Posts Tagged ‘Fitzroy Square’

Democracy, Mansion Tax & Justice – 2014

Wednesday, November 22nd, 2023

Democracy, Mansion Tax & Justice – on Saturday 22nd November 2014 I photographed protests about democracy and justice in the UK, the brutal persecution of Christians in Pakistan and Class War protesting outside the homes of millionaire objectors to a proposed mansion tax. My day’s work ended in Brixton with an annual march remembering young men killed in Brixton Police Station.


Occupy Democracy at Supreme Court – Parliament Square

Democracy, Mansion Tax & Justice - 2014

Activists from Occupy Democracy had spent the night on the wide pavement in front of the Supreme Court on the west side of Parliament Square and were getting ready to hold two days of workshops there.

Democracy, Mansion Tax & Justice - 2014

The Supreme Court is housed in the ornamented former Middlesex Guildhall facing the Houses of Parliament across the square and does not sit at weekends, perhaps why the police had not tried hard to remove the protesters.

Democracy, Mansion Tax & Justice - 2014

Parliament Square itself was still fenced off and guarded, with police fearing that Occupy protesters might come and set up up a tented camp there. One of the banners the protesters had brought read ‘WE ARE THE GHOST OF BRIAN HAW’, the peace protester who had defied legal and illegal attempts to remove him from his camp facing Parliament for many years.

Democracy, Mansion Tax & Justice - 2014

A small group of protesters was sheltering from the rain in the doorway of the Supreme Court and I went to say ‘Hello’ and take a few pictures.

Others were holding posters and banners and waiting for others to come an join them for the workshops. I couldn’t stay but hoped to come back later, but ran out of time to do so.

Occupy Democracy at Supreme Court


Justice for Shahzad & Shama – Downing St

Shahzad Masih and Shama Bibi were Pakistani Christians who had been trapped into bond labour at a brick kiln in a Muslim village 35 miles south-west of Lahore. Shahad was involved in a dispute with the kiln owner and landlord as he wanted to pay off his debts and leave and the landlord’s accountant is alleged to have raped Shama.

Shama had cleared out and burnt some items belonging to her father after his death on 30th October 2014. These included some black magic amulets and written charms. The ashes were seen by a Muslim worker and he accused her of burning the Koran.

A large mob came from surrounding villages and attacked the couple, stripped them and tied them to a tractor, beating them as they were taken to the kiln, where petrol was poured over their bodies; accounts differ as to whether both were still alive when they were then thrown into the furnace while there six year old child watched. Armed police stood by but refused to interfere in their murders.

The police and authorities appear to have tried to cover up the case and buried the remains of the bodies in secret to avoid their families arranging a funeral. But the news leaked out and the federal government had appointed a minister to co-ordinate the case. At Downing Street there were prayers and speeches calling for justice including from an Elim Pentecostal minister and singer Si Genaro.

Justice for Shahzad & Shama


Class War Griff Rhys Jones Mansion Tax – Fitzroy Square

Earlier in the month, Class War had announced they would stand a number of candidates in the forthcoming 2015 General Election and had put together a manifesto largely as they walked the short distance from the pub to a Poor Doors protest.

Marina Pepper rang the bell at Griff Rhys Jones’ house

Class War did not expect to win any seats – or even save their deposits, but “to launch a furious and coordinated political offensive against the ruling class with the opportunity an election gives us to talk politics to our class.” And they intended to “make ourselves central to the campaign in a funny, rumbustious combative and imaginative way.”

One of the key pledges in their manifesto was for a 50% mansion tax, and it was also a policy on a rather less punitive scale for the then Labour party (no longer in existence.) And several well-known and filthy rich people had voiced their objections including Griff Rhys Jones who said he would leave the country if Labour levied a mansion tax.

On Saturday 22nd November a small group from Class War, including two of their election candidates Marina Pepper went to protest at the £7 million home of Griff Rhys Jones in Fitzroy Square, telling him to “f**k off now“, offering to pay the fare.

Class War rang on the bell though nobody came to answer it, although there were signs of movement inside. They put hazard tape around the area outside the house before going for a walk around the square, pausing for another brief protest outside the home of Guy Ritchie, another millionaire objector to a mansion tax.

Continuing around the square, next to the house where both George Bernard Shaw and later Virginia Woolf both lived, they came across the Magistrates Association – who got another sticker, as did the locked gates into the private garden in the centre of the square.

Having gone around the square they arrived back outside Griff Rhys Jones’s house where they stopped for a group photograph and a few more minutes of protest before leaving for a nearby pub. I would have liked to join them but had to rush to another event.

