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Hizb Ut-Tahrir & Grenfell Protests – 2018

Hizb Ut-Tahrir & Grenfell Protests: On Saturday 14th April 2018 I photographed a protest at the Turkish Embassy by the now proscribed group Hizb Ut-Tahrir and later went to Kensington Town Hall where I photographed bikers on a ride for Grenfell and the silent walk 10 months after the tragic fire.

Hizb Ut-Tahrir protest against Turkey

Turkish Embassy, Belgrave Square

Hizb Ut-Tahrir & Grenfell Protests - 2018 — *Men stand at the front of the protest opposite the Turkish embassy*

Hizb Ut-Tahrir Britain had come to protest criticising Turkey for their role in supporting President Assad in regaining control of Syria.

They say Turkey since the end of the Ottoman state in 1922 has been a secular state “whose role is to protect the colonialist’s interests in our lands” with Turkey recognising the Zionist occupation of Palestine in 1949.

They accuse President Erdogan of strengthening Turkish military and economic ties with Israel, “defending and strengthening our enemies who murder us in Syria and Palestine“.

The protest took place on the night in the Islamic calendar when the Prophet made a night journey to al-Aqsa (Jerusalem) and it called on all Muslims to support the Palestinians in their fight “against the illegal occupation, as they are mercilessly killed by the Zionist regime.”

Hizb Ut-Tahrir are a Sunni Muslim group who call for the restoration of the Khilafah Rashidah, the “Rightly Guided” rule of the four caliphs who succeeded the Prophet in a 30 year reign from 632 -661 AD when Muslim armies conquered much of the Middle East.

The organisation was banned in January 2024 after a protest outside the Egyptian Embassy in which they called upon Muslim armies to attack Israel. Previous calls under Tony Blair and David Cameron to ban the organisation had been opposed by the UK government’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation and the Home Office as Hizb Ut-Tahrir did not advocate violence.

Hizb Ut-Tahrir protest against Turkey

Bikers for Grenfell

Kensington Town Hall

Bikers, including Muslim bikers Deen Riders and others took part in a United Ride 4 Grenfell from the Ace Cafe on the North Circular to Parliament and then came to Kensington Town Hall demanding action and justice for the victims of the Grenfell fire.

People gathering from the monthly silent march for Grenfell cheered and applauded them as they rode past and then began their march. Among them were many of the survivors from the fire.

Bikers for Grenfell

Grenfell Silent Walk – 10 Months On

Kensington

*‘Tories have blood on their hands’ but the silent walks seemed to have had little impact*

The Grenfell fire was a tragedy waiting to happen because of decisions made by Kensington and Chelsea Council who had approved the fitting of unsafe cladding to cut costs, had ignored residents complaints about safety in the building, and more. Government too share some of the blame for their cutting ‘red tape’ policies that had hugely compromised safety, including the privatisation of fire inspections.

The contractors they employed to carry out the cladding – and those they had employed had not done the job properly – but the council had failed to oversee their work properly and the reduced safety regulation regime allowed them to get away with improper installaion.

Kensington & Chelsea is a borough of extremes of wealth, and its Tory council is largely run by and for its wealthier residents. Both in the way in which it ran its social housing leading up to the fire and its failure to deal effectively with its aftermath it showed little concern for the poorer in the borough. Ten months after the fire there were still survivors who were not properly rehoused.

And now, almost nine years after the fire on Wednesday 14 June 2017, we have still seen no justice, despite a long and hugely expensive inquiry. As so often the authorities seem to have been more interested in protecting the guilty, kicking things into the long grass. I doubt there will ever be any real justice – if it comes it will be far too little and far too late.

More at Grenfell silent walk – 10 months on.

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End Iraq Invasion – 2003

End Iraq Invasion: Saturday 12 April 2003 saw another protest (there had been one a week earlier) against the invasion of Iraq which had begun on 20th March 2003 with US troops supported by those from the UK, Australia and a few from Poland.

Before the invasion UN weapons inspectors had reported that they had found no evidence of ‘weapons of mass destruction’ in Iraq. But US and British politicians still insisted Iraq had these, but had just hidden them well. We now know that there were none. It was an invasion and war fought on known lies.

