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Coal Drops, Libraries and Housing – 2018

On Saturday 3rd Novemeber I got to London earlier than anticipate and had time for a little walk before photographing the first protest I had come to cover, over the cuts to public libraries. Later I went to photograph another protest about the plans to demolish many London council estates under so-called ‘regeneration’ plans which involve demolition and rebuilding by developers with little social housing.

Euston to Kings Cross Coal Drops – Sat 3 Nov 2018

Problems on my railway journeys into London are rather common, often involving considerable delays. Last weekend a replacement bus for part of the way meant that my usually slow journey scheduled to take 35 minutes to travel 20 miles instead took an hour and a half. But on Saturday 23rd November 2018, there was something of a miracle. When I arrived at the station a train which should have arrived half an hour earlier was just pulling in and an announcement told me it would be running non-stop to Waterloo.

Where possible I like to arrive at events perhaps 10 or 15 minutes before the advertised start time make sure I don’t miss anything. Travelling across London is often a little unpredictable, with odd holdups so I usually allow plenty of time. I’d arrived at my station a few minutes early, and with the non-stop service got me to Waterloo around 25 minutes before I expected. The normal timetable schedule gives a 5 or 10 minutes slack to make it less likely that train operating company has to pay fines for late running, and without stops the journey is significantly faster. Together with an Underground train that came as I walked onto the platform I arrived at Euston with around three quarters of an hour to spare.

This gave me time for a walk to the newly opened retail development in the former King’s Cross coal drops. I’d photographed the disused coal drops many years earlier, taking pictures of the demolished bridges across the Regents Canal and the still standing drops on the north side where coal brought from the North in railway goods waggons was transferred into carts for delivery across London. At first the waggons were lifted and tipped, later waggons had opening doors in their bottoms to dischage directly in the waiting carts and lorries.

My walk also took me through Somers Town, which has some of inner London’s more interesting social housing and past the new Francis Crick Institute before reaching the canal and a new walkway to Coal Drops Yard and Granary Square, and gave some views of the gasholders relocated across the canal from Kings Cross, some of which are now filled with flats. I made my way back with just enough time to visit the toilets in St Pancras Station before going to the meeting point for the Library protest at the rear of the British Library in Midland Road.

Euston to Kings Cross Coal Drops

Save Our Libraries march – British Library, Sat 3 Nov 2018

The march and rally against cuts in library services, which are a vital part of our cultural services, especially for working class schoolchildren and young people was organised by Unison and supported by PCS and Unite, but they seem to have done very little publicity and the numbers were far fewer than expected.

Unfortunately the march clashed with another event I wanted to cover and I had to leave a few minutes before it was due to start. Perhaps more joined the protest for the rally at the end of the march outside Parliament.

Save Our Libraries march

No Demolitions Without Permission – City Hall, London. Sat 3 Nov 2018

‘Axe the Housing Act’ had called a protest to demand an end to the demolition of council estates unless these were approved by a ballot of all residents, and for public land to be used to build more council homes rather than being turned over to developers to make huge profits from high-priced flats.

Most of those who came were from London council estates under threat of demolition by Labour London councils and speaker after speaker from estate after estate got up and spoke about the lies, evasions and often illegal activities of London Labour councils bent on demolishing their council estates.

*Green Party co-leader and London Assembly’s Housing Committee chair Sian Berry*

Instead of looking after their working class populations Labour councils are time and time again forcing through demolition of council estates, enabling developers to make huge profits by building flats for sale largely at market rent, with a small proportion of high rent ‘affordable’ homes and a miserably small number of homes at social rent, promoting schemes which cut by thousands the number of council homes.

*Tanya Murat, Chair of Southwark Defend Council Housing*

Although a new policy was about to come in to insist their should be residents ballots, London Labour Mayor Sadiq Khan had responded to this by fast-tracking 34 demolition schemes by Labour councils before it was implemented. He allowed some schemes to go forward without a ballot, and had failed to insist that all residents were allowed to take part in such ballots.

*Former Lambeth Council leader and veteran Labour politician Ted Knight*

Among the groups taking part in the rally were Class War and the Revolutionary Communist Group, both very much involved in campaigns across the capital on housing, and among the most effective at raising the issues involved in London’s housing. For some reason the rally organisers would not allow representatives of either of these to speak at the event, which led to a loud confrontation when Labour supporter Ted Knight came to speak. More below on this.

At the end of the rally people marched around City Hall with their banners.

No Demolitions Without Permission.

Class War protest Labour Housing record – City Hall, Sat 3 Nov 2018

Although Class War supporters were one of the larger groups taking part in the ‘No Demolitions Without Permission’ rally at City Hall they and others were denied any opportunity to speak as a part of the official rally.

