Wimbledon, Pensions & Hammersmith: On Saturday 19th June 2004 I paid a short visit to Wimbledon Village Fair before photographing a TUC protest calling for changes in pension law and better pensions in Westminster and then going for a short riverside walk in Hammersmith. There are more pictures from the protest on My London Diary, I’ll include the short text I wrote at the time about the day as well as some from the captions I wrote in 2004.
Wimbledon Village Fair
Home of tennis and the Wombles, Wimbledon always strikes me as an alien implant in London by some civilisation with a time machine, a sense of humour and a very fat wallet. I dropped in to the Village Fair just to see it still existed.
Pay Up For Pensions – Trade Union Congress March and Rally
Half an hour later I was back in the real world. Where companies make off with the pension funds leaving people who have paid in to schemes for years with no pensions. where other creditors come before pension holders when companies go bust.
Where millions of lower paid workers now have no employment pension rights at all. Where women have always been treated unfairly in many respects. Where government has worsened conditions for civil servants, teachers and others. As TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber says “Those who used to have good pensions now have poor pensions. Those who used to have poor pensions, now have no pension.”
Around 5-10,000 people marched down from Temple towards the Houses of ParliamentMarchers included many workers who have already lost their pensions when their companies foldedBanners on the march included many union branches including those for civil servantsPeople of all ages took part; not only the old are affected by pensions.Marchers included pensioners who had served in WW2Women have never been treated fairly over pensions by employers or stateThe pink pensions pig caught between Big Ben and Parliamentary OfficesWorkers from Samuel Jones lost their pensions when the company was taken over‘Protect the Pension Promise’, ‘NO to work ’till you drop”. The labour movement looks to the government to act on pensionsPensioners want a better deal, and the unfairness of pension theft is widely recognised
Unfortunately the New Labour Government wasn’t listening and the “the great British pension theft” begun by Margaret Thatcher and taken over by Gordon Brown continued, while ineffectual legislation introduced after the scandal when Robert Maxwell stole £460 million from the Mirror pensioners continued to allow companies to steal pensions from their workers. Despite pension protection schemes, workers can still lose when companies are taken over or fail.
River Thames at Hammersmith – Furnival Sculling Club
On the way home I went for a walk by the river in Hammersmith, another area of London strongly associated with William Morris. The Funivall Sculling Club here was established in 1896 as the Hammersmith Sculling Club For Girls – the world’s first women’s rowing club – by Dr Frederick Furnivall; it went unisex in 1901. Furnival had earlier championed rowing for working men. He served as the model for Ratty, the water rat in ‘Wind In The Willows’, as well as being involved with the preparation of the Oxford English Dictionary.
Hammersmith Mall – The second building is the Furnival Sculling ClubWeeds and pollution in the ThamesPlastic bottles and other rubbish collected up by this landing stage near Hammersmith Bridge
The former BBC Riverside Studios – part converted to offices which were advertised by the banner at roof level. It was imaginatively redeveloped in 2014-6 to provide better public facilities, a riverside walkway and 165 flats.
The ‘Carnival of Dirt‘ united activist groups from the UK and around the world in a funeral procession for the many killed by mining and extraction companies, powerful financial organisations whose crimes are legitimized by the City of London.
Mining companies have exploited mineral resources in countries around the world, mainly in the majority countries to feed the industrial development of countries such as ours, and have done so with little or no regard for the environment or the people who work in their mines or live in the areas around, creating large amounts of pollution and destroying vital habitats and traditional ways of life, driven by producing minerals at the lowest possible cost.
Many of those companies are based in London, in part because of our imperial past and are listed on the London Stock Exchange and trade on the London Metal Exchange. They are propped up by our pension funds and protected by our government and even allowed to get away with evading millions (if not billions) of UK taxes – as well as often evading taxes in the countries where they mine. Among the major criminals named were Xstrata, Glencore International, Rio Tinto, Vedanta, Anglo American, BHP Billiton, BP and Shell.
Turtle & Dugong – Xstrata has destroyed their homeland in the Macarthur River
The carnival procession began at St Pauls and stopped at the Stock Exchange, the Bank of England and the London Metal Exchange for speeches about the various crimes, before going to stop for lunch at Altab Ali Park.