Class War Griff Rhys Jones Mansion Tax


Still No Justice for Ricky Bishop – Brixton

Ricky Bishop, a fit young black man, died from unexplained injuries hours after being taken to Brixton Police Station on 22 Nov 2001. Family and supporters call it a modern day lynching and march annually to remember him and call for justice.

Ricky Bishop was a fit young black man when taken into Brixton Police Station on 22 Nov 2001, but hours later he died from unexplained injuries. His family and supporters call his death a modern day lynching and march annually to remember him and call for justice.

People met in Windrush Square and marched slowly to the police station, calling out the names of the officers they accuse of murdering him, to hold a memorial event around the tree outside which has been adopted as a remembrance tree for Ricky Bishop and the others killed there by police.

Among the speakers was Marcia Rigg who spoke forcefully of the long battle to get any proper investigation into the death in he police station of her brother Sean Rigg in August 2008. While she was speaking there were shouts from officers inside the police station accusing her and the family of lying about the police.

I felt shocked and disgusted that police still feel the killing people as they did Sean Rigg is defensible and go to great lengths to prevent proper investigation, giving police almost total immunity from the consequences of their actions.

Although many of the over 3,000 custody deaths between 1969 and 2011 may not have been the result of deliberate actions or failures, there has not been a single officer successfully prosecuted, despite considerable evidence of wrongdoing. Instead we have seen repeated instances of failures to properly investigate and interview officers, collusion to give false statements, unnecessary holding up of cases, disallowing of evidence, misleading of juries and other means, including failures of both the Crown Prosecution Service and the so-called Independent Police Complaints Commission.

Many more pictures of the march and memorial on My London Diary at Still No Justice for Ricky Bishop.


7 Years Ago in London

Monday, November 22nd, 2021

Seven years ago on Saturday 22 November 2014 I photographed four very different events.

Occupy Democracy at Supreme Court

Occupy Democracy activists had camped out overnight in front of the Supreme Court, watched by police who had fenced in almost all of the grassed areas in Parliament Square to prevent them being occupied. The activists were hoping to hold two days of workshops there, but things had not started when I left after taking pictures.

Justice for Shahzad & Shama

Pakistani Christians and others were protesting opposite Downing St calling for justice for the brutal murder in Pakistan of Shahzad Masih and Shahzad Masih , bonded labourers at a brick kiln, who were falsely accused of burning pages of the Quran, attacked by a Muslim mob, tortured and burnt alive.

There are around 4 million Christians in Pakistan, a little under 2% of the population and they face extreme persecution, with those who have converted from Islam at greatest danger. Christians are treated as second-class citizens, discriminated against in employment, where they largely do the lowest status jobs, and girls are at risk of abduction and rape, sometimes being forced to convert to Islam and marry their attackers. Christians are often accused of blasphemy, as in this case to settle civil disputes, with those accused being attacked or killed by Islamic extremist groups, whose criminal acts are largely ignored by the authorities.

Class War Griff Rhys Jones Mansion Tax

Class War went to the £7m Fitzroy Square home of Griff Rhys Jones who said he would leave the country if Labour levied a mansion tax, telling him to “f**k off now”, offering to pay the fare. Class War’s manifesto for the 2015 general election includes a 50% mansion tax.

No one came to answer the door when they put their leaflet through and after a few minutes making their presence felt outside, the walked around to the south side of the square to protest outside the outside the home of Guy Ritchie, another millionaire objector to a mansion tax. They put a few stickers on other places around the square, including the Magistrates Association and the gates to the private garden in the centre of the square, returned for another short protest outside Griff Rhys Jones’s house before retiring to the pub. Unfortunately I couldn’t join them as I had another event to photograph in Brixton.

Still No Justice for Ricky Bishop

Ricky Bishop, a fit young black man, died from unexplained injuries hours after being taken to Brixton Police Station on 22 Nov 2001. Family and supporters call it a modern day lynching and march annually to remember him and call for justice.

The marchers met up at Windrush Square and then marched slowly through the centre of Brixton to the police station, where a tree outside has been adopted as a remembrance tree for Ricky Bishop and the others killed there by police.

At the tree there were speeches, including a detailed and forceful presentation by Marcia Rigg of the battle she and others faced to get any proper investigation into the death there of her brother Sean Rigg in August 2008.

These two are not the only young black men to have died at the hands of Brixton police, but so far there has been no police officer bought to justice from the crimes they committed. The only real action by the police has been to remove all of the photographs and momentos placed by some of the families from the tree in front of the police station.