Class War have been the most active group in supporting and raising the profile of campaigns in London against estate demolition mainly by London Labour councils who are responsible for the great bulk of estate sell-offs and demolition involving over 160 council estates – social cleansing on a massive scale. Among those protesting at the rally with Class War was Leigh Miller, recently illegally evicted from Gallions Point Marina under orders from the Labour Mayor of London.

*Leigh Miller, recently illegally evicted from Gallions Point Marina and Lisa McKenzie hold the banner high*

It was no surprise that when a prominent Labour politician got up to speak, Class War erupted, shouting him down to make clear that it was Labour who was responsible for estate demolitions. It was perhaps unfair on Ted Knight, a former Lambeth Labour leader who together with other councillors defied Thatcher and was surcharged and banned from holding public office for 5 years.

*Ted Knight (right) and Martin Wright (left) shout at each other*

Knight has supported Central Hill Estate residents in their fight against Lambeth Council’s plans for demolition, singing from much the same hymn sheet as Class War on housing issues. As Lambeth council’s leader he was clear that “Nothing is too good for the working classes” and estates such as Central Hill reflect this. And there was a little of old scores in the verbal attack on him by Whitechapel anarchist Martin Wright.

*Finally at the end of the rally, Leigh Miller did get a chance to speak.*

As a number of those estate residents allowed to speak at the rally pointed out, homes will only be saved if people become more militant and engage in the kind of direct actions which Class War advocates – and not by rallies like today’s outside a closed City Hall.

Class War stood to one side at the end of the rally when most of the rest taking part marched around the empty offices, they were calling for a rather different revolution.

Class War protest Labour Housing record

3 Cosas at London University 2013

3 Cosas at London University 2013: The protest around the University of London Senate House on Wednesday 17th July 2013 was part of a long running campaign to get all workers at the university decent pay and conditions of service. At it’s root was the attempt by the university to dissociate itself from any responsibility for many lower-paid staff – cleaners, security, catering – whose work is essential to the running of the university by employing them indirectly through outsourcing companies.

These staff work alongside others directly employed by the university who get good contracts with decent provision of pensions, holiday entitlement and sickness pay, but are on rock-bottom contracts, receiving only the statutory minimum requirements. Things are usually made worse by bullying managers from the outsourcing companies who overload the workers and often fail to provide proper safety equipment for the jobs.

Some Unison branches, along with students from the University of London Union and some teaching staff and others from neighbouring London Universities had worked successfully together to improve wages and conditions of these lower paid staff, with protests in 2010-2011 getting the London Living Wage for the workers. They had now joined together to campaign for ‘3 Cosas’ – the three causes of sick pay, holiday pay and pensions, with the Spanish title reflecting the background of many of the university cleaners in London’s Latin-American community.

Unison nationally had publicly dissociated itself from the protests by some local branches and had failed to support either for the successful Living Wage Campaign or the new 3 Cosas campaign. The Senate House Unison Branch had recently elected branch officers who supported the campaigns but the results of the election were annulled by the Unison union leadership.

This led to almost all of the outsourced workers and some of those directly employed leaving Unison in protest, joining the grass roots IWGB which had been active in its support and now represented a majority of the outsourced workers. Despite this the university refused to engage with the IWGB, continuing to recognise the far more submissive Unison who seem not to care about the low paid workers.

The protest on this day was larger and angrier than usual, as the University had called in police the previous day to handle a student protest – and police had arrested a young woman who had chalked a slogan on a wall plaque, charging her with criminal damage. Chalk was used by the protesters as it causes no damage and is easily wiped off.

The 3 Cosas campaign has received support from branches and officials of other trade unions, including the RMT and UCU, the university and college teachers. And among those who came to give their support was Green Party Leader Natalie Bennett who spoke briefly before have to rush off to a BBC interview.

The protest began just outside the Senate House and as Bennett left the protesters moved into the open lobby area underneath the bottom of the building for a noisy few minutes chanting ‘Sick Pay, Holidays, Pensions, Now!’ and other slogans, blowing whistles and horns and using megaphone siren sounds to the accompaniment of some highly dynamic drumming from the SOAS samba band.

They then walked out from there and marched around the street to the south of the building opposite the British Museum North Entrance where there was a brief rally mainly to make those going into the museum aware of why they were protesting.

They walked back onto the university site for another noisy protest outside Stewart House, then back underneath Senate House where they stopped to listen to a speech from the ULU Vice-President. IWGB organiser Alberto Durango then invited everyone to go across the road and make their presence felt in front of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, where the IWGB is just starting to fight for the cleaners there to get the London Living Wage.

