Posts Tagged ‘co2’

Armenians, Football, Tweed, TTIP, KFC, BP, NHS – 2015

Friday, April 18th, 2025

Armenians, Football, Tweed, TTIP, KFC, BP, NHS: Ten years ago on Saturday 18th April 2015 London was busy with protests and I rushed around covering seven events, though the last four at Shepherds Bush were all part of the Day of Dissent rally against TTIP, related to the problems which would be caused with a trade deal with the USA – and all threats now relevant to the current talks between our government and the Trump administration.


Centenary of Armenian Genocide

Armenians, Football, Tweed, TTIP, KFC, BP, NHS - 2015
A woman paints an Armenian flag on a man’s cheek

I met hundreds of Armenians close to Hyde Park corner on Piccadilly as they prepared for their annual march in protest against the Armenian Genocide. This year, 2015 marked the centenary of the start of the killing of 1.5m Armenians by Turkey between 1915 and 1923.

Armenians, Football, Tweed, TTIP, KFC, BP, NHS - 2015

Turkey still refuse to accept the mass killings as genocide and the UK has not recognised the Armenian genocide. Armenians demannd that both countries should recognise this historic event and that it should be taught in the national curriculum.

Armenians, Football, Tweed, TTIP, KFC, BP, NHS - 2015

Some carried placards with pictures of Hrant Dink who is described as ‘The 1,500,001st Victim of The Armenian Genocide‘. Editor of the Istanbul Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos, he was prosecuted under Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code which makes it a crime to publicly denigrate the Turkish government, republic or nation. After having received many death threats he was assassinated by a 17 year old Turkish Nationalist in January 2007.

Armenians, Football, Tweed, TTIP, KFC, BP, NHS - 2015

I left the protest shortly before the march began, hoping to see them later at Downing Street but had left Westminster before they arrived.

More pictures: Centenary of Armenian Genocide


Football Action Network Manifesto

I went to Westminster to find the Football Action Network who were taking copies of their manifesto to the Labour, Tory and Lib-Dem offices, and finally caught up with them on the steps of the Lib-Dem offices.

Their demands include a Football Reform Bill, a living wage for all staff, fair ticket prices, safe standing, and reforms to clubs & FA.

Football Action Network Manifesto


Tweed Cycle Ride

I briefly left the football fans as the Tweed Cycle Ride stopped on the road opposite and rushed to take pictures as it went into Parliament Square. The vintage-themed ride, “a jaunty bike ride around London in our sartorial best“, stops for tea and a picnic and ends with “a bit of a jolly knees-up” and raises funds for the London Cycling Campaign.

Tweed Cycle Ride


Stop TTIP Rally – Shepherds Bush

Shepherds Bush was the venue chosen for the Day of Dissent rally against TTIP, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, a proposed trade treaty between the European Union (then still including Britain) and the United States which would have given excessive power to corporations, enabling them to override national laws.

The event began with a rally on Shepherds Bush Green with speakers including Dame Vivienne Westwood, John Hilary of War on Want along with many others.

But much of the time was spent in a number of group discussions and it wasn’t an easy event to make interesting pictures. What was really clear was the threat that the TTIP treaty being negotiated by governments and corporations poses to democracy and all public services, that it would be a threat to public health and the NHS and would prevent changes made to combat climate change.

Campaigners then left to carry out the three separate actions I then photographed.

Stop TTIP rally


KFC protest over TTIP – Shepherds Bush

Protesters in white coats formed a line outside KFC at Shepherds Bush dipping rubber chickens in buckets of chlorine and acid, illustrating that TTIP would force the UK to accept unsafe agricultural and food practices (including GMO crops) allowed in the USA.

Chickens need chlorine washing because of lower farm hygiene standards and US meat contains much higher levels of hormones and other chemicals than here.

KFC protest over TTIP


BP die-in against Climate Change

On the other side of Shepherds Bush Green protesters calling for a fossil fuel free future staged a die-in at BP Shepherds Bush against TTIP, which would force countries to use dirty fuels including coal, tar oil and arctic oil and seriously delay cutting carbon emissions and the move to renewable energy.

After some speeches about the protest the protesters got up from the garage forecourt and walked away.

More at BP die-in against Climate Change.


Westfield ‘Save our NHS’ protest

Protesters walked in to the Westfield Centre to protest outside the Virgin media shop over the danger that TTIP poses to our NHS. Virgin Healthcare, (in 2021 rebranded as HCRG Care Group) had already taken over providing large parts of the simpler services provided by the NHS, replacing the easily run parts of our National Health service, and taking money out of the system.