Almost certainly both the US and UK authorities at the time of invasion knew that there were no WMDs in Iraq, but the US had been planning and working up to the invasion for several years and were not going to let the facts get in the way of their war. The US had also carried out a long campaign to link Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 attacks although there was no evidence for this and later “assertions of operational links between Iraq and al-Qaeda have largely been discredited by the intelligence community.”

End Iraq Invasion - 2003 Bruce Kent — *Bruce Kent*

The British public were also clear we should not go to war, with the largest protest ever in London in February 2023 demanding we not not invade Iraq. This had followed a unprecedented long campaign across the country with many local groups out on the streets in protest.

There were similar protests in other countries, with the largest of all in Rome where over three million took to the streets – roughly twice as many as in London.

Many of our allies also came out against the invasion – including France, Germany, Canada and New Zealand, but Prime Minister Tony Blair was determined to support the invasion – using misleading claims and lies to persuade MPs to back it – including that infamous ‘dodgy dossier’.

End Iraq Invasion - 2003 Jeremy Corbyn — *Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn*

By April 12th Baghdad and Kirkuk had been captured, and on May 1st President Bush announced the end of “major combat operations’ although the war continued with an insurgency against the occupying forces and the new US-backed Iranian government.

The insurgency continued after the US pulled out of Iraq in 2011, eventually resulting in the rise of ISIS. Various studies and experts conclude that the invasion and occupation resulted in a huge rise in Islamic terrorism and the global Juhadist movement.

In 2004 “UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called the invasion illegal under international law, as a breach of the UN Charter.” It was an event that showed the US’s contempt for a rules-based international order or at least their assertion that the rules did not apply to them, operating under the simpler principle that US might is US right.

All pictures from Saturday 12 April 2003.

Aldermaston2004 – Sunday

Aldermaston2004 – Sunday: I took part in and photographed the 2004 London to Aldermaston march against the next generation of nuclear weapons, though I only marched part of the way. I photographed the rally in Trafalgar Square on Good Friday and marched the short distance to Kensington before leaving.

I had other commitments the following day when the marchers went on from Southall to Slough, but got on my bike on Sunday morning to meet them as they came into Maidenhead on their way to Reading. And on the Monday I marched with them from Reading to Aldermaston. Below are some of the pictures I took on the Sunday, with text from 2004 on My London Diary and links to the pictures from Friday and Monday.

Aldermaston March 2004

Aldermaston2004 - Sunday — *I met the marchers on Sunday morning as they came into Maidenhead*

Aldermaston2004 was jointly organised by CND, the Aldermaston Women’s Peace Campaign and Slough4Peace.

The ‘Stop The Next Generation Of Nuclear Weapons’ march from London to Aldermaston started on Good Friday, 9 April 2004, from Trafalgar Square, where there was a ‘No New Nukes’ rally.

Aldermaston and nearby Burghfield are at the centre of the UK’s atomic weapon programme, and the march was a protest against the development of a new generation of nuclear weapons. In 1958 the dangers of nuclear war were clear to most of us, and almost fifty years of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction among members of the ‘nuclear club’ make them even more of a danger now.

*Bristol Radical Cheerleaders keeping our spirits up*

Since 1958 we have seen another almost 50 years of lies and deception dressed up as security and national interest. For example we still haven’t been told of the nuclear warheads kept by our American allies at Lakenheath.

Aldermaston2004 - Sunday Pat Arrowsmith — *Pat Arrowsmith with vintage CND placard and CND badges, striding along the road in Maidenhead*

Saturday, the march continued from Southall to Slough via Uxbridge. I had other things to do in the East End, but managed to catch up with the march on Sunday morning at Maidenhead Bridge with some furious bike riding.

By then, some problems with Thames Valley Police had emerged, with the police trying to force the march on to the pavement, while some marchers insisted on keeping to the road. In the end a compromise emerged, with the police tolerating those who wanted to stay on the road walking close to the edge of the pavement.

*Sheffield Samba Band plays the march into lunch at Knowl Hill*

From Maidenhead it seemed a long walk to Knowl Hill for a rather late lunch stop. There we were greeted from a distance by the sounds of the Sheffield Samba Band who piped the march in to lunch.

