Posts Tagged ‘policing’

Against Worldwide Government Corruption – Free Asange – 2014

Friday, March 1st, 2024

Against Worldwide Government Corruption – Saturday 1st March 2014, ten years ago, saw a small but lively protest “organised, attended and led by people who are appalled at the present state of the UK and the world, and who are convinced that a better world is possible if we got rid of the greedy and corrupt who currently are in change – the party politicians and their governments, the bankers and the corporations, the warmongers and the spies.“

Against Worldwide Government Corruption

Of course the world is dominated by the rich and powerful and the organisations they have set up and the laws they have established to maintain there domination, though these at least in some places also offer some protection for the poor and powerless. But I don’t really believe that protests like this offer any real hope of changing the situation.

Against Worldwide Government Corruption

But they perhaps do show us that another world is possible one with “justice and a fairer society, one that doesn’t oppress the poor and disabled, that doesn’t spy on everyone and doesn’t use the media and the whole cultural apparatus as a way of keeping blind to what is really happening.“

Against Worldwide Government Corruption

It’s the kind of spirit that led to the emergence of the Labour Party and inspired many of its leaders even into my youth – and was in part rekindled by the rise of Jeremy Corbyn, propelled into the leadership of the Labour Party in 2015 by huge support from the ordinary membership. But Labour had long lost its way, its organisation and many MPs sponsored and supported by companies and wealthy individuals inherently opposed to its ideals and dedicated to the maintenance of the status quo.

Against Worldwide Government Corruption

The protest was a wide-ranging one, and on My London Diary I quoted at some length from the speech before the march by one of the organisers, Mitch Antony of Aspire Worldwide (Accountable System Project for International Redevelopment and Evolution.)
At the end of it he gave a long list of things the march was against:

We march against Global Government Corruption
We march against ideological austerity
We march against privatisation for profit
We march against the bedroom tax
We march against bankers bonuses
We march against the corrupt MPs
We march against state spying on the people
We march against state controlled media
We march against government misrepresentation
We march against warmongering
We march against global tyranny
We march against state sponsored terrorism
We march against the military industrial complex
We march against the militarisation of the police
We march against the suppression of alternative energies

Against Worldwide Government Corruption

The march got off to a poor start, as the advertised meeting point in Trafalgar Square was closed to the public that day, being got ready for a commercial event the following day. Not everybody who came found the new location – and there were aggrieved posts on Facebook from some who failed, though I think they cannot have tried very hard.

Police often find reasons to delay the start of marches, but these protesters were definitely not taking advice from them and set off on the dot at 2pm to march west to the Ecuadorian Embassy where Julian Assange was still confined despite being given political asylum.

On the way the several hundred marchers caused no problems and aroused some interest among those on the streets, mainly tourists. A misguided attempt by officers to stop the march on Piccadilly led to a sit down and was soon abandoned.

When they came to Harvey Nicholls in Knightsbridge some joined in the protest against the store by the Campaign Against the Fur Trade for a few minutes, and a crowd gathered around the main door shouting at this company that still deals in fur and fur-trimmed garments.

But soon people moved on to the Ecuadorian Embassy where Assange was still trapped. Police filled the steps to the building, guarding the door and stopping anyone from entering.

There were far too many people to fit inside the small penned area for protesters on the pavement opposite the Embassy. The protest here in support of of Julian Assange and Edward Snowden and other whistle blowers and over the continued refusal to grant Assange safe passage to Ecuador, continued for around an hour. Many of the protesters then saw the refusal as a personal vendetta against him by then home secretary Theresa May, but it is driven by a continual British failure to stand up to the USA.

Since then we have seen the continued persecution of Assange by successive Tory governments and his arrest and incarceration in the maximum security Belmarsh prison after a changed Ecuadorian government withdrew its protection. Attempts to extradite him to the US where he could be executed or given a 170 year prison sentence are continuing, and it seems likely he will die in prison either here or in the US for publishing material that made clear to the world the war crimes being committed by the US.

At the end of their protest in front of the Ecuadorian Embassy (it occupies only a few rooms on an upper floor of the building) marchers were leaving to go back to Westminster for another rally in Parliament Square, but I’d had enough and took the tube to make my way home.