There had been several heavy showers and by lunchtime my zoom lenses were all steamed up internally – zooming draws in damp air which condenses on the glass – and I only had a 16mm fisheye giving totally clear images. I needed to dry the others out and decided I had taken enough pictures and it was time for me to go home – although the carnival was going to continue to the West End and end with a ‘Reclaim the Streets’ style party starting on the Embankment at 6pm.
I described the event at length in 2012 and here I’ll quote some of it, but you can still read it all at Carnival of Dirt on My London Diary.
The funeral cortege that gathered at St Pauls included a large snake, a turtle and a tortoise, a reminder of XStrata’s criminal diversion of the McArthur River, destroying the ecosystem and despoiling the sacred sites of Australian aborigines.
There were coffins representing the dead and naming many of the companies involved one said ‘Glencore Values – Toxic Assets, Toxic Environments‘, another ‘XStrata – X-Rated on Human Rights‘ and pointed out the CEO Mick Davis “Gets £30 million to stay in job while 2 Dead 80 Injured protesting at Tintaya mine in Chile.’
A small coffin represent the over 18,000 child miners in the Phillipines, while another read ‘10 Million Dead Through Conflict in 16 years equals a 9/11 every 2 days‘. A black coffin carried on the side the message ‘Resist Corporate Terrorism‘ and on the top the message ‘London Metal Exchange – Setting the Global Standard in Bloodshed‘ with red drops bleeding from it. Another testified to the genocide in West Papua where Indonesian troops have torched villages.
Many carried placards with photographs of a few of the better-known activists who have been murdered for standing up to corporate terrorism, and marchers distributed a leaflet naming 15 of them – Valmore Locarno, Fr Fausto Tentorio, Victor Orcasita, Alexandro Chacon, Fr Reinel Restropo, Dr Gerry Ortega, Armin Marin, Dr Leonard Co, Elizer Billanes, Jorge Eliecer, Floribert Chebeya, Raghunath Jhodia, Abhilash Jhodia, Damodar Jhodia, Petrus Ayamiseba. Others carried photographs of unnamed and horribly mutilated victims.
Carnival, Racist Deportations & more Naked Cyclists: I began work on Saturday 13 June 2009 photographing a carnival procession in Carshalton in the south of London, travelled to Islington in north London for a protest against Britain’s racist and inhuman immigration policies and finally covered the uncovered cyclists taking part in the 2009 London World Naked Bike Ride, photographing the preparations in Hyde Park ad the start of the ride there and then on the ride at Waterloo and in the West End.
Carshalton Carnival Procession – St Helier – Carshalton
Sutton’s May Queen 2009 came to look at my cameras
My account of this event on My London Diary begins with a slightly unkind description “of the St Helier estate, a huge sprawling area built by the LCC 1930 to a kind of debased Garden City plan almost entirely without the charm of those earlier developments on what had previously mainly been the lavender fields of Mitcham.”
The procession began next to the “St Helier Hospital [built] in the modern style of the 30s, facing the imaginatively named St Helier Open Space” outside the Sutton Arena leisure centre and as usual I found the more interesting pictures were those I took there rather than on long procession to Carshalton where it was to end at a fair in Carshalton Park.
I’d come to the carnival largely because I was then working on a project on London’s May Queens, with several groups of them from across south London taking part in the procession, along with various other local organisations. And a Dalek and others in fancy dress.
The Rotary had brought their Father Christmas coming out unseasonably from the chimney of a small four-wheeled house towed behind a car at the rear of the procession. He’d been there too when I photographed the carnival previously in 2004.
It was a long an hot trek to Carshalton from St Helier, and the procession paused at Carshalton College for a break. I’d walked enough and made my way to the station missing the rest of the event and the funfair in Carshalton Park.
Speak out against Racism and Deportations – Angel, Islington
Britain’s major political parties at the prompting of our mainstream press have long promoted myths about migrants and asylum seekers, the more rabid of our tabloids in particular promoting the views of clearly racist columnists who publish stories about them getting homes and huge benefits, depriving the working class of housing, pushing down wages, taking “our jobs“, making it impossible to see doctors and more.
