protest | >Re-PHOTO

Israel, City Island, Mayfair & West Hendon – 2015

Israel, City Island, Mayfair & West Hendon: I did a lot of travelling around London ten years ago on Thursday 22nd January 2015 by public transport and on foot. First I made the journey by rail, underground and DLR to the Excel Centre for a picket calling on HP to stop supporting Israeli prisons and military, then walked to the Lower Lea Crossing to photograph building work on City Island and on to the DLR at East India station to go to Canning Town From there the underground took me to Green Park and the Ritz where I met a small group from Class War on a visit to ‘Rich London’.

I had to leave them on Bond Street to make my way- tube, a short walk between stations in West Hampstead and rail to Hendon with another short walk to meet West Hendon Estate where residents were just coming out from a meeting to march from the estate to a rally outside Hendon Town Hall and I walked the just over a mile with them. But after around 20 minutes of the rally I felt very tired and had to leave for home – another short walk and an hour and a half of travel.

Stop Arming Israel picket HP at BETT

Israel, City Island, Mayfair & West Hendon - 2015

Protesters had come to picket the Excel Centre where Hewlett Packard’s Vice-President for Worldwide Education, Gus Schmedien, was speaking at the BETT education technology show, to ask ‘What about the Palestinian Children You’re Helping Kill?’ They had set up a highly educational display close to the entrance and also gave some speeches and handed out fliers.

HP supply equipment and services which keep both the Israeli prison system and the Israeli military running and so support the killing, torture and other illegal activities of the Israeli regime.

Many of the teachers and others going into BETT stopped to take leaflets and talk with the protesters, some taking photographs of themselves or colleagues in front of the protest.

More pictures at Stop Arming Israel picket HP at BETT‘

City Island – Lower Lea Crossing

Building work both on the former Pura Foods site on Bow Creek, now renamed City Island and on the Limmo Peninsula site on the eastern bank of Bow Creek was now going ahead.

City Island isn’t an island but in the downstream loop of the s-shaped bend of Bow Creek south of the East India Dock Road and is surrounded on three sides by the tidal river.

Building on City Island was abandoned after the site had been cleared and a single building erected when the financial crisis hit in 2008 and it was now shooting up fast. The elevated Lower Lea Crossing

More pictures City Island – Lower Lea Crossing

Class War visit ‘Rich London’ – The Ritz and Old Bond St

*Ritz security were very polite to Class War and watched the protest outside the hotel*

I met with a small group from Class War outside the Ritz where they were holding their banner with its quotation from US Anarchist Lucy Parsons (1851-1942), “We must devastate the avenues where the wealthy live“.

From there they took the banner to stand in front of some shops on Piccadilly and then onto Old Bond Street, pausing outside De Beers and then into the Royal Arcade.

It seemed a fairly aimless wander, Stan took a seat with Churchill (who is wearing a Class War ‘Spot the Tory’ sticker.)

I left them holding up the banner outside Sothebys to go to Bond St and make my way to West Hendon.

More pictures. Class War visit ‘Rich London’.

West Hendon march for Social Housing – Hendon

Residents on the West Hendon estate overlooking the Welsh Harp reservoir were fighting the the redevelopment of their estate for sale to the rich. Its waterside location makes it a very desirable location for developers and estate agents.

The residents were campaigning for all who live on the estate to be rehoused in the area and I arrived at the end of a meeting in the community centre with speakers from other housing campaigns including Focus E15 from Stratford.

I took pictures of them posing outside the community centre then went inside where free hot soup was very welcome before we went outside for a march around the estate. A banner was dropped from one of the balconies with the message ‘Public Housing Not Private Profit’.

Part of the area to be built on was York Memorial Park, a green open common designated as “a War Memorial in perpetuity” to the 75 people killed and 145 severely injured by a bomb dropped here on 13th February 1941. Over 366 houses were destroyed and a further 400 damaged by the blast, with 1500 people made homeless.

