Tag: Class War

More from May Days: 2016

Clerkenwell Green was more packed than ever for May Day 2016, with the big attraction being a rally before the start of the march with Jeremy Corbyn as the main speaker, along with TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady.

While the event usually attracts little media attention, TV crews and photographers were out in force, with a crowd of photographers around the open-top bus from which he was speaking, and mobbing him as he arrived and left. The stewards became rather heated and there were some who threatened the photographers and a considerable amount of pushing from both them and the photographers. I was glad I had decided to keep well clear.

The march was much as usual, and I tried to photograph all the banners – and most of them are on My London Diary.

Having had the main speakers before the march started, the rally which followed was perhaps something of an anticlimax, though there was perhaps a wider range of speakers than usual having got the political big guns out of the way earlier. The event was enlivened by a colourful protest by Ahwazi Arabs against their repression over many years by the Iranian regime which has stolen their land and is trying to eradicate their culture.

I left for Altab Ali Park in Whitechapel, where the Bangladeshi Workers Council along with Red London, trade unionists, labour movement, political and community activists had organised a rally to commemorate and celebrate May Day.

 I met up with a small group from Class War at a pub in Aldgate and walked down with them to 1 Commercial St, the ‘Poor Doors’ tower block where the fourth in a series of anti-capitalist street parties organised by anarchists in East London was to start.

Several hundred turned up, some in fancy dress and others in black and the party got started. After partying and blocking Whitechapel High St the set off to protest elsewhere, first outside the sleazy misogynistic Jack the Ripper tourist attraction in Cable St, and then on to block Tower Bridge for a few minutes, where as well as the usual smoke flares we also get a show of fire breathing.

As they paused by the Southwark Council Offices in Tooley St I kept walking. I’d been on my feet for far too long and needed to rest on a train home. I had to take several days off before getting back to taking pictures.

F**k Parade 4: Ripper & Tower Bridge
Anti-Capitalist May Day Street Party
May Day Rally & Gonosangeet
May Day Rally
Ahwazi Protest at May Day Rally
May Day March
Day at Clerkenwell Green

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

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

More from May Days: 2015

My May Day started as usual with the march from Clerkenwell Green, dominated visually by members of the Turkish and Kurdish communities and with the usual mix of trade unionists and left-wing groups, perhaps even more international in nature than in previous years.

The march to Trafalgar Square was made a little livelier than usual by the presence of Class War and other anarchist and anti-capitalist protesters, some of whom took over the whole of the road rather than keep to one carriageway. Police tried hard to control them and made at least one arrest, which led to some scuffles.

One issue that dominated the rally in Trafalgar Square was the strike against privatisation at the National Gallery which overlooks the square, and in particular the victimisation by the management of Candy Udwin, the PCS rep there.

Later in the afternoon anti-capitalist protesters met up at Tower Hill, and led by lass War and their Lucy Parsons banner went on to block Tower Bridge this afternoon and blocked traffic, calling for social housing rather than social cleansing for Londoners and an end to cuts in foundation courses and other aspects of education. It was a lively event, and I left them when they marched off along Tooley St past London Bridge to protest in Westminster.

I walked back across Tower Bridge and on to Aldgate where Class War were organising their ‘Reclaim the Beats’ “epic street party” outside the tower block where they had held around 30 weekly ‘Poor Doors’ protests against the separate entrance down a side alley for the social housing tenants in the block.

A huge cheer went up as they unfurled a new banner showing leading politicians with the message “All Fucking Wankers”, a replacement for that seized by police at an earlier protest. Although it had later been judged to be an acceptable political comment, the police contrived to lose it rather than face the indignity of returning it to Class War.

A few minutes later a mobile sound system in the form of a small house on wheels with ‘Affordable Housing’ across its roof and the party really kicked off. After a few minutes people moved out to block the main road and then to march off to protest at Tower Bridge and in Bermondsey. I was too tired to go with them and instead went down the stairs into Aldgate East tube.

