>Re:PHOTO Peter Marshall - Thoughts on Photography

Dirty Money Still Rules

Nine years ago on Wednesday 7th November 2012, the day that the election of Obama for a second term as President of the US was announced, the Campaign against Climate Change organised a series of protests in London urging him to stand up against the lobbying, dirty money and media lies funded by the Koch brothers and other fossil fuel companies.

Nine years later, after both the end of Obama’s presidency and four years of climate denier Trump, President Biden is still having problems in getting his plans to clean up the environment (and other policies) voted through because of opposition by a Senator who made a fortune from a coal brokerage business in which he owns more than a million dollars in shares and who receives more donations than any other senator from the coal, oil and gas industry.

*Campaign Against Climate Change, March 2003*

The Campaign against Climate Change was founded in 2001 as a response to President Bush’s rejection of the Kyoto Protocol, and I think I first photographed one of their marches back in March 2002 when they pushed a bed with Bush in bed with the Esso tiger from Esso’s UK HQ to Westminster. It was a long walk and the wheels fell off the bed as it came to Westminster Bridge, but in 2012, after a static protest at the HQ of giant US private company Koch International they chose sturdier wheels in the form of an open-top bus.

Koch Industries is the US’s largest private company and made its fortune through developing improved processes of oil refining, and this remains a major part of its widespread activities. It is owned by the Koch Brothers, who ‘have been a major source for funding disinformation on climate change and in instigating the wave of populist anti-science, anti-regulatory, right-wing extremism associated with the “Tea Party”.’

Both in the US and the UK, governments are hugely influenced by the lobbying of big business, with many politicians accepting large payouts for services rendered, as well as a large PR and lobbying industry aimed at law makers and the media. The truly shameful think about the current case of Owen Paterson is not that he was paid paid £100,000 and broke the rules, but that their are rules that exist which he claims to have kept within to allow such paid lobbying by MPs.

*Phil Thornhill at the front of the bus*

Although the bus didn’t lose its wheels, it was desperately cold as it went through London on a cold, wet and windy November evening, with Phil Thornhill of the CCC leaning over the top with a large megaphone informing the public about the reason for the protest. It was also extremely bumpy, which together with the low light made photography rather difficult, and most of the time I was too busy holding tight to the rail across the top of the seats to take pictures.

Finally after its journey through the rush-hour streets the bus arrived at the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square and we all alighted. At first police tried to push the protesters into a penned area in a dark corner of the square where it would be neither heard nor seen. The protesters sensibly refused and after some discussion were allowed to protest as usual in front of the locked front gates – protected outside by a thin line of police, and inside the tall fence by wandering armed officers.

*Barach Obama with David Koch on the top of the bus*

Protests such as this of course had no effect on Obama’s business-friendly administration, while Trump made climate denial core policy of his tweets. But these and other protests did raise awareness of the catastrophe the world is facing. Many of us had been aware of the coming crisis for many years – at least since the 1980s, though there were warnings from some scientists years earlier, but the wider public, often misinformed by the media was largely ignorant.

Without protests such as this around the world, it seems unlikely that their would have been an agreement reached at COP 21 in Paris in 2015, and since then, helped by the publicity given to Greta Thunberg and David Attenborough, not to mention various extreme climate events around the world, there is now a wide consensus that something needs to be done, and done urgently. But thanks to the huge continued efforts of big business in fossil fuels the politicians are still locked into doing too little too late.

More pictures: Stop Fossil Fuel Dirty Money takeover of US.

Around Old St

H J Brooks & Co, Old St, Islington, 1988 88-5n-22-positive_2400 — *H J Brooks & Co, Old St, Islington, 1988 88-5n-22*

These pictures continue the walk around Finsbury and going back east along Old St to South Shoreditch. They are all in my album 1988 London Photos, but here I’ve put them in the order in which I took them. I also made some other exposures not on line, and the album only contains those images I now find more interesting and worth preserving.

H J Brooks & Co were at a number 136 on the south side of Old St, close to Tilney Court and the building is still there, now offering IT services and support. Henry Brooks was one of many companies in this area in the furniture trade, supplying the various fittings which can be seen in the window.