I regretted not bothering to pick up my meal tickets, but was really too busy to stop to eat. I photographed the column of marchers setting off for Reading and then started a more lonely walk back to Maidenhead and my bike.

The pictures in this post are all from my walk with the marchers from Maidenhead to Knowl Hill on Sunday 11th – there are a few more here.

*The march heads off from Knowl Hill with around 9 miles to go to Reading*

More about the 2004 Aldermaston March on My London Diary with many more pictures from both the ‘No Nukes Rally’ and the final day of the march on Monday 12 April:
Friday’s pictures in London
Reading to Aldermaston

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Roma Nation Day – 2005

March Against Racism, London, 9 April 2005

Roma Nation Day – 2005: March Against Racism

On 8th April 1971 the first World Roma Congress met at Chelsfield in southeast London. It called for Roma self-determination and international unity and the delegates unanimously rejected all of the names given to them by outsiders, including Gypsy (or Gipsy), still often used in English, which the community viewed as insulting. Both Rom and Romany have also been in use in English since the 19th Century, but throughout Europe the term Roma is now officially used, though in German-speaking countries the name Sinti is common.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romani_people Linguistic and more recent DNA studies show that Roma originated in northwestern India around 1500 years ago and later migrated to Europe, reaching the Balkans around 900 years ago. They have long been subject to persecution and in some central and east European countries were slaves until the 1840s and 50s.

In 1930s Germany Roma in Germany were stripped of their citizenship and many were interned and there was a programme of compulsory sterilisation. In 1942 the Porajmos or Romani Holocaust began, with Roma being sent to extermination camps. Estimates vary wildly of the number killed in Germany and German occupied territories, between 200,000 and 1,500,000.

Roma still suffer considerable persecution in some countries including Romania, and the end of communist control has led to an increase in prejudice and persecution there and elsewhere. And across all countries including our own there is still widespread denial about the persecution they still face.

8th April, the day of the first congress, was adopted in 1990 as the International Roma Day of Action. Perhaps because of that denial it has not received much attention.

Roma have generally taken on the predominant religions of the countries they have settled in and the London action began with a church service at St Jame’s Piccadilly before marching through central London. I photographed them outside the church and on the march, ending my pictures as they went up Charing Cross Road.

In my account on My London Diary in 2005 I used the term gypsy as this was still almost always used in the media and Roma was not widely understood. Commonly too, Roma are called ‘travellers’ although many Roma are settled and most ‘travellers‘ are not Roma. Here’s what I wrote in 2005:

After a church service commemorating the 500,000 Roma murdered in the Nazi holocaust, Roma from several countries marched across London against the ethnic-cleansing of 30,000 gypsies from their own land and in protest over threatened evictions at Dale Farm, Essex, Smithy Fen, Cambridgeshire, and elsewhere.

After the march, gypsy Richard Sheridan was to announce that he was standing against sitting Tory MP John Baron at Billericay in the general election on 5th May 2005 in order to make the travellers’ voice heard. [He did not actually stand, but did attract some media attention to the cause.]

More pictures start here on My London Diary.

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National Gallery, Trayvon Martin & Dykes – 2012

National Gallery, Trayvon Martin & Dykes: Saturday 31 March 2012 I began outside the National Gallery were the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) were demanding that the gallery stopped hosting events for the arms trade. From there I went to the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square for a protest about the US failure to prosecute the killer of black teenager Trayvon Martin. Finally I went to London’s first Dyke March since the 1980s.

Disarm The National Gallery

Trafalgar Square

Around 20 protesters had come to Trafalgar square as ‘artists’, dressed in blue paint-stained smocks and equipped with moustaches, berets, paint brushes, palettes and easels with large sheets of paper and a smattering of Franglais.

They erected their easels in a line on the North Terrace in front of the National Gallery and painted the letters D, I, S, A, R, M, T, H, E, G, A, L, L, E, R and Y anbefore standing with them in front of the gallery.

There also brought other anti-war artworks to display and handed out postcards for onlookers to sign calling on Nicholas Penny, Director of the National Gallery, to end his support of the arms trade.

The main entrances of the gallery were closed during the protest and a long queue built up at the lower entrance. Many in that line were amazed to find that an art gallery was supporting arms sales. As the postcard says – and people overwhelmingly agreed – Art and arms don’t mix.