NHS campaigner Gay Lee introduces the protest and the short piece of street theatre

Campaigners urged that the NHS should be excluded from TTIP, but governments and business insist it should not be. Now in 2025 we are again worried that any US-UK trade agreement made by the Starmer Labour government may open up our health service to much greater privatisation by the giant US health companies.

George Barda offers his garland of dollars to ‘Richard Branson’

Many UK government members have significant financial interests in private healthcare companies, and coulld have expected rich profits if TTIP is agreed as it will force the NHS to contract out its services to them.

A pensioner in a wig acts as a judge

After Trump became president he stopped the TTIP talks so he could pursue a trade war with the EU. One of the few things we can thank him for.

I had been worried that security staff might try to stop photographers working as like most shopping centres, Westfield does not generally allow photography. Police and security watched the protest closely but did not generally try to stop it or photographers working.

The protesters were considering further protests, but I had been on my feet too long and left for home.

More on My London Diary at Westfield ‘Save our NHS’ protest.


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Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March – 2005

Wednesday, February 12th, 2025

Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March: Another post from the past – 20 years ago on Saturday 12th February 2005- which has perhaps added resonance now that Trump and President Musk have condemned humanity to death with their climate roasting rejection of our last chances of survival. Though like some of his multi-billionaire friends he perhaps trusts inhumanity will survive in their climate bunkers with their heavily armed guards to keep out the rest of us. And as a small bonus I’ll add the anti-consumerist Valentines Day Reclaim Love which I photographed later the same day around Eros.

So here again is the text from 2005, suitably recapitalised and slightly corrected, along with a few of the pictures and linked to the rest. And the odd link to add context which people may have now forgotten.


Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March

Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March - 2005
The Statue of Taking Liberties
Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March - 2005

When I talked about the dangers of increasing CO2 emission and the need to cut down use of fossil fuels 35 years ago, I was a crank. Now everyone except the USA oil lobby and their political poodles recognises that climate change is for real.

Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March - 2005
Caroline Lucas, MEP, talking to other marchers
Campaign against Climate Change Kyoto Climate March - 2005

Even Blair has recognised it as the most vital issue facing us, threatening the future of the planet, although actually taking effective action still is a step too far for him. However he did call for a conference to examine the problem, which told him and us that we had perhaps ten years to take action before it would be to late.

4x4s waste fuel and endanger pedestrians and cyclists

Kyoto is history now thanks to the US boycott, (although it comes into effect this week), but it should have been the first inadequate step on the road to action.

Displaying flags of the 141 countries who have adopted Kyoto

Every journey has to start somehow, and even a half-hearted step is better than none, and would have led the way to others. What got in its way was Texan oil interests, whose political face is George W Bush.

I’ve photographed most of the Campaign Against Climate Change’s Kyoto marches over the past few years. This one was probably the largest, and certainly excited more media interest, truly a sign that the issue has become news.

Police stand guard as Lucy Wills berates ExxonMobil for their lies on climate change which drives US policy

Starting in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, the march stopped first outside the UK offices of Exxonmobil, on the corner of Kingsway for a brief declaration,

then for a longer demonstration outside the Australian High Commission in Aldwych (with guest appearances by its PM ‘John Howard‘ and an Australian ‘Grim Reaper’ with cork decorated hat),

Uncle Sam as the Grim Reaper in Trafalgar Square

before making its way past Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus to the Us Embassy.
more pictures


O-I-L One in Love – Reclaim Love, Eros, Piccadilly Circus

I left the climate march in Picadilly and returned to Eros, where O-I-L, One In Love, were organising a small gathering to “reclaim love” and “send love and healing to all the beings in the world” on the eve of Valentine’s day. It’s something we could all do with, and it was good to see people enjoying themselves around the statue of Eros (Anteros for pedants) in what is usually one of the most depressing spots on London’s tourist circuit.

Irish poet Venus CuMara who founded and organised these free street party

There was the samba band again, Rhythms Of Resistance, (hi guys) and dancing and people generally being happy and friendly and free Reclaim Love t shirts and apart from the occasional showers it was harmless fun.

The circle to send love and healing to all the beings in this world

Rather to my surprise, the police either didn’t notice it or decided to ignore it, an unusually sensible strategy

more pictures


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XR Zombie System Collapse Action – 30 Oct 2024

Monday, November 11th, 2024

XR Zombie System Collapse Action: On Wednesday 30th October I returned to Trinity Square Garden to cover the third day and final day of Extinction Rebellion’s actions demanding the insurance industry end their support of new fossil fuel projects – part of a week of world-wide action, including protests the following two days in other UK cities. I’d missed Day 2 where they had marched with a giant potato.