More about the protest and many more pictures on My London Diary: Against Worldwide Government Corruption.

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Call for Justice over Police Killings

Saturday, October 28th, 2023

Call for Justice over Police Killings: The huge media outcry over the charging of a police officer for murder over the killing of Chris Kaba is a reminder to me that thousands have died in police custody, in prison, immigration detention and secure psychiatric hospitals, many under very suspicious circumstances, almost certainly over 2000 since 1990.

Call for Justice over Police Killings

Official figures fail to record many of these deaths has having taken place in custody and those responsible have often lied or withheld evidence. Investigations have often been superficial and some inquests, rather than attempting to get at the truth have been used to hide it.

Call for Justice over Police Killings

The Kaba case is something of a landmark and while the officer concerned remains innocent until proved guilty, if convicted he will be the first to be found guilty of either murder or manslaughter for such a death. Although it seems obvious that the police should be held responsible for their actions, until now our justicve system has failed to do so.

Call for Justice over Police Killings

Earlier this month, the IOPC (Independent Office for Police Conduct) published a letter to the family of Sean Rigg, making a unreserved apology for the failures in investigating his death in Brixton Police Station in August 2008. It was an apology which only came about after 15 years of determined campaigning and investigation by the family, particularly Sean’s sister Marcia, doing much of the job the police should have themselves done and being met by lies, deceit and cover-up.

Call for Justice over Police Killings

This apology was also a first, and many other families are still waiting for any semblance of justice and with little hope of ever receiving it.

Policing isn’t an easy job, but it isn’t made easier by some of the actions of the police and the institutional failures, including racism. Policing in the UK is meant to be by consent, but that is a consent that has to be earned, and one that is squandered by failures to properly respond to complaints and investigate the actions of officers.

Every year since 1998, the United Families and Friends Campaign (UFFC), a coalition of families of people killed by police, in prisons, in immigration detention and in secure psychiatric hospitals have met in Trafalgar Square and made a march of remembrance to a rally opposite Downing Street. Most years I’ve taken part and photographed this, and the pictures in this post come from the march on 28th October 2006.

You can read what I wrote then about this some way down the My London Diary October 2006 page, and I won’t repeat it here. There are of course a few more pictures too, linked from there, though you can also go directly to them.

But there are some particular things I’d like to point out about that year’s march. Firstly is that among those taking part were members of the Family of Jean Charles de Menezez, the Brazilian electrician shot without warning as he sat peacefully in an Underground train at Stockwell Station. The woman who ordered this murder was later rewarded with various promotions and honours and cleared at a trial of any personal culpability for his death and rose to become Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police and was honoured for her service.

On her watch we saw the first plans for patrols in the UK by armed police, increased use of controversial stop and search powers, live facial recognition, the heavy handling of a vigil for Sarah Everard, various failures to implement reforms and obstruct the course of justice in cases involving the police.

Pauline Campbell speaking at the event in 2003

Also taking part in 2006 was Pauline Campbell, whose daughter Sarah Campbell died in Styal Prison in 2003, who told us that home office had finally admitted responsibility for the death of her daughter. The death of her daughter drove her to become a powerful and persistent campaigner taking direct action against the increasing number of deaths of women in custody. But Pauline’s story had a tragic end when her body was found on her daughter’s grave after committing suicide on her daughter’s birthday in 2008.

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Student Fees & Cuts And Two Views On Egypt

Saturday, January 29th, 2022

The main event I covered 11 years ago on 29th January 2011 was a march by thousands of students, teachers, parents and others through London to defend education and the public sector. The demonstration, backed by the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts was one of two national marches today, with another taking place in Manchester.

Two months earlier on Nov 10th a similar national protest had ended with some protesters storming into the Conservative Party HQ on Millbank, where considerable damage was caused and a number of protesters and police injured. Protest stewards tried to stop them but were unable to do so, and there were apparently very few police around as they rushed in. It was an hour before riot police arrived and began to fight the students and force them out. Around a dozen of the protesters were injured badly enough to require hospitalisation, along with three police officers. Fortunately no one was killed when a protester threw a fire extinguisher off the roof into the crowd below. 54 people, mainly students were arrested.