The Disarm the Gallery protest was organised by the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) as the during the DSEi arms fair the previous September, weapons manufacturer Finmeccanica had paid the gallery £30,000 to hold events there.

DSEi is the worlds largest arms fair with buyers and sellers from around the world including many corrupt and tyrannical regimes, selling the equipment used by dictators around the world to equip armies and police to keep order and fuelling conflicts which kill thousands if not millions.

Disarm The National Gallery

Protest for Trayvon Martin

US Embassy, Grosvenor Square

*Marcia, sister of Sean Rigg, killed by police in Brixton police station speaks at the US embassy protest*

Black teenager Trayvon Martin was walking back from a local convenience store to the house in Florida where he was staying with this father when he was stopped and then shot dead by George Zimmerman, a self appointed neighbourhood watchman who claimed he had felt threatened by a black teenager wearing a hoodie.

He had gone to the shop to buy a soft drink and some Skittle sweets and many at the protest wore hoodies and carried packets of Skittles and soft drinks.

*Lee Jasper and Zita Holbourne of BARAC*

Florida police backed Zimmerman’s story that he had acted in self-defence and refused to arrest or charge him. Later the pressure from protests like this across America and around the world led to him being brought to trial, but a Florida jury acquitted him.

*People stressed that the killing of Trayvon Martin very much reflects the treatment of black people not just in the USA but elsewhere including the UK*

The embassy protest was was chaired by Merlin Emmanuel, brother of Smiley Culture, killed by police in his own kitchen, and speakers included Marcia, the brother of Sean Rigg, murdered in Brixton Police Station. Other speakers also brought up cases of deaths and discriminaton by police in the UK.

More pictures at Protest for Trayvon Martin.

London Dyke March 2012

Soho Square – South Bank

*Stella and Lucy of DIVA magazine in Soho Square for the London Dyke March*

After a rally in Soho Square over 600 women marched through Soho and Trafalgar Square to the National Theatre.

The march was the first dyke march since the 1980s and set out to support dyke visibility and welcomed “dykes, queers, bisexuals, transwomen, genderqueers and allies” and “all folk who want to support dykes to march with us” in “a grassroots, non-commercial, anti-racist, community-centred, accessible, inclusive event.”

Speakers at the rally “were Kirstean Hearn, the chair of Inclusion London and someone who as a member of Equality 2005 gives disability equality advice to government, Lady Phyll Opoku, co-founder and Managing Director of UK Black Pride, journalist and founding editor of METQ magazine Paris Lees, Shi tou, an artist and film-maker who was the first lesbian to come out on Chinese TV and one of China’s most prominent lesbian activists, and Clare B Dimyon, awarded a MBE in 2010 for her work supporting LGBT people in Central and Eastern Europe.”

You can view many more pictures of the march and rally on My London Diary, including pictures of most or all of the speakers at London Dyke March 2012.

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Stop The War – Hands Off Iraq – 2002

Stop The War – Hands Off Iraq: The protest in London against the US plans to invade Iraq on Saturday 30th March 2002 was I think the first of the really huge protests in London and across the world against the invasion then being planned by U.S. president George W Bush following the September 11th terrorist attacks on the United States.

*George Galloway MP at the start of the march in Hyde Park*

The Stop the War Coalition had been formed shortly after the 9/11 attacks and had organised this protest together with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and the Muslim Association of Britain.

It is hard to give any accurate estimate of the numbers taking part in protests as large as this, but I think there must have been well over a hundred thousand marching – much smaller than the well over a million that marched in London 11 months later in February 2003, but still a very significant number. It received very little coverage in the mass media and so it is now still difficult to find anything about it online.

By March 2002 the initial huge public sympathy with the USA over the 9/ll attacks had given place to a feeling that Bush and his “war on terror” was determined to attack Iraq at all cost even though it seemed unlikely that there was any real link between Iraq and Al-Qaida, and there was little if any evidence that Iraq still possessed “weapons of mass destruction“.