XR had posted: “We Predict a Riot – mass action…..a zombie apocalypse! A wide range of creative actions will highlight what social collapse will look like in the UK as the population begins to panic in the face of repeated floods and food shortages over the next decade.

And we had been promised a “Zombie die-in with flashmob, zombie insurers stumbling around” as well as a “Zombie Mass Dance Discobedience – This is the undead dance for life! – wear business suits with a zombie twist. We are the undead, dancing our way through the halls of power to expose the profiteers of destruction!”

I arrived to find a group of around 20 people practising the Zombie dance in Trinity Square, and a giant bomb of CO2 with protesters in business suits holding red boxes with the words WAR, FAMINE, EXTINCTION and FLOOD and a man reading a special copy of the ‘Daily Fail’.

Eventually the several hundred protesters set off on a march heading to Tower Palce, the home of insurers MarshMcLennan, where there was loud music from the Samba band, a short speech calling on them to end the insuring of new fossil fuel projects, a die-in, a few zombies runnning around and then the Zombie Mass Dance Discobedience.

Reading The Crimes outside insurers MarshMcLennan

Next stop was insurers AIG where a small group went inside the building to deliver a letter, but were soon ushered out.

The march continued around the City, before stopping for a lunch break outside the Howden Group offices on the corner with Bevis Marks.

After lunch the march continued, going back past Lloyds and on to the Sky Garden building in Fenchurch St, home to home to insurers Ascot, Talbot, Chaucer, Markel, Allied World, CNA Hardy, Tokio Marine Kiln, Sirius International and Lancashire Syndicates.

Here a small group had arrived before us to poster the windows with large signs, ‘INSURING FOSSIL FUELS = CLIMATE CHAOS’ and three campaigners were perched on top of the main entrance porch.

I’d been on my feet too long and things seemed to be at an end, so I sloped off for a pint of Brains (it was Halloween) in the Crosse Keys before making my way home. You can read about the protest in a press release from XR, and see more of my pictures here.


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Axe the Draxosaurus – 2016

Saturday, April 20th, 2024

Axe the Draxosaurus – On Wedesday 20th April 2016 environmental activists protested outside the AGM of Drax Plc at Grocer’s Hall next to the Bank of England in the heart of the City of London. Drax power station near Selby in Yorkshire used to be the UK’s biggest coal-fired power station, but since 2012 has become the world’s biggest wood-burning plant, and the company Drax Plc has become the second largest producer of wood pellets in the world

Axe the Draxosaurus

Drax power station now emits more CO2 than any other plant in the UK, and it does so with the aid of a huge subsidy from our UK electricity bills, almost £1 billion in 2021.

Axe the Draxosaurus

It get subsidised by the UK Government as part of the plan to decarbonise electricity generation despite the evidence from scientists around the world that the burning of forest wood for energy increases carbon emissions and is incompatible with the attempt to limit global warming to 1.5°C.

Axe the Draxosaurus

The subsidies that Drax receives increase our electricity bills and should be going to expand truly renewable energy sources such as wind, wave and solar energy. Instead they are paying Drax to pollute and pay out large dividends to their shareholders.

Axe the Draxosaurus

Sourcing the wood to burn at Drax – and for them to sell to other wood-burning plants is also a social and environmental disaster. Much of the wood comes from Drax’s pellet mills using large mmonoculture pine plantations in Southeastern USA, large sterile forest areas with little or no wildlife which have been expanded greatly in area, in part by the total clearance of areas of ancient forest.

Also in the USA, Drax buys pellets from Enviva, the world’s largest pellet producer which has come under criticism for its clearcut felling of US coastal hardwood forests.

Drax has also been criticised by environmentalists for its clear cutting of ancient forests in Canada, and its Portuguese supplier of pellets has been found to have sourced trees from nature reserves. And logging for wood pellets for Drax is also destroying ancient forests in Estonia and Latvia.

The amount of wood burned at Drax is huge – 6.4 million tonnes in 2022 – and will have involved the cutting down of twice that mass of trees. It is more than the entire UK wood production – but only supplies less than one hundredth of our energy needs.

Drax is now attempting to claim further subsidies for its BECCS (Bioenergy With Carbon Capture And Storage) project which seems very unlikely to be able to capture any significant amount of its huge annual CO2 output. It would obviously be far better simply to stop burning wood and turn to truly renewable power sources.