I’ve often criticised the police estimates of numbers taking part in protests, typically less than a half of the actual participants, and on that occasion they had been misled by their own estimate that only 20,000 would attend the protest. On the day it was more than twice that number, and the 225 officers deployed was far too few.

There were further student protests in November and December where police came out in larger numbers and some seemed to be taking revenge for their earlier failure – including twice dragging one protester from his wheelchair and across the roadway and almost killing another who was later charged with taking part in violent disorder along with four others – and eventually all were found not guilty.

But by 29th January police tempers had cooled, and too many videos and reports of their extreme actions had been aired on social media and even in the mass media. They were taking no chances this time and there were many more police around, but they were also doing their best not to provoke confrontation.

As I commented in my report on My London Diary:

Police do seem to have learnt lessons after their mistakes last year, and I saw no real problems arising today. Despite the number of protesters in anarchist dress with facemasks, most students are not out to cause trouble. But if police start pushing people around, or kettling them, problems are going to arise.

And later:

At one point outside the Millbank tower complex, police wanted to drive a couple of vans of reinforcement through a crowd, and some people sat down on the street. Police asked them to move but met with no cooperation. Rather than try and force the issue, police just formed a line so that the two vans could bypass the seated students and drive along the pavement. It was a simple solution that avoided further friction. Later there were reports of half a dozen people arrested in minor incidents.

My London Diary

As in November, the event ended with a rally close to Tate Britain on Millbank, but by the time I arrived with the tail end of the march this had ended. I was a little surprised by this as it was a much smaller event then in November, with perhaps 5,000 marchers, but perhaps few speakers had wanted to attend. Some of the marchers planned to go on to protest in Oxford St and at the Egyptian Embassy, but for me it was a chance to walk across Vauxhall Bridge and catch a train home.

I’d been at the Egyptian embassy earlier in the day, and photographed two protests taking place there. Opposite the embassy Egyptians had gathered “”to show our solidarity & support of our fellow Egyptians in our beloved country, who decided on making Tuesday 25/01/2011 a day of protests & demonstrations in Egypt against the unfair, tyrant, oppressive & corrupt Egyptian regime that has been ruling our country for decades.”

A hundred yards away Hizb ut-Tahrir, an Islamist group calling for the establishment of a Muslim caliphate was also holding a protest. The Egyptians opposite the embassy had told very firmly that the embassy protest – like the Egyptian revolution – was to be entirely non-sectarian and that they were not welcome there.

More about all three protests on My London Diary:
No Fees, No Cuts! Student March
Solidarity with the Egyptian Revolution
Hizb ut-Tahrir Turned Away

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Saturday 16th April 2016

Friday, April 16th, 2021

There was a lot happening in London on Saturday 16th April 2016, and I managed to catch some of it. The largest march was organised by the Peoples Assembly Against Austerity. It demanded an end to privatisation of the NHS, secure homes for all, rent control and an end to attacks on social housing, an end to insecure jobs and the scrapping of the Trade Union Bill, tuition fees and the marketisation of education.

It was a large march and by the time I arrived people were fairly tightly packed on around 500 metres of Gower St waiting for the march to start, and it took me some time to make my way through to the gazebo where speeches were being made before the start of the the march – though I found plenty to photograph as I moved through the crowd.

Finally I made my way to the front of the march and photographed some of the main banners lined up there, but police held up the start of the march and I had to leave before it moved off.

I was disappointed in Whitehall as there was no sign of an event I had been expecting to take place there – or perhaps I was too late. But in Parliament Square I met Ahwazi Arabs from the Ahwazi Arab People’s Democratic Popular Front and the Democratic Solidarity Party of Alahwaz who have demonstrated London in solidarity with anti-government protests in Iran every April since 2005, on the anniversary of the peaceful Ahwazi intifada in which many were killed and hundreds arrested by the Iranian regime.

The Ahwaz region, an autonomous Arab state, was occupied by Iran in 1925 iand they incorporated it into the country in 1935 largely to allow the British Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (BP since 1954) to exploit its rich oil reserves. Since then Iran has pursued a campaign to eliminate Ahwazi culture and change the ethnic makeup of the region by encouraging Persian settlers. BP dominated Iranian oil until Iran nationalised it in 1951, and again became an important force there after the CIA (and MI6) engineered coup in 1953 and the company is still the major partner supplied by the National Iranian Oil Company.