You can read more about this on ‘Broken Barnet‘ which relates how the promises that this would be preserved “were quietly buried by Barnet Tories, once they had made a deal, in secret, with Barratt London” and that at the Housing Inquiry they even denied the existence of the park – where there is now a 29 storey tower block of luxury flats.

We stopped here for a short memorial service to a Hendon war hero, Dorothy Lawrence, the only female Sapper of WW1, serving in the Royal Engineers, 51st Division 179th Tunnelling Company, BEF. You can read more about her and her unfortunate life after this in my post from 2015.

Then we marched for a mile or so in the dark to Hendon Town hall where the third day of the Housing Inquiry had just finished ned for a rally with a number of speeches from people from West Hendon and other campaigners, including Jasmine Stone from Focus E15. Some who spoke had been at the enquiry and were able to tell the crowd what had happened so far. But I was too tired to stay to the end of the rally.

More at West Hendon march for Social Housing.

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Grants Not Debt – 2016

Grants Not Debt Protest Blocks Bridge: The previous week a parliamentary committee had scrapped the means-tested maintenance grants for for students and on Tuesday 19th January 2016 the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC) organised a rally and protest to support that day’s Labour party debate against the action and the government’s flagrant denial of democratic process.

Student maintenance grants to cover living costs were brought in in 1962, nicely in time for me to go to university the following year. Before that students from poorer homes had been reliant on awards by their counties, some more generous than others. UK students then paid no fees for their courses, and though New Labour abolished the grants in 1999 they brought them back in 2006 when they brought in higher course fees.

In his 2015 budget, Tory Chancellor George Osborne had announced the intention to abolish grants and replace them with increased maintenance loans.

Grants Not Debt Clive Lewis — *Clive Lewis* MP

But the change was only actually brought in by a committee vote under the Education (Student Support) (Amendment) Regulations 2015. The Third Delegated Legislation Committee approved the changes for students beginning their courses in the 2016/17 academic year on Thursday 14 January 2016 by ten votes to eight.

The amount of money students would be eligible to receive would not be changed (it would actually increase by inflation) but it would very nearly double the amount of debt for students from the poorest homes who had qualified for the full grant who would now end a three year course owing around £35,000 extra. Of course these amounts have greatly increased since 2016.

Students living in London – as many of those at this protest were – would in 2025/6 be eligible for a maintenance loan of £13,762 in their first year – and a total well over £40,000 for their 3 year course. With the cost of tuition fees this would bring their total student loan up to around £70,000.

The rally began in Parliament Square and there were a number of speeches including from Labour Shadow Minister in Department of Energy and Climate Change Clive Lewis MP and Shelly Asquith the NUS Vice President (Welfare).

At the end of her speech the students decided it was time to take some action and began to march past the Houses of Parliament onto Westminster Bridge. Some had brought a banner ‘NO GRANTS = NO BRIDGE’.

On the bridge many of them sat down while others remained standing with their banners and traffic was blocked. A police officer tried to persuade Shelly Asquith to get the protesters to move but she ignored him and the protest continued.

Eventually the police managed to clear the north-bound carriage way but the protest continued to block traffic going south.

After an hour or so the protest appeared to be dying down, with some students leaving and although the protest was still continuing I decided to go too.

Many more pictures on My London Diary.

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Heathrow, Gaza & the Tamils – 2009

Heathrow, Gaza & the Tamils: On Saturday 17th January 2009 I took a bus to Heathrow for a flash mob against a third runway, then the tube into Westminster for a protest against Israeli attacks on Gaza in Trafalgar Square which ended with a march to protest at Downing Street, where Tamils were protesting against the genocide taking place in Sri Lanka.

No Third Runway Decision Day Flashmob – Terminal 5, Heathrow Airport

Earlier in the week the Labour government under Gordon Brown had announced they were to press ahead with airport expansion and build a third runway at Heathrow despite the environmental consequences. Several hundred people turned up at Terminal 5 for a ‘flashmob’ protest at 12 noon.