The protest in 2016 was organised by Biofuelwatch on whose web site you can find more a detailed briefing about Drax and why it is vital to end the subsidies for its polluting and environmentally destructive activities.

You can find information on the Axe Drax page about the trial of the #DRAX2 arrested after paint was sprayed on the government department supporting the subisdies to Drax – it begins at Southwark Crown Court on April 22nd 2024. And on August 8-13th 2024 Reclaim the Power is holding a mass protest camp for climate justice “targeting Drax – the biggest emitter in the UK, the world’s biggest burner of trees and a key driver of environmental racism.”

Drax AGM Biomass opposition


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All photographs on this page are copyright © Peter Marshall.
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Climate Emergency Rally & Wave – 2009

Tuesday, December 5th, 2023

Climate Emergency Rally & Wave – Saturday 5th December 2009 was probably the day of possibly the largest protest then in the UK over the impending disaster of climate change. Over a hundred organisations had come together in the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition representing a combined membership of around 11 million “from the Women’s Institute and RSPB to Christian Aid and Unison.”

Climate Emergency Rally & Wave - Saturday 5th December 2009

This is the group which now calls itself less contentiously The Climate Coalition and organises a ‘Great Big Green Week‘ which slipped by last June without me noticing it (and I belong to several of the organisations it includes.) It’s good that a wider group is concerned about climate change, but the action over the ever increasing crisis has passed on to others such as Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil.

Climate Emergency Rally & Wave - Saturday 5th December 2009

The next Great Big Green Week is 8th – 16th June 2024 and it would be good to see some real action, stopping down polluters, mass protests, creating news headlines every day. With now a combined supporter base of 20 million and with sister organisations in Wales, Scotland and Ireland they should be able to achieve a major impact.

Climate Emergency Rally & Wave - Saturday 5th December 2009

The Campaign Against Climate Change had organised an annual Climate match at the time of the UN Climate talks every year since 2005 and although it was good to see a wider participation despite that huge potential and massive publicity the march was perhaps only a little more than five times the size of previous years. And the 2009 event, entitled ‘The Wave’ did seem more a stunt for the media than an informed political event. As I commented, “Surely with the backing of 11 million the coalition should be making demands, not just waving, and it’s perhaps hard to see the significance of blue hands and faces in a demonstration about global warming.” Red would perhaps have been a more appropriate colour choice than the coolest of colours.

Climate Emergency Rally & Wave - Saturday 5th December 2009

Campaign Against Climate Change began the event with a rally at Hyde Park with speakers giving a clear political message, which I summarised in my account on My London Diary:

They stress we really need to take emergency action in the UK now, starting with the declaration of a Climate Emergency. Immediate actions should include a 10% cut in carbon dioxide by the end of 2010, a million new green jobs by the end of 2010, a ban on domestic flights, the scrapping of the roads program and a 55 mph speed limit, and an end to the use of agrofuels.

My London Diary

But the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition had absented themselves from this and met instead in Grosvenor Square, joining with those from the rally to march to surround the Houses of Parliament in ‘The Wave.’ And on a Saturday of course there were not even any MPs there to wave at – and only a few had come to take part in the protest.

More interesting things were happening on the fringes of the main event, and in some of the groups on the march, and I covered as much as I could of this, though I did miss the Climate Camp protesters who took over Trafalgar Square, who I visited briefly a couple of days later.

Rather separate from the main march was an ironic protest by around 50 people dressed as city traders representing the World Association of Carbon Traders.

The City gents including a few ‘gentesses’ and rather more bad false moustaches along with some power-dressed business women marched under the banner ‘Carbon Trading: The Final Solution‘ in a rather nasty yellow, perhaps meant to be gold, though it seemed more mustard to me.

The WACT logo – ‘CO2$’ and placards including ‘Trust Me, I’m a Banker, Capitalise On The Climate’, ‘In Markets We Trust’, ‘One Solution. Trade Pollution’, ‘Greed is Green’, ‘Carbon Trader = Eco Crusader.’ and ‘Cash In On Climate Change’, as well as the ‘Permits to Pollute’ they were handing out made their ironic intention clear, though some tourists on the pavements seemed very confused.

I recognised them despite their disguises as the Space Hijackers whose activities over the years had given a new creative face to protest; here they gave a welcome touch of ironic humour and substance to what was perhaps otherwise a rather bland if colourful event that often seemed more like a PR media stunt than a political demonstration.