I walked back up Whitehall to Trafalgar Square, by which time the Peoples Assembly marchers were arriving for a rally.

Things were visually rather more interesting on the North Terrace, where people were dancing to the ‘dig it sound system’, which carried a message from Tom Paine: “The World is my country – All people are my brethren – To do good is my religion”.

And in one corner the Palestine Prisoners Parade were attracting attention with juggling, hula hoops and speeches to the often arbitrary detention without proper trial suffered by many Palestinians held in Israeli jails. Many of them are on rolling detention orders, released and immediately re-arrested and put back in prison.

As the rally came to an end the United Voices of the World trade union began a protest a short distance away on the Strand, supported by Class War and others, demanding the reinstatement of 2 workers suspended by cleaning contractor Britannia for calling for the London Living Wage of £9.40 an hour for all those working at Topshop. The UVW say Brittania is systematically victimising, bullying and threatening cleaners and Topshop refuse to intervene.

The fairly small crowd held a noisy protest outside the shop entrance, with was blocked by security men, and a large group of police arrived and began to try to move the protesters, and began pushing them around. The protesters didn’t retaliate but simply moved back; some holding up placards in front of the police cameraman who was filming the event were threatened with arrest.

Eventually the protesters marched away, walking back along the North Terrace of Trafalgar Square where they picked up a few more supporters and then on to Top Shop at Oxford Circus for another protest and stand-off with the police.

After a fairly short protest there the protesters marched on to John Lewis, where the UVW have a long-standing dispute calling for the cleaners to be treated equally with others who work there. As they approached the store some police became more violent and one woman was thrown bodily to the ground several yards away.

Other police and protesters went to help her and the protesters called for – and eventually got – an apology for the inappropriate use of force. Things calmed down and the protest continued, but as it moved off after several speeches with many leaving for home the police picked on two individuals and began searching them and threatening arrest and the situation became more tense, with police threatening both protesters and press.

More on My London Diary
UVW Topshop & John Lewis Protest
UVW Topshop 2 protest – Strand
Palestine Prisoners Parade
Dancing for Homes, Health, Jobs, Education
Homes, Health, Jobs, Education Rally
Ahwazi protest against Iranian repression
March for Homes, Health, Jobs, Education

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Black Lives Matter

Sunday, June 7th, 2020

Staines, Surrey, UK. 4th June 2020.

I won’t be going to today’s ‘Black Lives Matter’ protest at London’s US Embassy though I would like to be there, both to show my support and also to take photographs, and it would be an easy journey for me.

The health risks of attending, though not huge, are greater for me than for most or all those who will be there, as if I were to be infected my life would be at greater risk both because of my age and because I have diabetes. I’m fortunate not to have great problems with diabetes, and I think I lived with it for over 30 years before it was diagnosed as a contributory factor to my heart attack in 2003, and now insulin and a careful diet usually keep it well under control, but it does mean my immune system isn’t too great.

The risks would be quite low. According to one of our leading epidemiologists speaking on the radio yesterday, about 1 in 700 people currently has Covid-19 and is infectious, although they may not be showing any symptoms. The proportion who are infectious in the protest crowd is likely to be rather smaller, as those who do have symptoms will almost certainly stay away. The protest will be taking place outside in a very open area, which will cut down the chance of infection.

The chance of being infected depends on various things. You reduce it by physical distance from an infected person – so if people at protests are able to keep that 2m away from people not in their own social group that helps greatly. If people who have the virus are wearing even simple home-made face masks that greatly reduces their spreading of the virus.

Protesters ‘Take the Knee’ at the side of Staines Town Hall.

Being a photographer is slightly more complicated. In the nature of things you have to move around and thus have a greater chance of coming close to one of that very small number of infected persons present. The moving around also cuts down your chance of always keeping that 2m distance. If you are, like me, someone who likes to get close to those you are photographing, you would be advised to change your way of working, moving perhaps to longer focal lengths. And you would certainly be advised to wear an effective mask when working. Moving around does have the advantage of decreasing the time you are close to any individual, which will also reduce the chance of infection.