“Attracting most press attention were four brave young ladies who had saved the ten quid for a red ‘STOP AIRPORT EXPANSION’ t-shirt and instead opted for red body paint with a black message across their midriffs, ‘Simply No Slaughter‘ and a pair of strategically placed gold sticking plasters proclaiming ‘art‘ and ‘port‘ (port was indeed on the left.)”

Many local residents were there, some with their children, along with John Stewart of HACAN (Heathrow Association for the Control of Aircraft Noise) the organisers of the event, and local MP John McDonnell who was being congratulated for his seizing the mace in the House of Commons when the announcement was made.

The demonstrators chanted, thrown red balloons in the air, red tennis balls at an ‘Aunt Sally’ of Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon and conga’ed around the area while a large squad of photographers photographed and videoed.

The campaigners were surrounded in a loose ring by police and airport security who made no attempt to stop them, though police had made some searches before the event began. Some of them were clearly amused by the event as were a few passengers making their way through the departure area.

*John Stewart of HACAN thanks everyone for coming*

After almost three-quarters of an hour of protest John Stewart thanked everyone for coming and repeated the determination of all those involved to keep up the fight to ensure that, despite the decision, the runway will never be built. So far it has been prevented, though it seems likely that despite the increasingly obvious and critical environmental crisis our current Labour government will resurrect this enviornmental catastrophe, though it remains doubtful if the private finance required can be found.

And there was a cheer for John McDonnell’s action in Parliament and a final chance to pelt the Transport Secretary before we all left for buses or tube.

Many more pictures at No Third Runway Decision Day Flashmob.

1000 Dead and Nothing Said – End the Slaughter of Gaza – Trafalgar Square

*A man burns an Israeli flag in at the rally in Trafalgar Square*

I was a little late arriving at the rally in Trafalgar Square but got there just in time to hear Tony Benn being announced and getting a huge greeting. As I commented he was “One of the greatest political figures of the last 50 years, [and} it’s a national tragedy that while he has so often been right on major issues, governments have seldom if ever followed his lead.”

*An 11 year old Palestinian girl, now living in Manchester speaks*

The square was fairly full with perhaps 5-10,000 protesters though there had been a much larger national protest in London a week earlier against the attacks on Gaza in previous weeks that had killed over a thousand Palestinians including more than 300 children.

*Palestinian singer Reem Kelani spoke before singing a traditional song*

After some more speeches a group of children all dressed in white robes marked with bloody red handprints who had been standing on the plinth came down and went with a deputation to take a letter from the rally to Downing St, calling for an immediate ceasefire and reparations for the war damage inflicted by the Israeli attacks.

I went with them down Whitehall to Downing St, where police led them into a pen close to the gates.

While Diane Abbott, MP, PSC General Secretary Betty Hunter and Lindsay German of Stop the War with others took the letter into Downing St, the children posed for pictures, at first while standing and then lying on the ground as if the innocent victims of an Israeli attack.

But unlike those 300 childen in Gaza, these children were just playing dead.

A few hours after this protest Israel announced a ceasefire on its own terms. The end of the killing was welcome, but there was no justice for Palestine.

Much more and many more pictures at Gaza: 1000 Dead and Nothing Said.

Tamils protest Sri Lankan Genocide – Downing St

Several hundred Tamils were densely packed into a pen opposite opposite Downing Street to draw attention to the continuing attacks on Tamil civilians, schools, hospitals and churches by the Sri Lankan Army and Air Force and to call for an independent Tamil state, Tamil Eelam, in Sri Lanka.

Tamils accuse the Sri Lankan government of genocide, and claim that in the past month alone over 300,000 Tamils have been forced to move out of their homes by the bombardment.

The decades long civil war which ended in May 2009 with the defeat of the Tamil Tigers had attracted relatively little attention in the mainstream media, but the assasination of leading Sri Lankan opposition newspaper editor Lasantha Wickramatunga on his way to work a week earlier and the publication of the obituary he had written for himself, And then they came for me, was the subject of a two page article in The Guardian on the day of this protest.