Their message was of course a serious one. Carbon trading is at best an irrelevance in environmental terms, allowing ‘business as usual’ and with fat profits for some. But worse, as with all markets, it is a mechanism for allowing the wealthy to increase their domination at the expense of the poor.

Other groups also came with a serious political message, if sometimes also expressed rather rudely. For a short distance the main march was led by a black banner with the message ‘POLARIARIAT! UP YER BUM, COP 15!’ and a picture of a Polar Bear, threatened as arctic ice sheets melt and disintegrate. Stewards from the march soon came and argued with them to leave and after police intervention they moved a long way back in the march joining a few other like-minded groups. The quote from the 1987 film ‘Wish You Were Here‘ clearly didn’t fit the smooth PR presentation of the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition.

Finally it was 3pm and time to wave and I was with protesters in front of Big Ben to register the time.

Some people stayed on and continued to protest in Parliament Square for another hour or so. Among them were Climate Rush whose banners were calling for Equity “EMISSION QUOTAS MUST BE PER CAPITA. THE RICH HAVE NO MORE RIGHT TO POLLUTE THAN THE POOR”. As I commented this is something that the rich – and in particular the USA – don’t accept and which was likely to prevent any real progress in the talks at Copenhagen.

I took a great many pictures over the day, and put rather too many of them on My London Diary, along with rather more accounts than usual, including some things I’ve not mentioned here. The links are roughly in the order of events:
Climate Emergency Bike Ride
Climate Emergency Rally
The Wave – Before the March
Anticapitalist Block
World Association of Carbon Traders
Marching to the Wave
The Wave
COP Out Camp Out


One Billion Rising, Chaplin & MI6

Tuesday, February 14th, 2023

Three sets of photographs I made in London on a wet day nine years ago, Friday 14th February 2014.


One Billion Rising – End Violence Against Women – Trafalgar Square

One Billion Rising, Chaplin & MI6

This was the second worldwide annual ‘One Billion Rising’ with events taking place in 168 countries and women had come to Trafalgar Square to strike, dance and rise in defiance against the injustices suffered by women around the world.

One Billion Rising, Chaplin & MI6

In England and Wales, the Home Office reports that there are an average of 85,000 women raped each year, and 400,000 women sexually assaulted. They report that 1 in 5 women (aged 16 – 59) has experienced some form of sexual violence since the age of 16.

One Billion Rising, Chaplin & MI6

I arrived in time to photograph the start of the event, and stayed to watch a little dancing on the stage. The dancers there were under a canopy but I and much of the audience got rather wet watching. I wasn’t sorry that I had to leave shortly for an appointment at Downing Street.

One Billion Rising, Chaplin & MI6

More at One Billion Rising – End Violence Against Women.


Charlie Chaplin Climate Chaos – Downing St

My Downing Street appointment was not with the Prime Minister David Cameron, but with a rather better known figure, Charlie Chaplin, or rather his look-alike mime and activist Charlie X.

Given the weather he had abandoned the black trousers for waterproof yellow ones, but otherwise the was dressed as usual with his whited out face, small moustache, bowler hat, black bow tie and jacket. Sensibly as well as his walking stick he had brought an umbrella and had some hazard tape to keep his bowler in place in the high winds.

He was there to make a one-person silent protest over the failure of governments including our own to take real measures to combat carbon dioxide emissions which are causing global warming and climate chaos. At the time many of us across the country were suffering from flooding, with my own home having been under severe threat for almost a week – and left without mains drainage we were having to walk several minutes to a friends to wash and use a toilet that could still be flushed.

Charlie X was also there to draw attention to the dangers of fracking in the UK and show solidarity with communities who are fighting against it in their area. His mimed protest called on Cameron to act green not just talk green and stop listening to the highly funded lobbying by the dirty fuel companies.

Charlie Chaplin Climate Chaos


‘Justice Demands the Truth’ Vigil – MI6, Vauxhall

I was pleased to be able to dry out slightly and get just a little warmer on the bus to Vauxhall were I joined the Save Shaker Aamer campaign who where protesting opposite the well-known MI6 offices there on the 12th anniversary of the British resident’s illegal rendition to Guantanamo in February 2002.

On My London Diary I give more details of the case of this Muslim charity worker who was kidnapped by bandits and sold to the US army and tortured before being taken for rurther torture at the prison camp.