The main danger to protesters will almost certainly come from policing. The police seem consistently to fail to observe social distancing and fail to wear face masks, so putting the public at risk. But also they often try to herd protesters into smaller areas where social distancing may be impossible, often to try to keep traffic flowing.

A silent die-in for 8 minutes 46 seconds in the Two Rivers shopping park in the centre of Staines, the time Floyd was restrained by a police officer.

It was probably unwise for me to leave home on Friday to cover a Black Lives Matter protest which I could hear from my window in Staines, particularly as I rushed out unprepared, forgetting to pick up my face mask. Of course I tried to keep at a suitable distance but there were moments when this wasn’t practicable. It was a rather smaller protest, with perhaps a couple of hundred people, not all of whom were wearing face masks either. Rather more of my pictures than usual were made with a short telephoto lens, with my wide-angle used largely for wider views in an attempt to preserve social distance.

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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On the Third Day

Tuesday, March 31st, 2020

The rather tense stand-off between police and Extinction Rebellion protesters who were still blocking much of Westminster continued, with the police at times adopting rather rougher tactics, including the deliberate destruction of tents and other property as well as making arrests.

XR’s protest continued to be rather remarkable, with street performers, music and mimes including Charlie X as well as XR’s red and green robed troupes.

People were still determined to continue their protest and it was clear that the police were coming under increasing political pressure to end them, though quite a few officers seemed rather unhappy at what they were being ordered to do.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson had attacked the protesters, insulting them as ‘crusties’ but was still failing to take any action. XR’s demands remain, calling for the government tell the truth about the climate and ecological emergency, act to halt biodiversity loss, reduced emissions to net zero and create and be led by a Citizens Assembly.

There were many arrests during the day, with XR’s non-violent approach being maintained, and police succeeded in clearing some of the areas.

Extinction Rebellion Day 3

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, please share on social media.
And small donations via Paypal – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

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Rebellion continues

Wednesday, March 25th, 2020

The second day of Extinction Rebellion’s shutdown of Westminster was in some respects a disturbing one for those of us who believe in civil liberties and the rule of law, with the police moving in at times like a group of thugs and deliberately destroying the property of the protesters.

XR have a dedication to non-violence and made no attempt to stop the police or to resist the arrests that took place, and the use of force seemed quite uncalled for. Of course large scale acts of civil disobedience do cause inconvenience and annoyance to others, but the response of a civilised society should be to try and resolve the issues rather than to attack the protesters.

Those who break laws can and in the case of XR do expect to be arrested but should not be assaulted and too many arrests that I saw seemed to involve an unnecessary use of violence and deliberate infliction of pain.

One new banner read ‘CLIMATE STRUGGLE = CLASS STRUGGLE’ and it is perhaps hard not to see the police as a force being used by the small group of those who are rich and powerful to protect their own narrow interests at the expense of the rest of the people. Their more vigorous response on this second day of protest can only have been a result of considerable political pressure on them to subdue the protests. They clearly came not to keep the peace but to try and win a battle.

As you can see from my pictures, the protests were still continuing at various sites around Westminster and the general atmosphere was something of a festival. But a festival with a great deal of commitment by people desperate that our government take effective action against the most serious problem faced by the country and the world. We are just beginning to see a government forced into taking belated action against the threat posed by COVID-19, but we need a similar level of action against climate change that otherwise will be even more catastrophic.

‘Everything Will Change’ whether we like it or not, but we have a choice to make changes which may avert the extinction of our species. But our government continues to fiddle while the planet burns.

More at Extinction Rebellion continues.

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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Rich despise the poor

Tuesday, January 14th, 2020
Security escort a member into the club past protesting union members

The rich or at least a significant proportion of them are really not very nice people. It’s perhaps why some of them are rich, making deals and evading tax without any concern for others just for their own profit. It was the rich who made millions from the slave trade and the plantations, the rich who are still profiting from exploiting people in mines, from dispossessing people of their lands, polluting their water. The rich who profit from fossil fuels that are killing the planet, the rich who profit from asset-stripping and putting workers out of their jobs.