*Tony Benn and Dr Siddiqui at Hyde Park*

Iraq had ended work to produce biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons in the 1990s and most or all of its stockpiles had been destroyed. In November 2002 Saddam Hussein had allowed UN inspectors search Iraqi facilities for WMDs and they found none. The US alleged that Iraq had hidden them – and forged documents were produced about uranium. No WMDs were found during the US invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003-2011 and US secretary of state Colin “Powell and George Bush eventually admitted Iraq had not had them.”

*Stop The War – Hands Off Iraq – 2 Mar 02 – Park Lane*

Despite then known facts, Tony Blair had decided to support the US invasion against the huge opposition from the British public. He and his government lied to parliament, most notably with the “Dodgy Dossier” and other documents. The dossier, “sexed up” by Alistair Campbell was largely plagiarised from a thesis by a graduate student at California State University, and contained many errors and unchecked statements, and contradicted much of actual evidence from intelligence sources. It should have ended the political career and any credibility for both.

Back in 2002 I was working with both black and white and colour film, but it was difficult for me to digitise the colour work – and I only posted black and white images on My London Diary. I still have only digitised a few of the many colour images I made at that time.

Included in this post are all of the images I posted on My London Diary and below is the short text I wrote to go with them. The files are small and they were posted across several pages as many then still accessed the web on slow dial-up modems. They are reduced versions of the images I filed to my agency, made by scanning black and white prints.The original post is still online, but adds nothing to this post.

The Stop the War, Hands off Iraq demonstration on 2 March was a large sign of public opinion. People were still leaving Hyde Park at the start of the march when Trafalgar Square was full to overflowing two and a half hours later.

Police estimates of the number were risible as usual – and can only reflect an attempt to marginalise the significant body of opinion opposed to the war or a complete mathematical inability on behalf of the police.

Tony Benn told us it wasn’t worth taking his picture – “It won’t get in the papers unless I go and kick a policeman” but he didn’t and was quite right.

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Jobs Justice Climate – 2009

Put People First: Jobs Justice Climate

Embankment to Hyde Park

World leaders were to hold the G20 London Summit at the Excel Centre in Docklands beginning on April 1st (a date some thought highly appropriate), with the stated themes “Stability, Growth, Jobs“, and chaired by Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Countries and organisations taking part, included Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Ethiopia, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey and the USA, as well as the European Union and organisations including the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and the World Trade Organisations.

The ‘Put People First’ march was the first of several major demonstrations aimed at influencing the meeting and was backed by a very wide range of over 150 organisations, both from this country and abroad.

As well as trade unions, charities, and pressure groups there were also many other less organised groups and individuals.

Those marching were calling for a new approach to social justice for the world as a whole, and for urgency in action by world leaders not just to find a solution for the current financial problems, but to tackle the even deeper problems of global inequality and of climate crisis.

But the G20 went ahead very much to prop up the banks and financial institutions that had caused the financial crisis, though agreeing on the need for greater regulation, making none of the wider changes that this and other protests demanded. If anything it worsened those deeper problems.

Unsurprisingly it was a very large march with probably several times the official police estimate of 35,000 taking party.

Most police attention was on a relatively small ‘autonomous’ block of around 800 people in the middle of the march which had a strong police escorted. They objected to the police behaviour, particularly very obtrusive photography by FIT teams and some sat down in the road blocking the march behind them for around half an hour.

Police had bullied the front of the march to set off at a cracking pace, hard for photographers to keep up with and the march soon spread out over much of the route.

I wanted to photograph as many of the marchers as I could, walking slowly and letting them go past me as they walked along the Embankment, up Bridge Street and Whitehall to Trafalgar Square. Then I rushed to get to the rally in time.

On My London Diary you can read more about the rally, and see pictures of many of the speakers. This protest was “a well ordered event with at times a carnival atmosphere, which made some of the police prognostications look rather silly.“

*Politicicans and Businessmen are not ignorant – they are intelligent and corrupt. They break our legs and expect us to say thankyou when they offer us crutches*

One of my fellow NUJ members filming the ‘autonomous’ block rally was stopped and searched, and he and others reported a mysterious ‘man in black’ rushing into this alternative rally and emptying half a dozen small tightly wrapped packages from a black bin bag at the bottom of the stepladder from which people were speaking before exiting rapidly stage left.