Kapital Kwickprint, Old St, Islington, 1988 88-5n-24-positive_2400 — *Kapital Kwickprint, Old St area, Islington, 1988 88-5n-24*

I think Kapital Kwickprint was quite close to the Old Street roundabout at the junction with City Road which I’ve since photographed on various occasions. The premises appear to be shared with Sheet Metal and Wire Workers Malbot Ltd, and it was their notices including a hanging sign that attracted my attention as well as a rather curious doorway, firmly shuttered and with the message ‘LETTERS FOR MALBOT LTD’ and an arrow pointing to a postbox beside it.

It is hard to identify this location now, but I think it was in Mallow St, where the next frame on the film was clearly taken. At top left is the address 3TO4.

Warehouse, Leonard St, Paul St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 1988 88-5n-12-positive_2400 — *Warehouses, Leonard St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 1988 88-5n-12*

This very sturdy-looking building is still present on the corner with Paul St and is now offices with the name ‘Victoria House’ and address 1 Leonard Circus. Like the warehouses further along the street it probably dates from the 1870s.

Warehouses, Leonard St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 198888-5n-13-positive_2400 — *Warehouses, Leonard St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 1988 88-5n-13*

Part of an impressive row of warehouses on Leonard St dating from 1874-7 which have now been converted to office and residential use. C W Burrows at 69 describe themselves as House Furnishers – and this area was a great centre for furniture manufacture.

The business of J.Davis & Company (Machines) limited, now dissolved, was described at Companies House as “Wholesale of machinery for the textile industry and of sewing and knitting machines – Importing and distribution sewing machines.”

Great Eastern St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 1988 88-5n-15-positive_2400 — *Great Eastern St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 198888-5n-14*

Great Eastern St was constructed in 1876 and these buildings date from shortly afterwards. You can see a small part of No 42 at right of picture, which is Grade II listed and built with No 40 in 1877.

And this picture shows the Grade II listed building at 40-42 built in 1877 by J. W. Brooker for the cabinet ironmongers Edward Wells & Co. As the listing states it is “in an eclectic style with Gothic, Italianate and Venetian influences.” This building was only listed in 2006, and is currently occupied by a cafe and an estate agent. I’ve photographed the entrance on the corner at right on other occasions.

Christina St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 1988 88-5n-16-positive_2400 — *Christina St, Shoreditch, Hackney, 1988 88-5n-16*

Christina Street looking east from close to Phipp St. The site at right now has a building on it, and the street looks considerably tidier.

City Road area, Shoreditch, Islington, Hackney, 1988 88-6a-02-positive_2400 — *City Road area, Shoreditch, Islington, Hackney, 1988 88-6a-02*

Today’s mystery picture. A quite distinctive building but I can’t remember what it was or exactly where it was, though probably somewhere quite close to Wesley’s Chapel on the City Road where I was photographing on the same walk a couple of frames later. It has a vaguely religious feel and may well have been sold and demolished since 1988. I hope someone will recognise it and tell me in a comment.

Click on any of the pictures to go to a larger version in my album 1988 London Photos, from where you can browse the album.

Remember, Remember

Despite some rumours I wasn’t around to photograph Guy Fawkes as he made his way into Parliament, but I was there in 2012 when ‘Anonymous’ wearing Guy Fawkes masks popularised in the graphic novel and film ‘V for Vendetta’ chose November 5th 2012, Bonfire Night, for their “worldwide Anonymous operation of global strength and solidarity, a warning to all governments worldwide that if they keep trying to censor, cut, imprison, or silence the free world or the free internet they will not be our governments for much longer.”

I wrote a fairly long account of the night, or at least those parts I witnessed, on My London Diary at Anonymous March to Parliament where you can also see many more pictures, and I won’t repeat the details here, but it is worth restating the aims of the protest:

In the UK the protest called for an end to cuts in education, health and welfare and the end of ‘austerity measures’ that target the poor and vulnerable, calling on the government to tackle the causes of the problems, including the banks and tax avoidance and evasion. They also want freedom for the Internet, with respect for the privacy of Internet users and the dropping of the Communications Data Bill.

My account also mentions that:

Anonymous also asks for Internet activists who are held as political prisoners to be released, including Julian Assange currently still unable to leave a London embassy, Richard O’Dwyer, the “PayPal 14, Jeremy Hammond, Topiary and the 4 anons of the UK that will stand trial on November 7th.”

