigg holds a picture of Mandela as she addresses the protest against the PCS*

Since 1990 there had been 1433 deaths of people in custody, many under highly suspicious circumstances and not a single conviction of any police, prison officers or security guards who have either failed in their duty of care or more actively caused their deaths.

Relatives and friends of those who dies had come to protest outside Rose Court, the home of the Crown Prosecution Service. The last successful prosecution brought against a police officer was for involvement in a black death in custody was in 1972, after the death of David Oluwale in 1969. Police officers have been prosecuted for several other black deaths in custody – Joy Gardner, Christopher Alder and Mikey Powell – but none was successful.

The standard response from the CPS – led by Keir Starmer from 2008-2013 – is that there is ‘not enough evidence to prosecute’, largely because the cases have not been properly investigated. Often the police involved are simply not questioned, and in some other cases they simply refuse to answer questions.

Bereaved protest at CPS Failures

‘Cops Off Campus’ Protest Police Brutality – Bloomsbury

Following protests by students and others against student fees and cuts, the closure of the student union and calling for acceptable pay and conditions for low paid largely migrant cleaners, catering staff, security staff and others, the University management had tried to ban protests on campus and had brought in numbers of police to enforce that ban.

This protest was called after the previous day police had brutally assaulted a group of students who had briefly occupied a part of Senate House, arresting a number of students including the Editor of the student newspaper and a legal observer.

The organisers had intended this to be an entirely peaceful march around the various s sites of the university in the area to the west and north of Russell Square, but it was clear that the police had other ideas. There seemed to be police vans down every side-street in the area as students assembled on the pavement outside the University of London Union in Malet St.

There were a few short speeches before the march set off to walk around the block but were stopped by a line of police across the street, with those who tried to walk through it thrown roughly backwards.

They turned around only to find police blocking both the other end of the street and a side street leading to Gower Street and their only way open was to go onto the campus, walking past SOAS and out onto Thornhaugh Street. There they turned up into Woburn Square and then turned to make their way into UCL, only to find the gates from Torrington Place were locked and guarded by security.

They then turned into Gower Street where they saw another group of police rushing towards them and they then rushed through the gates into the Main Quad. Here there was a lot of discussion about what to do next and they eventually decided to take a back street route to Torrington Square, and set off at a rapid pace. I took a more direct route to meet them there. But by now it was dark and I was tired of walking around London and decided to go home.

The police operation seemed to me “an incredible and pointless waste of public money, and it resulted in more inconvenience to the public than if the event had not been policed at all.” Perhaps more importantly this kind of policing alienates a large proportion of young people, acting strongly to destroy the ‘policing by consent’ which has always been the the basis of our police system.

More at ‘Cops Off Campus’ Protest Police Brutality.

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Olympic Site & Budget Cuts – 2012

Olympic Site & Budget Cuts: Wednesday 5th December 2012 was a cold day in London, with the temperature just three or four degrees above freezing during the day, but there was plenty of blue sky with a few clouds and it seemed ideal weather to wrap up and go and see what progress had been made in restoring the Olympic site, still largely off-limits some months after the end of the games. And later in the early evening I returned to Westminster for a protest against the cuts which had been announced by Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne in his autumn budget statement.

Olympic Area Slightly Open – Stratford Marsh

Much of the area around the Olympic site had been closed to the public in May, including the Greenway, the elevated footpath on top of the Northern Outfall Sewer which runs close to the Olympic stadium, but this was now re-opened in part.

The section between Stratford High Street and the main railway lines which run from Liverpool Street station to Stratford and on further east was however still closed and would remain closed for years as work was now taking place for Crossrail – opened as the Elizabeth Line in 2022.

I started my walk in the early afternoon around the Bow flyover where the Bow Back rivers were still closed to traffic with a yellow floating barrier, but the footpath along the Lea Navigation had been re-opened. One improvement made presumably for the Olympics was a pathway and footbridge taking walkers under the busy road junction and across the canal.

Finding the new entrance to the Greenway meant walking between fences on the Crossrail site down Pudding Mill Lane, and probably I would have abandoned the route had it not been for signs put up by the View Tube café – though when I finally reached this I found I was the only person to have done so and the cafe was deserted.

There were still fences everywhere as you can see from my photographs but I was able to walk along the Greenway to Hackney Wick and then along the towpath beside the navigation. But the footpath beside the Old River Lea was still blocked off.

By then the light was beginning to fade and the Olympic stadium was gaining a golden glow. I walked a little further along the towpath and photographed the Eton boathouse as the sun was setting setting before crossing the canal and making my way to Hackney Wick station.

Many more pictures, both normal and panoramic views on My London Diary:
Olympic Area Slightly Open.

Osborne’s Budget Cuts – Strand to Whitehall

Several hundred students, trade unionists, socialists and others marched with UCU London Region down the Strand and into Whitehall shouting slogans against public service cuts, the rich, David Cameron and George Osborne in particular.

Opposite Downing Street they joined with others already protesting there including CND and Stop the War who were calling for the government to stop wasting money on the war in Afghanistan and vanity projects supporting the arms industry such as Trident and its planned replacement.

“The Afghanistan war — which everyone knows is futile and lost — is costing around £6 billion a year. The yearly maintenance costs for Trident are £2.2 billion a year. The cost of renewing the Trident system — which this government is committed to do — would cost up to £130 billion. Two aircraft carriers are being built at a cost of £7 billion. Then there’s the £15 billion to be spent buying 150 F-35 jets from the US, each of which will cost £85 million plus an extra £16 million for the engine.”

The rally began shortly after the marchers arrived. By now it was only just above freezing and speakers were asked to keep their contributions short because of the temperature.

Among the speakers were John McDonnell MP, Kate Hudson of CND, author Owen Jones, Andy Greene of DPAC, Green Party leader Natalie Bennett and others including a nurse from Lewisham Hospital threatened with closures, from the NUT, UK Uncut and other trade unionists.

*Kate Hudson CND and Romaine Phoenix Coalition of Resistance/Green Party*

Many of the speakers called on trade unions to take effective action against the cuts. calling for union leaders to stop simply speaking against them and take the lead from their members and start organising strike action. But of course few did and the cuts continued unabated.

More at Osborne’s Budget Cuts.

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