Tamils protest Sri Lankan Genocide

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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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Palestine & Syria – 2018

Palestine & Syria: On Saturday 13th January 2018 I photographed a protest at the London US Embassy in Grosvenor Square against the continuing imprisonment of children in Palestine and another opposite the Russian Consulate over their continuing support for the Assad regime in Syria including the bombing of civilians.

Free Ahed Tamimi & All Child Prisoners

Teenager Ahed Tamimi was in prison in Israel for slapping an Israeli soldier who came into her family’s garden shortly after she had learnt that a relative had been shot by Israeli forces.

Her detention made the news and prompted this protest, but she was only one of the thousands of Palestinian children have been detained by Israel since 2000 in a systematic policy which the UN has said includes abuse and ill-treatment. Many Palestinian children have been kept for many days in solitary confinement in small underground cells in Israeli jails.

Israel is an apartheid state, with very different laws and police treatment for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank who are subject to Israeli military law and dealt with in military courts which offer little or no chance of justice. Many are held without any real trials in ‘administrative detention‘ which can be essentially indefinite, with prisoners being released at the end of one sentence and immediately re-arrested for another period of detention.

A number of those taking part were relatives or friends of Tamimi’s family, including her father’s cousin Nana Hourriyah, or of other prisoners in Israeli jails. One man who spoke had recently spent 3 months in Palestine and had stayed with the family of another child prisoner. He had then been deported for taking part in a peaceful protest.

During the hour I stayed at the protest a single Zionist protester in a pen at the end of the street waved an Israeli flag, shouting insults at the protesters and accusing them of supporting Hamas, which they firmly denied.

More at Free Ahed Tamimi.

Stop the Massacres in Syria

Protesters lined the street opposite the Russian Consulate calling for an end to the massacres taking place in Syria. Protests are not allowed in the private road a few yards away outside the Embassy.

Russia and Assad’s forces were bombing civilians in Idlib, Hama and Eastern Ghouta, specifically targeting medical workers and facilities, with 8 hospitals in Idlib bombed since the start of December.

Many of those still living in Idlib had fled there from other towns and cities previously bombed by Assad and his Russian allies who were attempting to complete the destruction of all groups opposed to the Assad regime and bomb or starve to death the civilian population in areas held by opposition forces.

Only now after the fall of the Assad regime has the full scale of their human rights abuses become widely known with over 150,000 people thought to have been tortured and killed in his infamous prisons. As many as 620,000 were killed in the 14 years of civil war – around 1 in 35 of its prewar population, with around half these being civilians.

More than 14 million – almost two thirds of the Syrian population – were forced to leave their homes in the civil war. Half remained elsewhere in Syria, around 5.5 million in surrounding countries. Around a fifth of the countries pre-war population made their way to Europe, with the majority of these going to Germany. The UK set up a scheme to take Syrians but the numbers here remain relatively small at around 40,000.

Stop the Massacres in Syria

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Guantanamo Day – 11th January

Guantanamo Day – 11th January: Today is the 23rd anniversary of the setting up by U.S. President George W. Bush of the illegal prison camp at Guantanamo Bay inside the US Naval base on Cuba.

Bush had issued a military order in November 2001 “for the indefinite detention of foreign nationals without charge and preventing them from legally challenging their detention” and to their shame the US Department of Justice claimed that the principle of ‘habeas corpus‘ did not apply to the camp as it was not on US territory.

At first a temporary camp called ‘Camp X-Ray’ was set up at Guantanamo and the first twenty detainees arrived there on 11 January 2002. Later they were moved to a more permanent Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

The US administration argued that the site was not US territory as it was only held under a lease from Cuba last updated in 1934 “under which Cuba retains ultimate sovereignty but the U.S. exercises sole jurisdiction.” Cuba since the 1959 revolution has argued that the US presence there is illegal and has called repeatedly for them to leave and return the territory to Cuba.