Nothing could of course be further from the truth. It’s the greed of the wealthy and government policies that have led to these problems – and without the migrants we would be in a considerably worse position. It’s something that is glaringly obvious when we need to make use of the NHS which would have collapsed entirely without them, but also in other areas. Demonising migrants is a deliberate policy divert public attention and anger away from the real problem of our class-based society. Divide and rule by our rulers,
Most of those who settle here from abroad want nothing more than to work and contribute to our society, though we make it hard for many of them to do so. They want a better life, particularly for their children and often work long hours for it. Migrant workers who clean offices are often more qualified than those who work in them – but their qualifications are not recognised here, and asylum seekers are unable to work except in the illegal economy.
Some facts:
Over a quarter of NHS doctors were born abroad (and others are the sons and daughters of migrants);
Immigrants are 60% less likely to claim benefits than people born in Britain;
Studies sho immigration has no significant effect on overall employment, or on unemployment of those born in Britain.
This campaigning protest in a busy shopping area outside one of London’s busier Underground Stations was organised by the Revolutionary Communist Group and was also part of a campaign by the Suarez family to prevent the deportation of John Freddy Suarez Santander, a 21 year-old father with a 3 year-old son. He came here from Colombia when he was six and grew up here. As a teenager he committed an offence and served 7 months in a young offenders institution.
Two years after he had served his sentence, the New Labour government passed a law to deport all immigrants with a criminal record, and an order was made for him to be sent back to Colombia, where he has no remaining relatives. His case in 2009 was still being considered at the European Court of Human Rights. The ECHR generally asserts that juvenile offences should not be seen as a part of a criminal record, but the Home Office decided the month before this protest to deport him anyway, and this was only stopped by his family going to the airport.
I’ve written rather often about this event, intended as a protest against the domination of our lives by ‘car culture’ which has resulted in our towns and cities and transport networks being designed around the priorities of motorists and road transport rather than us as pedestrians and cyclists – and to serve the interests of the companies that make cars and lorries. And it has resulted in illegal levels of pollution causing massive health problems.
Although it’s certainly an eye-catching event, it isn’t always very clear why it is taking place to those standing on the pavements, gazint at it in amazement, laughing and recording it on their phones. It’s probably good for our tourist industry, though I rather think London has too many tourists anyway, particularly as I struggle to walk over Westminster Bridge.
Heres one paragraph of what I wrote in 2009 – you can read the rest on My London Diary.
Some riders did have slogans on their bodies, mainly about oil and traffic, and some bikes carried A4 posters reading REAL RIGHTS FOR BIKE and CELEBRATE BODY FREEDOM or had flags stating ‘CURB CAR CULTURE’ which made clear the purpose of the event to the careful onlooker, but for most people it seemed simply a spectacle of naked or near-naked bodies. Though of course also a rare treat for any bicycle spotters among them.
I didn’t censor the pictures I put on line from the event though I’ve carefully selected those in this post. I think that there is nothing offensive about the naked human body but I included the following statement with the link to more pictures I posted then and which you can still see online.
Warning: these pictures show men and women with no clothes on. Do not click this link to more pictures if pictures of the naked human body may offend you.
Heathrow Villages fight for survival: On Sunday 12th April 2015 in the run up to the 2015 General Election, campaigners launched a renewed fight against the expansion of Heathrow which threatens to swallow up much of the area, showing again the local determination to protect its historic community against a third runway.
As a fairly local resident although on the other side of Heathrow I’d been involved in the successful campaign a dozen years earlier against the expansion, which had eventually convinced all political parties that expansion at Heathrow was politically impossible. And when the 2010 election put a Tory Lib-Dem coalition into power plans were cancelled as the Lib-Dems had always strongly opposed them.
Datchet Border Morris in the Great Barn
But Heathrow had not taken NO for an answer and had continued to spend a considerable amount lobbying for it, including setting up a heavily funded PR organisation called ‘Back Heathrow’ to come up with spurious survey results suggesting local backing for expansion.