Everyone will be aware of some of what is still now taking place over Assange, including a CIA plot to kidnap him from the Ecuadorian embassy, then the Ecuadorian government withdrawal of his immunity, calling in the police to remove him, since when he has been kept largely in isolation in the high-secuirty Belmarsh prison as the US authorites continue to press for his extradition. The US appeal last week against a previous court decision that he could not be extradited because of this mental health and the likelihood that he would commit suicide has been largely the subject of a news blackout by the British media.

But the other cases have probably faded from most of our memories – if we were ever aware of them, so here are some brief reminders with information from Wikimedia.

Richard O’Dwyer created a web search engine which linked to copyright infringing sites and was charged in New York with conspiracy to commit copyright infringement and criminal infringement of copyright. He fought against extradition, but after Theresa May as Home Secretary ruled he could be sent to the US to face charges in November 2012 signed a deferred prosecution agreement, paying a £20,000 fine for charges to be dropped.

The PayPal 14 were charged under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act in July 2011 for attempted denial of service attacks on Paypal in 2010 after it refused to make payments to a Wikileaks account, in what they say as a digital ‘sit-in’. Most later pleaded guilty to misdemeanours to avoid more serious charges and were sentenced to probation with 13 sharing a fine of $6,615 each.

American activist and computer hacker Jeremy Hammond was sentenced to two years in hail for hacking a US pro-Iraq war group in 2005. In December 2011 he was involved in a hack of private intelligence firm Stratfor, which compromised 60,000 credit cards and downloaded 5 million emails, some later published by Wikileaks. Identifying himself as anarchist-communist he defended his actions saying “I did what I believe is right” and was sentenced to the maximum penalty of 10 years in jail. He was released under supervision in November 2020, having been kept in jail longer for refusing to testify to a grand jury investigation into Wikileaks and Julian Assange.

Topiary, British hacktivist Jake Davis, was a member of Anonymous and LulzSec, involved in various online attacks including defacing the goverment websites of Zimbabwe, Syria, Tunisia, Ireland, and Egypt as well as the Westboro Baptist Church. Then aged 18, he was arrested in 2011 at his home in the Shetlands and charged with offences including a conspiracy to launce a denial-of-service attack against the Serious Organised Crime Unit. Tried with three fellow hackers (I think probably the 4 anons of the UK referred to by Anon) in 2013 he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 24 months in a young offenders institute, with the 21 months he had been electronically tagged before the sentence being counted against it.

Anonymous hackers were also responsible for a number of successful attacks on child pornography sites, and actions against Scientology, a cult they saw was causing harm to many followers. They say “Distributed Denial of Service must be recognised as a legitimate form of protest, as long as an aim and reason has been specified by the protestors.“

Anonymous March to Parliament

Free Education – No Barriers, Borders or Business

Free Education – No Barriers, Borders or Business was the call by the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC) on their march through London on Wednesday 4th November 2015 against the abolition of maintenance grants and demanding free education without fees and huge student debts and an end to turning higher education into a market system impoverishing staff and students.

The march began in Malet St outside what had been the University of London Union, founded in 1921 as the University of London Union Society and was run by students for students. In 2013 the University of London decided to close ULU, taking over the building and running it as ‘Student Central’, now managed by the university, though continuing to offer similar services and resources for the 120,000 students, including bars, restaurants, shops, banks, a swimming pool and a live music venue – though some of these were on a reduced scale. But in 2021 it was announced that Student Central was to close and the building would become a teaching space for neighbouring Birkbeck College.

There were some speeches in Malet St before the march began, with speeches from several student representatives from various universities around the country, teaching staff and some fighting words from Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell MP. Green Party leader Natalie Bennett also marched with the students.

Antonia Bright of Movement for Justice spoke about the UK’s racist immigration policies and invited students to protest at Yarls Wood on the following Saturday.

Among the marchers was a ‘black bloc’ carrying red and black anarchist flags and including Class War carrying their ‘WE HAVE FOUND NEW HOMES FOR THE RICH’ banner, along with a ‘book bloc’ carrying large polystyrene padded posters with the names of left wing and anarchist classic books on them or slogans such as ‘Rise, Riot, Revolt.’

The march went through Russell Square Square and down to High Holborn where it turned west and then took Shaftesbury Ave and the Charing Cross Rd to Trafalgar Square.

From there it went down Whitehall to Parliament Square where I left it briefly to photograph campaigners from the Save Shaker Aamer Campaign who had mounted a weekly vigil for his release from Guantanamo and were holding a ‘Welcome Home Shaker’ celebration.