MI6 officers were present during some of the torture and his return to this country would be embarrassing for them. They were widely thought to have been secretly briefing against his return and telling lies to Jack Straw, Foreign Secretary from 2001-6 and later Secretary of State for Justice which he apparently or perhaps conveniently believed.

Shaker’s release to the UK would also embarrass the US security agencies responsible for his continuing torture at Guantanamo where he stood up for his rights and those of other prisoners. Although the US security agencies including the CIA, State and Defense Departments cleared him to be released six years ago, they wanted to release him to his native Saudi Arabia, knowing that as a former dissident he would quickly disappear there without trace.

Because of the continuing rain, after posing for photographs and a short vigil in front of the MI6 building the protesters moved a little further away for a rally on the pavement under one of the railway arches before going to try and hand in a Valentine card for the head of MI6, Sir John Sawer, which stated:

MI6, we would love you to … help us bring Shaker Aamer home. Shaker Aamer, unlawfully imprisoned and tortured in Guantanamo for twelve years – he faces no charge or trial- he has been cleared since 2007 to leave Guantanamo. So why is Shaker Aamer still there? Shaker Aamer would love to be at home with his wife and family in the UK. M16, you could help. Tell the truth about torture! MI6 have a heart, don’t block Shaker Aamer’s release to the UK from Guantanamo.”

Security on the gate refused to accept the card, but eventually the protesters simply pushed it through a gap in the gate and left for a final protest opposite the building.

More at ‘Justice Demands the Truth’ Vigil.


Tax Rebellion

Sunday, December 15th, 2019

Travelling around London as I do is often frustrating, with traffic often blocking the streets rather than moving through them. If I had any sense I would have picked up my folding bike, a Brompton, and took it with me to get to this protest at City Hall, the home of the Greater London Authority, more or less next to Tower Bridge.

My journey had started badly, with my train into London arriving around 25 minutes late – impressive for a journey which normally only takes 35 minutes. If I’d brought the bike I could have jumped on it and still got to City Hall on time, and if I’d been thinking more clearly I would have rushed down to the Jubilee line station to take a train to London Bridge, leaving me with just a short walk.

But when I’d planned the journey I’d given myself plenty of time, and the bus had two advantages. First my National bus pass meant it was free, and secondly it took me almost to the doorstep of where I was going so I decided to keep to my plan and take a bus. It was a bad call, and as I waited longer and longer at the stop I wondered whether to give up and go back for the tube, but finally the bus arrived and I got on. The first half mile was fine, but then we hit more traffic.

I ran up the path towards the protest, and saw the die-in starting from a couple of hundred yards away. I hadn’t missed it completely but it would have been rather better to have arrived and been available to photograph the start of the event.

The protest was to declare a tax strike against the Greater London Authority, withholding the GLA element of their council tax until they abandon projects which will cause environmental degradation and hasten ecological collapse. They want a citizen’s assembly to re-write the London Plan to stop all infrastructure projects polluting London’s air and invest in measures to cut carbon emissions and encourage healthier lifestyles

Many of London’s problems were made much worse by the abolition of the GLC by Margaret Thatcher back in 1986, leaving the city without any proper overall authority. The GLC under Ken Livingstone had made a good start in improving public transport in the city, but things more or less came to a halt, only to pick up again when he returned as Mayor with the newly formed GLA in 2000. Rail privatisation in 1994 made matters worse, with so many different companies responsible for overground services in the area – and recent franchisees seem even less competent than their predecessors.

The development of London in most respects also took a setback with the election of Boris Johnson as Mayor, who was able to claim the kudos for Livingstone’s cycle hire scheme, but was generally ineffectual, as well as wasting time and considerable money on a garden bridge that served no purpose and few wanted.

Progress with better cycling facilities has been slow, though much of the blame for this lies with the boroughs rather than the GLA. Some boroughs have been clearly anti-cyclist, and a strong lobby from cab drivers organisations has opposed innovation. Progress has been very piecemeal.

The Green Party has of course been pushing for better cycle facilities and other changes that would make London a healthier place, and both Sian Berry and Caroline Russell spoke. There were also protesters against the Silvertown Tunnel, which will greatly increase traffic on both sides of the river, particularly in Greenwich. This has now been given the go-ahead by Mayor Sadiq Khan who seems to have rather less concern for the environment even than his predecessor.

I don’t know how successful – if at all – the tax boycott has been, but I’ve heard nothing about it since. I think it would take rather more than this single protest, where many of those present will not have been London council tax payers, to get such a boycott going on a scale large enough to have any real effect.

XR London Tax rebellion


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