Someone kicked one of these packages open and found it contained a catapult, and all the packages were quickly kicked away under a fence into an area under maintenance behind the speakers. Around 20 minutes later, a policeman entered that area and collected the packages; the anarchists saw what was happening and rapidly dispersed.

As I ended my post on My London Diary: “Earlier in the week a police spokesman had given a widely broadcast media interview in which he predicted that there would be violence – and that some protesters would use catapults. It seems as if someone was determined to make this loony-sounding prophecy come true.”

More at Put People First: Jobs Justice Climate.

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Teachers March on NUT Strike Day – 2014

London

In 2024 Dr Stephen Burley wrote in ‘School Management Plus’ “The impact of the Govian education reforms has been unremittingly negative. Content heavy GCSEs have squeezed Key Stage 3, with many schools using Year 9 to cover over-burdened specifications. The EBacc, in the state sector, has devastated uptake in the creative and technical subjects, with music and DT fairing worst. Learning has narrowed to focus much more on memorisation as students cram for final exams.”

Those reforms were only a part of his ill conceived actions as Education Minister which included a rapid expansion of academies and multi-academy trusts and the introduction of ludicrous changes to the curriculum – such as ‘fronted adverbials’. He probably would have liked to see all those primary children seated in neat rows going through those ‘times tables’ as I spent so much time doing in the 1950s – and actually stated they should be learning the names and dates of the Kings and Queens of England.

He seldom if ever missed an opportunity to denigrate the work of dedicated teachers and clearly showed a fundamental distrust for the views of teachers and educationalists, relying instead in the strange and unsupported advice of a few often working outside their areas of academic competence.

The strike on 26th March 2014 came after Gove continually refused to engage in meaningful discussions with the unions over the changes his department is pushing through over pensions, performance related pay and the dismantling of a national pay structure.

I was fortunate to have left teaching after 30 years well before Gove and in my last years to teach mainly on courses not approved by the Ministry of Education (Ofsted inspectors didn’t come to judge my teaching but had to request my permission to observe and learn) and to teach other courses that were largely or entirely teacher assessed where students learnt by doing and creating rather than regurgitating.

Thousands came to London on their stike day, March 26th 2014 calling for Gove to resign or his attacks on their pay, pensions, conditions and job security and his denigration and undermining for their professional status, and I felt a great deal of empathy with them.

More at Teachers March on NUT Strike Day.

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ESOL, Libya & UCU – 2011

ESOL, Libya & UCU: On the morning of Thursday 24th March 2011 hundreds of students and teachers portested against cuts to English lnaguage courses for speakers of other languages. Then at lunchtime Libyans came to Downing Street to thank David Cameron for air strikes against Gaddaffi’s forces in Libya. Finally in the afternoon I photographed a march to Parliament by University and college lecturers from the London region protesting over pensions, jobs and pay,

ESOL Day of Action

Old Palace Yard & Downing St

ESOL, Libya & UCU - 2011 — *ESOL students and tutors crowd outside Downing St*

Several hundred ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) students and tutors from colleges across London, including Lambeth, Hackney, Barnet, Tower Hamlets and Greenwich came to a rally opposite Parliament as a part of a nationwide day of protest against government cuts in these courses.

There were similar protests taking place in Birmingham, Brighton, Bristol, Halifax, Leeds, Newcastle, Nottingham, Rochdale, Sheffield and Warwickshire.

ESOL courses provide an essential service for “many asylum seekers and refugees. ESOL is essential for integrating refugees into the community here and enabling them to contribute fully to British society.”

The cuts were expected to mean that around 70% of current students would be unable to complete their courses and roughly the same proportion of classes across the country would close. The closure would particularly impact women who were the majority of students.

Cuts in ESOL funding have continued since 2011, making it now difficult or impossible for many recent migrants to access courses. Some Reform UK-led local authorities are now cutting these course completely.

More on My London Diary at ESOL Day of Action.

Libyans Congratulate Cameron Over No-Fly Zone

Downing St

*Libyans chant praise for Cameron prodding the UN into action*

It was highly unusual for a protest to come to Downing Street to praise the Prime Minister for his actions, but around 500 Libyans were there to give thanks to David Cameron for the air strikes against Gadaffi’s forces and his leadership in establishing a ‘no-fly’ zone.