‘Reclaim the Beats’ at ‘Poor Doors’
Anti-Capitalists block Tower Bridge
May Day Rally supports National Gallery
May Day march against austerity and racism

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

Against the Sultan

I got to the protest rather late because I stopped on the way to meet the people from Class War who were going to attend the protest. Of course they were in a pub, and the pub they had selected to meet was quite a walk from the Dorchester Hotel outside which the protest was taking place.

It took a while to finish our drinks and to get moving, and eventually I gave up waiting for them, especially when some decided they needed to get a bus., though it was only half a mile to walk. I left with one of the more active members and we hurried, getting there in well under ten minutes.

The ruling by the Sultan of Brunei to make stoning to death the sentence for gay sex, adultery and blasphemy had enraged people around the world, and protests were planned in many cities outside the luxury hotels he owns, including the Dorchester Hotel in London’s Mayfair.

There was a large crowd of protesters, but at some distance from the hotel entrance, on the pavements of the minor street that runs around the front of the building and its large yard which allow taxis to drive to its doors. There really wasn’t enough room for protesters on the pavements, but police were trying to keept the roadway clear, arguing with protesters who were reluctant to move.

Although I was over half an hour late for the start, I was still in time to photograph the two major speakers, Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry and human rights activist Peter Tatchell, as well of course as many of the protesters and their posters and banners.

Class War turned up with their two banners almost half and hour after me, and for a while stood with them on the roadway (which the police by this time had given up the impossible task of keeping clear.) Their late arrival was probably timed to ensure they missed the speeches.

After standing for a few minutes holding the banners, Class War sized up the situation decided it was time for some more definite action. They pushed aside the barriers around the hotel yard and with the ‘Women’s Death Brigade’ banner led a rush past police and security to protest on the steps of the hotel.

They shouted for the others to follow them, and a few came immediately. Eventually most of the rest of the crowd joined them for a long and noisy protest on the steps of the hotel. There were a few arguments with police who came to stand in front of the doors, but no arrests before I left three-quarters of an hour later.

Many more pictures at Brunei Sultan gay sex stoning protest

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

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

To order prints or reproduce images

Mother Hysteria and Mogg

Starring Adam Clifford as Jacoob Rees Mogg and Jane Nicholl as Mother Hysteria the cast got together in a pub a short walk from the London Palladium where a full house of mugs were paying £38 a head to come and listen to Mogg.

Together with a small team of supporters the pair walked down to the Palladium, where early comers were queing to get into to the show and told them what they had come to see – and evening with a religious extremist.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is 20190226-d1138.jpg

It was almost certainly more entertaining than anything that was coming later in the evening when they got inside the theatre, but there were a few in the queue who got a little upset at Class War. The police too showed they lacked a sense of humour and were soon insisting that Class War move further away to the other side of the road.

The protest continued there, with some longer speeches from a few of those present, including a well-known Whitechapel anarchist, although I wasn’t sure how many of those largely out-of-town punters across the road would appreciate the rhyming slang of his placard, ‘Jacob Rees-Joey Ronce.’

Nor for that matter, its accuracy. ‘Mogg-Tax Dodging Snob’ on another placard was however doubly to the point. Behind his backing for Brexit is undoubtedly both the fact that he stands to make millions if not billions from it, and as another placard pointed out, he is truly ‘Lord Snooty’ personified.

The evening then descended further into farce as the police threatened Mother Hysteria with arrest for possession of offensive weapons in the form of some novelty stink bombs. They took her to one side and held her against the wall and searched her, after which the sergeant concerned retreated into a nearby shop and spent at least 20 minutes trying to think of something to put on the notice for her that didn’t sound entirely ridiculous.

I took a lot of pictures, but not all of them were usable. It was yet another occasion when the many buttons and the two control dials on my Nikon cameras attracted my wandering digits, and I found myself suddenly having taken a series of exposures at far too high a shutter speed for the lighting or too slow for the subject movement. I had problems too with flash, and one of my cameras had a problem with the hot shoe, which I think was not making proper contact with the flash resulting in it firing at full output and totally overexposing some frames.

But as you can see at Class War protest Rees-Mogg freak show, plenty came out OK.

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

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

To order prints or reproduce images