I caught up with the marchers again at the Home Office, where there was a great deal of noise, confusion and coloured smoke before the marchers turned around and walked back towards Victoria St.

They gathered outside the Dept of Business, Innovation & Skills, where a black clad block charged the mass of police protecting the building, but were forcefully repelled. More police arrived and started pushing everyone away, including peaceful protesters and photographers. I was sent flying but fortunately into some of the protesters rather than to the pavement.

Eventually the pushing stopped and the police set up lines across the street which prevented the more peaceful protesters leaving the area. I tried to leave, showing my press card. After some minutes of being refused I found an officer who let me through and I walked along the street to rest and wait to see how the situation would develop. Eventually the students managed to break through the police line and run along to join the others already there, and they moved off. I decided I’d had enough and made my way to Victoria station to catch a train.

More pictures:

Students at Home Office and BIS
‘Welcome Home Shaker’ celebration
Free Education – No Barriers, Borders or Business

Trade Justice Parade 2001

Twenty years ago today on 3rd November 2001 I wrote:
the trade justice parade was a serious event but also we were having some fun. the world trade organisation isn’t at all amusing, but i loved the t-shirt that said ‘wto – unsuitable for anyone with a conscience.
giant pound signs, balloons, a hug fat cat, the wto dragon, pirates and everyone made it an event to remember.
speakers included naomi klein (author of ‘no logo’) and sergio cobo from mexico.
My London Diary

And with the article I posted the two black and white images shown here. But I think most of the pictures I took of the parade were in colour, taken on colour negative film. But the only work I was putting in to a picture library back then was in black and white – and then still 8×10″ prints. There was still greater demand for black and white, and some of the pictures I took in colour I printed as black and white. The library would have taken colour, but mostly they worked with colour transparencies.

But I had recently bought a scanner with which I could scan colour negative film and it had software that could produce positive results with something like the correct colours. The results were not great and seemed to accentuate the faults in the negatives and exaggerate flare. The results were certainly not of professional quality as you can probably see – even after I have improved the pictures in Lightroom.

A year after I made these pictures I bought my first DSLR and things changed, though it took a while for the library and some other outlets to shift to accept digital files, and for a little while I was still taking black and white film for the prints they wanted as well as digital colour. But things changed quite rapidly to an all-digital world.

Going back to the negatives I’m sure I could now make much improved digital versions than these by ‘camera scanning’ – using a DSLR to photograph them and then Negative Lab Pro software to convert them to positives. It’s good news for those of us with archival material on colour negative film. But I can see no reason at all for wanting to take film again when digital produces so much better results with much less hassle.

The issues people were protesting about in the Trade Justice Parade are still very much with us – and in the UK the government last week passed yet another act hastening the privatisation of our NHS, while many of the same issues that were brought up by the protest are behind the failures to deal effectively with climate change. The huge greed for consumption and wealth of a small minority of the ultra-rich underlie both; they are not ‘high net worth’ but ‘high global liability.’

Finsbury 1988 (Part 2)

Helmet Row, St Lukes, Islington, 1988 88-5n-41-positive_2400 — *Helmet Row, St Lukes, Islington, 1988 88-5n-41*

From Whitecross St I wandered across Old St into Helmet Row to make this picture, before going back across the road.

Old St, St Lukes, Islington, 1988 88-5n-42-positive_2400 — Old St, St Lukes, Islington, 1988 88-5n-42

Helmet Row is the street beside this building, at at right is the tall spire of St Luke Old St, a Grade I listed chruch designed by John James and Nicholas Hawksmoor, the latter thought to be responisble for the unusual obelisk spire. In 1988 the church was derelict and roofless. Opened in 1733 it became redundant and closed in 1959, remaining empty until taken over as a music centre operated by the London Symphony Orchestra in 2003.

Golden Lane, Baltic St, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-43-positive_2400 — *Golden Lane, Baltic St, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-43*

I don’t think I went out of my way to photograph buildings with street signs on them, but it was very useful when they did have one – or even two like this on the corner of Golden Lane and Baltic St. Both buildings are still there, although only that at the right of my picture is still Mencap. That at left has gained the name LONDON HOUSE written rather large on both sides.