After a few minutes there they returned for a final session at the Senate House for some final speeches. The woman who had been arrested for chalking the previous day was one of those holding a No Justice No Peace’ banner in front of a line of security staff blocking the entrance, and there were calls urging the university to drop the charge of criminal damage, and some of those present chalked slogans on the tarmac in a show of solidarity.

Many more pictures at London University Cleaners Protest

University of London 3 Cosas Strike

Eight years ago on Tuesday 28th January 2014 low paid workers at the University of London were on the second day of their 3 day strike. Their union had organised a day of action around London and I had been invited to come and photograph it, having photographed a number of their previous protests.

University cleaners, maintenance and security staff were demanding that the University recognise their trade union, the IWGB (Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain) and give them better pay and conditions, comparable with other university staff they work alongside. The ‘3 Cosas’ were sick pay, paid holidays and pensions – all areas where these staff were only being given the legal minimum (and sometime not even that.)

As I wrote in 2014:

“although these workers work at the university and carry out work essential for the running of the university, the university does not employ them. Most low paid workers – cleaners, maintenance and security staff, catering works and others – at the University of London are no longer directly employed by the University, but work in the University on contracts from contractors Cofely GDF-Suez (who took over the former contractor Balfour Beatty Workplace at the end of last year.) The policy of outsourcing these workers seems largely intended to evade the responsibilities of London University towards an essential part of their workforce.”
3 Cosas’ Strike Picket and Battle Bus

It meant an early start for me, although the pickets had been outside Senate House for four hours when I arrived at 9am. Living outside London though on its edge I seldom arrive before 10am as it doubles my travel costs and I’ve never been a happy early riser. Fortunately the weather was good, a bright winter day and I’d dressed for the weather with thermal underwear, thick socks and a woolly hat, though it was still pretty chilly on top of the open-top bus.

The bus turned out to be a 1960 Routemaster which was sold by London Transport in 1986 but only converted to open-top in 2001. (I’d long thought that there was a plentiful supply of such vehicles after drivers attempted routes under low bridges, but apparently not, although a couple of bridges near where I live have had quite a few victims over the years.) Compared to modern buses, Routemasters offered a very bumpy ride with considerable vibration, and taking pictures on the upper deck required some faster than normal shutter speeds and most of the time working one-handed while clinging on with the other.

Space on bus tops is also quite small and moving around impeded both by the seats and the other riders (I think it’s a more appropriate term than passengers) and though they were very cooperative the top of the bus was pretty full. Most of the pictures I made were taken when the bus was stopped either at junctions or for short protests and my fisheye lens proved really useful.

The bus trip began at Senate House, and then began an extensive tour around central London, making a tour of various university sites where IWGB members were striking. There was a great deal of booing as we passed the Unison headquarters on Euston Road, as many of the workers had left Unison in disgust as they felt the were not supporting the demands of low-paid workers. The IWGB had intended to stop outside the offices of The Guardian newspaper, but had been held up too much by London’s traffic and drove past and on to Parliament Square.

Here we jumped off the bus and marched to Parliament where the IWGB had arranged to meet Labour MPs John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn for a short rally (and Andy Burnham sent a short message of support.)

There was a short shower before the bus came to pick us up on the Embankment, taking us to a side street near the Royal Opera House. Everyone kept quiet as we got off, then rushed around the corner and into the foyer. IWGB members there had voted for a strike the following month for union recognition and the London Living Wage.

In the foyer we were met by a man who introduced himself as the Unison Health & Safety rep and told the IWGB President and the other protesters that the ROH had already agreed that the cleaners will get the Living Wage, but had not yet told them. The Opera House recognises Unison, despite the workers almost entirely being IWGB members. It’s a ridiculous situation but one which is allowed under our poor trade union laws, though not one that makes sense for either workers or employers.

After making their views clear the IWGB members left quietly and got back onto the bus for the final visit of the day, to the Angel Islington, where Cofely GDF-Suez (who took over employing the workers at the University of London from the former contractor Balfour Beatty Workplace in December) has its offices. As at the Royal Opera House, there were plenty of police present and waiting for the protesters, but here they managed to lock the metal gates on the two entrances to Angel Square as the bus arrived, leaving the protest to take place in front of one of them in Torrens Place.

From here the bus was going on to the union offices at the Elephant and Castle and I was invited to join them for a very late mid-afternoon lunch but unfortunately I had work to do on the many pictures I had taken and had to leave them and make my way home.

IWGB at Cofely GDF-Suez
IWGB in Royal Opera House
IWGB at Parliament
‘3 Cosas’ Strike Picket and Battle Bus

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.