Gadaffi was of course a highly controversial figure in Libya. Supporters praised him for “combating homelessness, ensuring access to food and safe drinking water, and to dramatic improvements in education” and great improvements in medical care including a free and universal medical system. He had also done much to improve the status of women, though keeping the “sexes as “separate but equal”.’

But there was also a considerable downside, with the persecution of non-Arab Libyans, and human rights abuses. He alienated many by largely eliminating private businesses and imposed censorship. Under him Libya had no free press and no trade unions. And under him the system was highly corrupt and unemployment was high.

His brutal clampdown on protests inspired by the Arab Spring led to an uprising and the formation of the Benghazi-based National Transitional Council which this protest was supporting. Two weeks before this event France had recognised this as the “legitimate representative of the Libyan people” and Britain together with France was urging Europe to do so.

The UN had already suspended “Libya from the UN Human Rights Council, implementing sanctions and calling for an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation into the killing of unarmed civilians” the previous month and had declared a “no-fly zone to protect the civilian population from aerial bombardment”.

*One lone protester called for an end to attacks on Libya*

NATO went further and as well as enforcing this also carried out air strikes. Its actions are thought to have enabled the enabled the NTC – whose forces like Gadaffi’s also “disregarded the laws of war, committing human rights abuses, including arbitrary arrests, torture, extrajudicial executions, and revenge attacks” – to defeat Gadaffi.

More at Libyans Praise Cameron Over No-Fly Zone.

University And College Lecturers March

LSE to Parliament

University and college lecturers had received derisive pay offers in 2010 and 2011 meaning a cut in real wages allowing for inflation of 8-10%, and those from colleges in and around London marched to Parliament to protest over pay, job cuts and pensions.

Government was threatening cuts of up to 40,000 jobs in higher education and lecturers were worried that there might be large increases in student course fees that would deter many students.

They were also angered by government claims that their pensions were ‘gold plated’ – they are actually much less generous than the government’s lies – and proposed changes to the system.

Statistics also show that lecturers are paid much less than those with similar qualifications working in private industry. And they criticise the perception encouraged by our billionaire-owned press that they enjoy lengthy holidays as college terms are short.

Lecturers around the country were taking part in a one-day strike and the march by UCU London Region was one of many events around the country.

More at University And College Lectu r ers March.

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UN Anti-Racism Day & IDS Gone – 2016

UN Anti-Racism Day & IDS Gone: Saturday 19th March 2016 was UN Anti-Racism Day and was celebrated with a Refugees Welcome march and rally, and by Australians and others protesting at the Australian High Commission in London to condemn the Australian government’s treatment of refugees. Later in Parliament Square I joined disabled people and friends celebrating the resignation of Iain Duncan Smith whose policies had caused them so much suffering and harm.

Stand Up to Racism – Refugees Welcome March

BBC to Piccadilly Circus

Thousands met outside the BBC for a national demonstration called by Stand Up to Racism against racism, Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and fascism and to make the point that refugees are welcome here.

They had started at the BBC pointing out that it should have a much more positive attitude to refugees. It gives much air time to the views of racists and extreme right groups and personalities and fails to adequately represent the view of the majority of the British population shown in protests such as this.

The BBC often minimises the positive contributions of migrants and refugees to the British economy and keeping vital services such as the NHS running and fails to criticise the increasingly racist government policies.

As well as a large ‘Black Lives Matter’ bloc led by Lee Jasper and Zita Holbourne, there were also groups working with refugees trapped in the camps in Calais and Dunkirk by the failure of our government to set up legal routes for refugees, demanding our government take a much more positive and humanitarian approach to refugees. Apart from a small concession for children, forced on them by Lord Dubs with massive public support, which was very grudgingly administered and prematurely ended, successive governments have responded with increasingly draconian measures.

What I wrote in 2016 is now even more apposite: “Of course there are racists and bigots who oppose Britain taking in any refugees, and those who would want to abandon the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which Britain played a major role in drawing up in 1947-8. Winston Churchill – who many on the far right look on as a symbol of all things British – proposed a European Charter of Human Rights in 1947 and we were the first country to ratify it in 1951.”