Stables, Whitbread, Garrett St, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-44-positive_2400 — *Stables, Whitbread, Garrett St, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-44*

Whitbread’s huge stables, built in 1897 are a reminder of a past age, one that was soon to come to an end, when traffic in London was all horse-drawn, and large numbers of horses were needed to convey barrels of beer to thirsty Londoners. This stables was built to replace a smaller stables on Chiswell street and ramps at the rear enabled horses to be kept on its three floors. The top floor originally had windows like those below, but these were bricked up when it was later used by a gun club as a firing range. Some have now been unbricked.

These stables could house around a hundred horses to pull the brewery drays, a small fraction of the many thousands of horses on London’s streets every day – with a transport system of hansom cabs and horse buses needing around 50,000 to keep running and many more in harness behind various carts and wagons, along with a few saddle horses. And with Shire horses weighing around a ton a piece the stables had to be very sturdy and the pollution problem with each producing between 15 and 35 pounds of manure per day was huge, leading to the Great Horse Manure Crisis of 1894. No solution could then be found to the problem, and it was only the internal combustion engine that eventually came to the rescue – its pollution, though toxic was largely gaseous.

School Caretakers, house, Baltic St, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-46-positive_2400 — *School Caretakers, house, Baltic St, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-46*

The School Caretakers House and entrance to the Cookery School are still there in Baltic Street, though the school, built for boys, girls and infants by the London School Board in th 1880s, is now the Golden Lane Annexe of the London College of Fashion, part of UAL, the University of the Arts London.

Crescent Row, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-31-positive_2400 — *Crescent Row, Finsbury, Islington, 1988 88-5n-31*

The corner of Crescent Row and Sycamore St still looks much the same. Plans to demolish the building on the left edge of the picture were approved in 2017, but it appeared to have been renovated a year or so later.

Dress forms, Old St, Finsbury, Islington, 88-5n-34-positive_2400 — *Dress forms, Old St, Finsbury, Islington, 88-5n-34*

The view through a window in Old Street. I think this later became a café bar.

More from around Old St in a later post. Click on any of the images to view a larger version in my album 1988 London Photos from where you can browse the album.

Finsbury 1988 (Part 1)

Ropemaker St, Islington, 1988 88-5m-14-positive_2400 — *Ropemaker St, Islington, 1988 88-5m-14*

At the end of May 1988 I went to Finsbury on the northern edge of the City of London – not to be confused with Finsbury Park a couple of miles further north. I think I might have been visiting an exhibition at the Barbican Gallery which has its main street entrance in Silk Street, just a few yards from the border with Finsbury, part of the London Borough of Islington.

Ropemaker St, Islington, 198888-5n-61-positive_2400 — *Ropemaker St, Islington, 1988 88-5n-61*

Ropemaker St, Islington, 1988 88-5n-62-positive_2400 — *Ropemaker St, Islington, 1988 88-5n-62*

Finsbury St, Islington,1988 88-5n-64-positive_2400 — *Finsbury St, Islington,1988 88-5n-64*

Or it could be that I was simply visiting some of my favourite new buildings in London, in Ropemaker St, some now demolished and replaced. Those balconies – perhaps from the 1950s – are still there but the more recent building on the other side of Chiswell Street has been replaced by something bigger and blander.

Honourable Artillery Company, Gates, Finsbury St, Islington,1988 88-5n-63-positive_2400 — *Honourable Artillery Company, Gates, Finsbury St, Islington,1988 88-5n-63*

I simply had to turn around to find my next subject, the gates of the Honourable Artillery Company, established by Royal Charter on 25th August 1537 and said to be the second-oldest military corps in the world. It actually traces its history back rather further to 21 years after the Norman invasion. The ‘Artillery’ for much of its history was the long bow and it originally had a field in Spitalfields where it could practice shooting arrows, and it only moved permanently here to the Artillery Garden in in 1658. As well as military practice the ground has also often been used for sporting and other events; cricket is said to have been played here as early as 1725 and the first balloon flight in England began was here by Vincenzo Lunardi in September 1784. THe HAC is still a part of the Army Reserve, the oldest regiment in the British Army.

Diana, sculpture, Chiswell St, Finsbury St, Islington,1988 88-5n-52-positive_2400 — *Diana, sculpture, Chiswell St, Finsbury St, Islington,1988 88-5n-52*

In front of one of the buildings on Chiswell St was a narrow garden with a few bushes and a sculpture of Diana the Huntress with two dogs. I don’t know what has happened to this.