The USA also argued that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to ‘unlawful enemy combatants’, and went ahead holding prisoners there in cruel, inhumane and degrading conditions and torturing them. The Wikipedia article gives some details of the condemnations by the Red Cross and human rights organisations as well as the testimonies of released prisoners.

There was little if any evidence against great majority of the at least 780 men who were held in Guantanamo and most were finally released without charge, although today 15 detainees remain at Guantanamo Bay. Nine died while being held there. Only 16 detainees have ever been charged by the U.S. with criminal offences. Most were just foreigners who were in Afghanistan for various reasons and were captured and sold to the US forces by bounty hunters.

The last detainee with a British connection to be released was Shaker Aamer, born in Saudi Arabia but with British Resident status and a wife and family in Battersea, London who had gone to Afghanistan as a charity worker. He was captured by bandits and sold to the US in December 2001 and transferred to Guantanamo on 14 February 2002 after having been interrogated and tortured in the prison at the US Bagram air base. He was eventually released in October 2015 having been held for over thirteen years.

Some large protests against Guantanamo took place in London over the years, as well as smaller regular vigils at the US Embassy and in front of Parliament. I photographed many of these over the years, putting accounts and pictures on My London Diary as well as sending them to agencies. The pictures here come from my post about a small protest by active campaigners against the camp at the US Embassy on Monday 11th January 2010, Guantanamo Bay – 8 Shameful Years.

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Uganda Anti-gay Law & Guantanamo – 2014

Uganda Anti-gay Law & Guantanamo: Wednesday 8th January 2014 I photographed two protests in central London, the first in front of Uganda House in Trafalgar Square against the Anti-Homosexuality Act which had been passed by the Ugandan parliament but was awaiting signature by the President, and the second in Parliament Square calling for the closure of the illegal Guantanamo torture camp and the release of UK Resident Shaker Aamer.

Against Uganda’s Anti-Gay Law – Uganda House

A crowd filled the pavement outside Uganda House on Trafalgar Square in a protest organised by the African LGBTI Out & Proud Diamond Group and Peter Tatchell Foundation and supported by other groups including Queer Strike, Movement for Justice, Lesbian Gay Christians, Rainbows Across Borders, the RMT, Nigerian LGBTIs and Women of Colour.

They called on President Museveni not to sign the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, (often referred to as the ‘Kill the Gays’ Bill.) Originally the Bill had called for the death penalty for what it described as “aggravated homosexuality”, but this was reduced to life imprisonment when it was passed by an inquorate Ugandan Parliament in December despite not being on the day’s order of business.

Museveni eventually signed and the Act became law on 24th February 2014. The bill, under consideration by the Ugandan parliament since 2009 had provoked a huge amount of international condemnation and in June 2014 the US announced various sanctions against Uganda.

This Act was annulled by Uganda’s Constitutional Court in August 2014 as it had been passed without the necessary parliamentary quorum.

But in 2023, the Ugandan Parliament passed a new Anti-Homosexuality Act. Museveni passed it back to them for reconsideration when it was passed with minor amendments by a vote of 348 to 1 and he then signed it into law. It provided life imprisonment for homosexual acts and the death penalty for acts involving various groups of vulnerable people including those under 18 or over 75, disabled or mentally ill and repeat offenders or acts which transmit serious infectious diseases.

In 2024, the Constitutional Court upheld the 2023 Anti-Homosexuality Act, making a few minor changes, asserting “In defiance of international law, the judges ruled that the act does not violate fundamental rights to equality and nondiscrimination, privacy, freedom of expression, or the right to work for LGBT people.”

More about the 2014 protest at Against Uganda’s Anti-Gay Law.

Free Shaker Aamer Vigil – Parliament Square

The Save Shaker Aamer campaign mounted its first vigil in 2014 opposite Parliament calling for the Londoner’s urgent release. Held there without charge of trial since Feb 14, 2002 he was first cleared for release in 2007.