A very small group of members of the far-right group ‘Britain First’ in their para-military uniforms stood guarded by several times as many police on the steps around Eros as the march past, shouting their hate and insults and making derisory and threatening gestures. Most of the marchers simply ignored them, but a few rushed towards them but were held back by police.

Stand Up to Racism – Refugees Welcome march

Refugees Welcome Rally

Trafalgar Square

*Marcia Rigg whose brother Sean Rigg was killed by Brixton police in 2008,*

A long list of speakers came to the microphone in Trafalgar Square and I photographed most although I left before the end of the rally.

There are pictures of the following as well as Marcia Rigg on My London Diary:

Vanessa Redgrave;
Sabby Dhalu of Stand up to Racism;
Maz Saleem, daughter of Mohammed Saleem killed in a racist attack;
Stephanie Lightfoot, Bennett Co-Chair, United Friends and Families;
Dave Ward CWU General Secretary;
Sally Hunt UCU General Secretary;
Christine Blower NUT General Secretary;
Gary Younge Journalist;
Gloria Mills, Chair of the TUC Race Relations Committee;
Marilyn Reed, the mother of Sarah Reed who died in Holloway Prison;
Lee Jasper, Movement Against Xenophobia and BARAC;
Jeremy Hardy, Comedian;
Diane Abbott MP;
Michael Rosen Children’s novelist and poet;
Claude Moraes MEP;
Jean Lambert MEP;
Amna, a refugee from Mosul, Iraq;
Talha Ahmad National Council member,Muslim Council of Britain

Refugees Welcome Rally

Australians Protest on UN Anti-Racism Day

Australia House

Australians were protesting at home & at embassies around the world against their country’s racist immigration policy.

Many who try to claim asylum in Australia are locked up and detained indefinitely in contradiction to international law on remote Pacific Islands including Manus and Nauru in detention camps run by Serco and will never be allowed to resettle in Australia.

Detainees in these camps have been sexually abused, denied proper health treatment, and in at least one case, that of a young man called Reza Berati, beaten to death by the prison guards.

Serco also run detention centres such as Yarl’s Wood in the UK, where detainees have also been mistreated, sexually abused and denied proper health treatment. The Australian protesters were joined by members of Movement for Justice, which has held many protests at UK detention centres including Yarl’s Wood and Harmondsworth.

No UK newspapers, TV or Radio media had even sent reporters to this protest. The only other photographer taking pictures at the event had been commissioned by a Sydney newspaper.

Australians protest on UN Anti-Racism day

DPAC’s ‘IDS Resignation Party’

Parliament Square

IDS, Iain Duncan Smith, was Secretary of State for Work and Pensions from 2010 to 2016 and responsible for brutal cuts in welfare polices in those years.

In particular he decided to save money by making it harder for sick and disabled people to claim benefits, introducing new eligibility tests and benefit sanctions, incentivising DWP staff to strip claimants of their benefits often for trivial reasons or for matters beyond their control such as the late arrival of official letters or cancellation of buses and trains making them arrive late for appointments.

In 2015 the statistics showed that 2,380 people died in a 3-year period shortly after a work capability assessment declared them fit for work.

The poorly thought out nature of the introduction of Universal Credit also brought suffering to many, left for weeks without financial support. He introduced disastrous schemes to force the disabled into work and cut the support which had enabled some disabled people to work.

His period as a minister had combined a total lack of empathy with a peculiar incompetence and the National Audit Office accused the DWP of ‘”weak management, ineffective control and poor governance” and of wasting £34 million on inadequate computer systems.’

So naturally DPAC were pleased to see him go, and celebrated at this party – though with Prosecco rather than the Champagne some media reports stated. And perhaps their celebrations were a little muted by the knowledge that his successor Stephen Crabb had shown himself to be equally bigoted and lacking compassion and understanding of the needs of the poor and disabled.

Strangely, despite his long record of cutting disablity benefits, IDS’s stated reason for his resignation was that he was unable to accept the government’s planned cuts to disability benefits, later describing the policies he had spent six years putting into effect of “balancing the books on the backs of the poor and vulnerable” as divisive and “deeply unfair“.

DPAC’s ‘IDS Resignation Party’

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