Whitecross St, Finsbury, Islington,198888-5n-55-positive_2400 — Whitecross St, Finsbury, Islington,198888-5n-55

A tall warehouse on the corner of Errol St and Whitecross St has a sign for A J Brown Brough & Co Ltd, Paper and Packaging. The building is still there, now I think converted largely to residential use, with its main entrances in Dufferin St. But of more interest to many – and perhaps to me when I made the image – is the vintage Citroen in the foreground.

I’ll continue my walk around Finsbury in later posts. You can click on any of the pictures here to go to larger versions in my album 1988 London Photos.

Extinction Rebellion Climate Protest 2018

Protesters in Parliament Square on 31st October 2018 heard speeches from climate activists including Swedish schoolgirl Greta Thunberg, campaigner Donnachadh McCarthy, Labour MP Clive Lewis, economist and Green MEP Molly Scott Cato, before making a ‘Declaration of Rebellion’ against the British Government for its criminal inaction in the face of climate change catastrophe and ecological collapse.

Three years ago British campaigners were particularly inflamed by the almost total lack of any measures in the budget to meet the impending catastrophic climate change, and three years later we can say the same about last week’s budget. Sunak still seems to be intent on growth and business as usual, encouraging road building and air travel and there was little or no mention of any green initiatives, something of a pre-COP26 sabotage of stated government policies.

But as Thunberg and others made clear, we have seen some rhetoric but totally inadequate action so far to meet the challenge and the Extinction Rebellion protest made this clear in its ‘Declaration of Rebellion’ against the British Government for its criminal inaction in the face of climate change catastrophe and ecological collapse.

Schoolkids get it – and it led to Greta’s protest outside the Swedish Parliament which has inspired many around the world. Even some of our media are beginning to get it, but governments around the world, including our own seem reluctant to actually make the kind of changes that are needed. And although some MPs speak out, neither Labour nor Conservative parties have embraced the kind of policies that are necessary to avert mass extinction.

Its a shame that many on the left have devoted rather more energy to criticising the actions taken by Extinction Rebellion rather than getting out and doing something positive, with few others organising protests and direct actions. XR have done a lot to raise public awareness and the vicious reaction to their protests with the government pushing prosecutions against them and a draconian Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill currently in its final stages in Parliament , and threats to rewrite the Human Rights Act and to hobble judges have shown the true colour of our Tory government as we move towards a police state.

After reciting the ‘Declaration of Rebellion’ the protesters moved onto the road and sat down to block it and continue the rally with songs, poems and speeches, including by Caroline Lucas MP and George Monbiot. There were several votes during the sit-down when protesters were asked if they wished to leave the roadway as police were threatening to arrest them which resulted in a near-unanimous show of hands in favour of remaining.

As George Monbiot finished some of the protesters began to leave, and several activists stood up to encourage people to stay behind on the road and be arrested, and several groups continued the protest, including one circle with protesters linking arms including Donnachadh McCarthy and George Monbiot. Police surrounded the group, and then arrested the man to McCarthy’s left, coming back a few minutes later to take McCarthy away – and he later published an account of what appeared to be a symposium on climate change he conducted in the police van. Monbiot shortly after got up and left, apologising to those remaining that he needed to collect his children from school.

The arrests continued slowly, and there was still a group on one side of the road who had been locked together for some hours who police seemed to be largely ignoring and were still there when I left, along with others still sitting on the road.

I have low expectations for next week’s COP 26. We will get more promises to add to those which have already not been kept and not the real shift into action that the world desperately needs. Of course I’d be delighted to be proved wrong. But this side of a revolution I think it unlikely that the ultra-rich can be persuaded to change their ways.

Many more pictures at:
Extinction Rebellion roadblock
Extinction Rebellion rally

United Friends & Families March

Today at noon in London, the the United Families & Friends Campaign (UFFC), a coalition of those affected by deaths in police, prison and psychiatric custody, is holding its annual march from Trafalgar Square along Whitehall to a rally opposite Downing St as it has on the last Saturday in October since 1999. In 2010 the march was also on 30th October and I published a lengthy post about it with many photographs on My London Diary. Here is the text in full (with some minor corrections) and a few of the pictures.

United Friends & Families March

Trafalgar Square to Downing St, London. Saturday 30 Oct 2010

*Marcia Rigg-Samuel, sister of Sean Rigg, killed by police in Brixton, tries to deliver a letter at Downing St*
more pictures

The United Friends and Families of those who have died in suspicious circumstances in police custody, prisons and secure mental institutions marched slowly in silence down Whitehall to Downing St, where police refused to allow them to deliver a letter to the Prime Minister, David Cameron.