The street was sealed off by red barriers at both ends with security staff who let club members through

Of course most of us gain a little from such activities, with investments by our pension funds and other similar ways, but its the rich whose naked greed drives the process and who gain most massively. And while the country may lose billions through Brexit, the rich will keep their tax dodges and clever investments to keep and increase their wealth, congratulating themselves on having persuaded over half of the country to vote against their own interests.

Security staff help a club member who had assaulted protesters and tried to walk through the club’s barriers on the street

Inequality – the gap between the rich and the poor – has increased greatly in the UK over my lifetime. Studies of incomes show us becoming more equal until around 1979 and then increasing since then, with a small blip in 2008. According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, four million British workers are now living in poverty, half a million more than five years ago. Not only are the rich becoming richer, but policies including Universal Credit and benefit sanctions are making many of the poor destitute. On the streets we see an increasing gap, with more people homeless and reduced to begging, while the wealthy have become more ostentatious, and nowhere is this more evident than in Mayfair.

A club member is escorted past the protesters

Of course it is inexcusable that an exclusive private club such as LouLou’s which charges high prices for membership and services should pay workers less than the living wage, but what I find even more disgusting is the attitude shown towards the protesting workers and their supporters by some members as they go past the protest, and by the managers and staff of the club. Rather than talk to the union and pay a proper wage they employ extra security to confront the protesters.

Ian Bone asks a police officer why they are siding with the club owner who is refusing to pay a living wage

A large proportion of those now in poverty in the UK are in work – but also have to claim benefits to keep alive. These benefits are paid for by other tax-payers, essentially a subsidy from us to low-paying organisations and also to landlords, many of whom are extremely rich. Everyone in full-time work deserves a living wage, and we should have minimum wage rates that ensure this. In London that means the ‘London Living Wage’, determined each year and not the much lower government figure.

Police warn a Jane Nicholl she will be arrested if she continues to shout using bad language while a legal observer looks on

Police at the event seemed to adopt a rather aggresive approach towards the protesters from the IWGB Cleaners and Facilities Branch and supporters, threating some with arrest, while ignoring some rather aggresive action by the security. They also refused to take any action when the protesters pointed out that the security staff were not wearing a visible SIA licence as required by the Private Security Industry Act 2001. The protest was loud and at least one protester was threatened with arrest for shouting at members going into the club because of the language she used.

More at LouLou’s stop exploiting your workers

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, please share on social media.
And small donations via Paypal – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

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Shutdown Knife Crime

Saturday, August 10th, 2019

Operation Shutdown is a campaign to end the deaths from knife and gun crime on our streets, which have been rising over the last few years. Most of those in the campaign are people who have suffered the pain of losing a relative – brother, son, nephew, uncle – or friend to knife crime.

The great majority of the victims are young men, in their teens or twenties, and although many are black what they virtually all have in common is that they come from working class families mainly living in deprived areas.

Almost certainly the biggest driver behind the increase in deaths has been austerity, with the huge cuts this has forced councils to make in youth services and other vital support for families. Some of the violence on the streets is certainly gang-related, often concerned with drugs, but those killed are often people on the periphery or innocent bystanders.

It would be impossible not to empathise with the suffering of mothers, fathers and other relatives as they talk about their loss, but I don’t always feel that some of the measures they suggest would do anything to curb the growth of knife crime. I have very little faith in their idea that the government’s emergency committee COBRA considering the problem would have any real impact, and it could well worsen the situation.

Of course there are things that they call for that would help. Restoring the cuts in vital community services is an obvious need, and reversing the cuts in police numbers could help too, though perhaps only if this led to more sensitive and informed community policing.

We need also to look at ways to reduce the power and influence of gangs, which would almost certainly include an evidence-led reform of our laws about drugs, something which succesive governments have resisted.

After a rally opposive Downing St, Operation Shutdown marched to Westminster Bridge, where they presented wreaths to a police officer and hold a silence in memory of PC Keith Palmer, killed outside Parliament by terrorists before going on to block the bridge and hold a further rally.

More at Knife crime Operation Shutdown

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, please share on social media.
And small donations via Paypal – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

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