A dozen protesters in orange Guantanamo-style jump suits and black hoods lined the pavement opposite Parliament with posters and banners, occasionally walking slowly up and down to remind MPs of the need to press the US for his release. Although there has never been any evidence against him, his release and evidence of his continuing torture and the complicity in this of the British security service MI6 would greatly embarrass both the UK and US

You can read more about his case in my account on My London Diary. Eventually after years of public pressure and protests such as this he was finally released to the UK on 30 October 2015.

Free Shaker Aamer Vigil

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Tigers, Class War at Harrods – 2017

Tigers, Class War at Harrods: On Saturday 7th January 2017 I photographed a rally in Altab Ali Park in Whitechapel against a planned coal-fired power plant and other threats to the world’s largest mangrove forest, then went to Harrods where the United Voices of the World were protesting with the help of Class War calling for better wages and conditions for waiters and for them to get all of the tips given by customers.

Save the Sunderbans Global Protest – Altab Ali Park

Tigers, Class War at Harrods - 2017 — *Many of the protesters had black ‘tiger stripes’ on their faces – the Sunderbans are the home of the Bengal tiger*

This protest in East London organised by the UK branch of the National Committee to Protect Oil Gas & Mineral Resources, Bangladesh was a part of a global day of protest to save the Sunderbans, the world’s largest mangrove forest.

The Sunderbans, a UNESCO World Heritage site threatened by the planned Rampal coal-fired power plant and other commercial developments are the home of many species including the Bengal Tiger, and many at the protest had ‘tiger stripes’ on their cheeks.

The power plant is a joint project of the Bangladesh and Indian governments and would endanger the livelihoods of over 3.5 million people and make around 50 million more vulnerable to storms and cyclones, against which the Sunderbans serve as a natural safeguard. Coal would be brought up from India on one of the rivers through the forest and there would be industrial development on areas around it where this is currently banned.

Huge protests against it in Bangladesh have resulted in a number of protesters being killed, but the protest in London was entirely peaceful and ignored by the authorities.

Save the Sunderbans Global Protest

Harrods stop stealing waiters’ tips – Harrods, Knightsbridge

Grass roots trade union United Voices of the World which represents chefs and waiters working at Harrods protested outside together with Class War calling for 100% of the service charges to go to staff rather than the vast profits of the owners, the Qatari royal family, who were denying staff of around £2.5 million per year.

*Class War came to Harrods to support the UVW union*

A month earlier I had been there when UVW General Secretary Petros Elia had talked with Class War celebrating Christmas in a pub in Wapping about what was happening at Harrods. The company was keeping between 50-75% of all tips for itself and the UVW were going there to protest against this on January 7th. Class War were keen to come and lend their support.

The protest was robust but essentially peaceful, and was heavily policed with the protesters being warned they would be charged with aggravated trespass if they entered the store. A few individuals had gone inside earlier and had left fliers about the low wages and lousy conditions of the chefs and waiters for shoppers to find but their activities had not been noticed but the protest took place on the pavement and street outside.

*Class War hold up a banner in front of the doors to stop police filming from inside*

There were a few arrests during the protest for trivial offences – including one for letting off a smoke flare, but after the protest ended and I had left, police arrested four of the organisers – including Petros Elia – as they were packing up and held them for up to 18 hours before they were released on police bail.

No charges were ever brought, though one person who let off a firework unwisely accepted a police caution. The police action in making the arrests appeared to be a deliberate abuse of the law to both apply a short period of arbitrary detention and to impose bail conditions that they were not to go within 50m of Harrods to protect the company from further legitimate protests.

Harrods and their owners, the Qatari royal family, have many friends in high places including the Foreign Office and presumably these were able to put pressure on the police to take action against the protesters.

The campaign – and the protest – received tremendous support from the public and even from some of the right-wing press (perhaps because Harrods is owned by foreigners) and Harrods quickly announced that 100% of tips would be shared under an accountable system. You can read more and watch a five minute video of the protest on the UVW web site.

And of course see many more of my pictures and captions at Harrods stop stealing waiters’ tips.

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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.