It’s impossible to be sure how many of the suspicious deaths in police custody, prisons and secure mental institutions (and there are around 200 a year) have been as a result of lack of care, the use of excessive force and brutality, but certainly the answer is far too many.

Since 1999, the ‘United Friends and Families’ of some of those who have died have held an annual slow silent funeral march from Trafalgar Square down Whitehall to Downing St. It attracted particular attention in 2008 when the mother and other family members of Jean Charles de Menezes were among those taking part. This year’s event was rather smaller, and received little attention from the mainstream media.

A number of family members spoke with great feeling opposite Downing St, and then the group, by now around a hundred strong, moved across the road to fix flowers to the gates and attempt to deliver a letter to Prime Minister David Cameron. It seemed an unnecessary and pointless snub that the police refused to take the letter and that nobody from No 10 was apparently prepared to come and receive it.

Earlier there had been an argument with the police who had objected to the rally occupying one of the two southbound lanes of Whitehall, but was allowed to go ahead by the officer in charge after those present had refused to move. In previous years the police have usually seemed anxious to avoid confrontation, although in 2008 they insisted on searching all the bouquets before allowing them to be laid on the gates of Downing St.

*Jason McPherson’s grandmother speaking opposite Downing St*

Speakers at the rally opposite Downing St included Stephanie, the twin sister of Leon Patterson, Rupert Sylvester, the father of Roger Sylvester, Ricky Bishop’s sister Rhonda and mother Doreen, Samantha, sister of Jason McPherson and his grandmother, Susan Alexander, the mother of Azelle Rodney, and finally the two sisters of Sean Rigg.

What the families want is simple. Justice. And to know the truth about what happened. What emerged again and again was a shameful history of delay, evasion and covering up by the police, with the collusion of the IPCC, the Crown Prosecution Service and even at times judges, working together to ensure that justice fails to be done. The press have been fed lies – as in the de Menezes case, security cameras have suddenly been found not to have been working, CCTV tapes have been lost or doctored, officers involved have not been questioned until many months after the events, witness statements have been dismissed as ‘unreliable’. Deliberate delays are used as a tactic to prevent the truth coming out, and these also have allowed officers involved to collude in their cover-ups.

Overwhelmingly the victims in these cases are black, but one of the banners on the march reminded us that it affects the whole of our community, with a banner asking why 18 year old Sarah Campbell died in Styal Prison in 2003. Many of us present remembered and sadly miss her mother, Pauline Campbell; after her daughter’s tragic death she devoted herself single-mindedly to campaigning for justice, not just for Sarah but for other victims and to improve the system. Eventually she forced an admission from the authorities that their lack of care had caused Sarah’s death, but she became another victim of injustice when she committed suicide on her daughters grave.

*Stephanie Lightfoot*–*Bennett, speaks about the police murder of her twin Leon Patterson*

Leon Patterson was arrested in Stockport in 1992 and kept in a police cell for some days despite being in need of hospital treatment. He was found dead in his cell with a fractured skull and severe injuries, his blood covering the walls of the cell and his genitals mutilated, and in such a bad state that she failed to recognise him. The family challenged the initial inquest verdict which found his injuries to be self-inflicted, but there was no legal aid available for them. Fortunately the charity INQUEST supported them and a second inquest in April 1993 returned a verdict of unlawful killing, although this was quashed on appeal by the police on the grounds that the coroner had misdirected the jury on the law.

Roger Sylvester died in 1999 after being arrested by the Met. An inquest jury in October 2003 returned a verdict of unlawful killing, but the verdict was later quashed in the High Court, because the judge claimed the coroner’s summing up had confused the jury. The judge refused to order another inquest and said that no jury in a criminal case would be likely to convict any of the officers concerned of manslaughter.

Ricky Bishop was stopped, arrested and taken to Brixton police station on 22 Nov 2001, where he was assaulted and brutalised by police officers, leading to a heart attack. After that the police called a paramedic and he was taken to hospital and died. The family say that the police withheld vital evidence from the inquest and that the jury were not given a proper choice of verdicts at the inquest.