More on all of these on My London Diary:

Still No Justice for Ricky Bishop
Class War Griff Rhys Jones Mansion Tax
Justice for Shahzad & Shama
Occupy Democracy at Supreme Court


1987 Fitzrovia and around

Tuesday, August 4th, 2020
Fitzroy Square, Fitzrovia, Camden, 1987 87-2q-24-positive_2400
Fitzroy Square, Fitzrovia, Camden, 1987

I think I had an appointment to see a man who worked for a well-known architect’s firm with plush offices in Fitzroy Square. It was such a different atmosphere from my own workplace, at the time in a sixth-form college. I was offered coffee and a secretary brought it, filter coffee in a cup with a saucer on a tray with biscuits, cream and tinted sugar crystals. When I had visitors at work they got instant served by me from a kettle in the corner of a dingy shared office and if they wanted milk it was powdered granules. Sugar would come in a screwed up bag and if they were lucky I’d find a spoon to stir it, otherwise they might be offered a cleanish spatula or even a pencil. We had a BBC computer with a small green screen in one corner, there I walked past more computers, large graphics tablets and oversize screens than I’ve ever seen in the same building before. It was the first time I’d really seen how things were where the real money was.

The coffee was good, the talk interesting, but I don’t think I sold any of my photographs.

Fish Stall, Goodge Place, Fitzrovia, Westminster, 1987 87-2r-65-positive_2400
Fish Stall, Goodge Place, Fitzrovia, Westminster, 1987

It was only a fairly short meeting, and I had time to walk around the area before and after – and to cut my costs I’d got a train to Charing Cross and walked from there rather than use the Underground. So there are some pictures from Covent Garden and St Giles as well as Fitzrovia.

There are still stalls in Goodge Place, but not I think any dealing in basic foods such as fish, but all selling fast food for lunches for those who work in the area.

H Wolfin, Textiles, Great Titchfield St, Fitzrovia, Westminster, 1987 87-2r-46-positive_2400
H Wolfin, Textiles, Great Titchfield St, Fitzrovia, Westminster, 1987

This shop is still there, but rather than selling fabrics in large rolls to the trade now sells children’s clothes and baby presents to tourists and others, with delivery around the world. H Wolfin is still in business but elsewhere in Greater London, now was Wolfin Textiles in Hatch End, Pinner, and their web site states:

Originally known as Wolfin and Levy, Wolfin Textiles has been established for over 100 years and began in 1900 as an independent family-owned textiles shop in London’s Old Street. Specialising in fabrics for the theatre, film, interior and fashion industries, Wolfin and Levy moved to London’s West End in 1972, before finally relocating to Greater London in 1999 as Wolfin Textiles. Today we continue to hold onto the family ethos of offering the finest quality fabrics and real customer service. We pride ourselves on being able to offer wholesale prices for everyone, with no minimum order.

https://www.wolfintextiles.co.uk
St Charles Borromeo, Church, Ogle St, Fitzrovia, Westminster, 1987 87-2r-24-positive_2400
St Charles Borromeo, Church, Ogle St, Fitzrovia, Westminster, 1987

St Charles Borromeo in Ogle St is one of London’s stranger church buildings, a small Grade II listed Roman Catholic Church in what is described as a simple but “muscular” Gothic. Charles Borromeo was a 16th century Italian cardinal who took an active role in the counter-Reformation and is best known to Protestants for his ruthless suppression in the Swiss valleys; during a pastoral visit to one of them in 1583 he arrested 150 people including the provost, who, along with 11 women was condemned to be burnt alive for witchcraft.

According to Wikipedia, one biographer described him as “an austere, dedicated, humorless and uncompromising personality” and his uncompromising implementation of reforms “brought him into conflict with secular leaders, priests, and even the Pope.” After his death in 1584 he was rapidly venerated, particularly in Milan where he had been archbishop since 1564, and was made a saint in 1610.

Centre Point, St Giles, Camden, 1987 87-2q-66-positive_2400
Centre Point, St Giles, Camden, 1987

The building of Centre Point, designed by architect Richard Seifert, began in 1963 at the start of ‘Swinging London’ and the building, described as London’s first ‘Pop Art Buildings’ has always been controversial – as was its listing in 1995. Completed in 1966 it was then one of London’s tallest buildings and still dominates the area, its 34 floors reaching to 385 ft (117m).

Centre Point stood empty, apart from a brief occupation by squatters to draw attention to its being deliberately left empty during a housing crisis in London in 1974, for nine years until 1975. In 2015-8 the building was converted to residential use with 82 apartments, their interiors designed by  Conran & Partners. The cheapest was on sale in 2017 for £1,825,000 but the owners apparently denied that these were luxury flats.

More on page 3 of my 1987 London Photos.