Jason McPherson died in hospital after being taken there from Notting Hill Police station after having been arrested on suspicion of drug offences on 18 Jan 2007. Police believed he had a wrap of cocaine in his mouth and had used considerable and arguably excessive force on his head and chest to try to get him to open his mouth. A jury at the inquest in January 2010 came to a unanimous ‘narrative verdict’, saying that the procedures were not properly implemented and that “it did not appear Jason was given the opportunity to remove the drugs voluntarily through talking down (tactical communication).”

Azelle Rodney was killed by police in April 2005 after a car in which he was travelling was rammed and stopped by the Met in Barnet. Rodney was not armed, although the officer who fired the shots at close range was sure he was. Various misleading statements from police sources were widely published by the press. An inquiry into the case opened formally earlier this month and there is to be a hearing in the Royal Courts of Justice starting next week.

Marcia Rigg-Samuel, sister of Sean Rigg, who went into Brixton Police station in August 2008 a physically healthy man but was dead a short time later, killed by the actions of a small group of officers, led the procession down Whitehall from Trafalgar Square. She stood beside her sister, Samantha Rigg-David, the last of the families to speak, and then read the letter from the families to Prime Minister David Cameron. The inquest on Sean Rigg, adjourned in 2008, is not now expected until 2012.

The families then moved across the road to the gates to Downing Street, demanding that police open them so they could deliver their letter. Police refused, and a small group of armed police joined the armed officers already present. After considerable amount of angry shouting as the police continued to refuse to allow access or even to take in the letter – a few of the group were allowed to sellotape the flowers, a photo of Sean Rigg and the letter to the gates. The noisy demonstration at the gates was still continuing when I left.
more pictures

SOAS Shut Down 2015

Students at SOAS, University of London, occupied the Brunei Suite on the Bloomsbury campus on October 6th 2015, after a leaked management document detailed £6.5m of cuts including the loss of 186 courses, roughly a third of the curriculum.

This leak came as the latest in a whole series of decisions by management which dismissed or ignored the views of both students and staff, and led to a unanimous vote of no confidence in the management two days later by the General Assembly of the SOAS Student Union.

As well as the course cuts and problems with switching courses and choosing tutorials, they complained that management had ignored an overwhelming vote in support of the Boycott, Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) Campaign, ignored the opposition to the outsourcing of cleaners, security staff and other workers and failed to respond to the strike by Fractional workers (who are responsible for much of the teaching) for fair pay. The students said that management were failing to deal with the gender pay gap and that institutional racism is thriving in SOAS.

They called for a restructuring of the Executive Board and Board of Trustees to give students, academic staff and support staff authority over the running of our university, and suggested that a large proportion of the savings needed could be made by the Executive Board cutting their own inflated salaries rather than making staff redundant.

*The entrance to the occupation after management locked the doors*

The management responded with lies and by harassing the students, including by cutting off the power on 23rd October, and when many teaching and administrative staff refused to cross a picket line they locked the doors of the university. The entrance to the occupation became through the high ground floor windows.

After a rally held on 27th October which I had missed they tried to intimidate the trade unions by suspending Unison Branch Secretary Sandy Nicoll, falsely claiming he had let students into the main building to protest outside the offices of recently appointed SOAS Director Baroness Amos.

The protest on Thursday 29th was held to call for the reinstatement of Nicoll, and there were messages of support for Sandy from colleges and trade unions around the country as well as a long series of speakers who came to give their support in person.

It was a well-attended and noisy protest with much banging on catering pots and pans with Nicoll getting a lengthy welcome before he could speak.

At the end of the rally there was music and dancing, with people taking part in the 'Strikey-Strikey', an adaption of the Hokey-Cokey:
You put your left arm in
Your left arm out
In, out, in, out
You shake it all about
You do the strikey-strikey
And you turn around
That's what it's all about
Woah, the strikey-strikey
Woah, the strikey-strikey
Woah, the strikey-strikey
Knees bent
Arms stretched
Ra-ra-ra...

Things appeared to be drawing to a conclusion and I got ready to leave when things livened up a little with people setting off smoke flares as they paraded with banners in front of the occupied building to the music of a violin and drums.

The management finally backed down and reinstated Sandy Nicoll and eventually the occupation came to an end too, with management changing some of its plans but not meeting the main student demands. Dissent continued on campus and there was a further occupation in 2017. There have been some victories, and after a 12 year fight the cleaners became directly employed by SOAS at the end of August 2018.

More at SOAS Shut Down after Sandy suspended.