In 2012 the coalition government set up an Airports Commission led by Sir Howard Davies who had held many leading roles as an economist for both governments and private companies and who when appointed resigned from his roles as an adviser to GIC Private Limited, formerly known as Government of Singapore Investment Corporation, a part owner of Heathrow.
Officially the commission’s role was to consider how the UK could “maintain its status as an international hub for aviation and immediate actions to improve the use of existing runway capacity in the next 5 years” but unofficially it was designed to produce a political consensus in its final report in Summer 2015 that would put Heathrow expansion back on track.
The Polar Bears brought their banner ‘Any new runway is Plane Stupid’
In October 2016 the Tories under Theresa May made a third runway and a new terminal a central Government policy, and in June 2018 the House of Commons voted by a large majority in favour, despite the opposition or abstention of most London MPs.
Clifford Dixon (UKIP), Pearl Lewis (Conservative), John McDonnell (Labour) and Alick Munro (Green)
The Supreme Court in 2020 ruled the government’s decision had been unlawful as they had not taken their committments to climate change under the Paris agreement into account. The government then accepted the judgement, but Heathrow appealed and won, with the ban being lifted.
John Stewart of HACAN(Heathrow Association for the Control of Aircraft Noise)
However the plans have so far not gone ahead, in part because governments have not agreed to pick up the huge infrastructure costs around the airport that would be required and that Heathrow were unwilling to finance.
A war veteran plants a tree on the recreation ground against Heathrow expansion
When the right-wing led Labour government came to power in 2024, they immediately set about making changes to the planning process that would enable developments like Heathrow to go ahead with little or no proper examination and inquiries. And in January 2025 they “confirmed it was the new Labour government’s plan to proceed with a third runway within the current parliamentary term.”
However the arguments against expansion continue to grow in strength, particularly on environmental grounds and the Trump-initiated slump in world trade seems likely to damage the economic arguments for expansion as well as increase the already huge costs of the project. So it still seems unlikely that it will happen, and certainly not by the “projected completion date around 2040.”
You can read more about the activities in Harmondsworth around the village centre back in April 2015 on My London Diary and see the strength of the local opposition back then. There were Morris Dancers performing outside the village pubs and inside the incredible Grade I listed Great Barn and a rally with the Plane Stupid polar bear, speeches from the general election candidates and protesters on what would be the new Heathrow boundary in the village centre.
Heathrow has of course promised the Great Barn would be protected along with the fine part 12th Century Parish Church, but they would not be the same without their context.
Heathrow represents a huge failure by successive governments over many years to set up a new major airport for London at some more suitable location. Even when opened as a civil airport in 1946 it was not a particularly suitable location, though when relatively small and quiet aircraft such as the DC3 were in use it was not a great problem. But once these began to be replaced by larger noisier and more polluting jets and passenger numbers and traffic in the surrounding area shot up the need to close it and move to a new location was clear. Heathrow’s answer was always to expand and make the problems worse, building new terminals (and actually closing runways that had become too short for the newer aircraft.) Heathrow should have been closed down years ago – and would have been a great site for a new town.
St Patrick’s Day – 2008: A parade in Willesden on Monday March 17th 2008 celebrated St Patrick’s Day. I came to it from a protest by the all-Irish environmental and social justice movement Gluaiseacht against the Corrib Gas Project in Mayo outside the Shell Centre, and had to rush away for a protest by Tibetans at the Chinese Embassy.
Brent St Patrick’s Day Parade – Willesden Green
Brent is one of London’s more diverse boroughs and has a large population of Irish and Anglo-Irish residents, particularly in what was sometimes called “County Kilburn“. As a borough it promoted various events to celebrate and unite its different communities, and among them I think was the only London borough to have its own St Patrick’s Day Parade.
Or it did until government cuts in funding to local authorities which hit particularly hard on boroughs like Brent meant it could no longer afford to support these community events.
London does now celebrate St Patrick’s Day with a march and event in Trafalgar Square on the nearest Sunday to the day itself, and I photographed the first of these, promoted by then London Mayor Ken Livingstone in 2002, though I only put a few black and white images on to My London Diary.
But the parade in Brent, though often involving some of the same people and floats was always a more interesting and intimate event, with the large local element giving it greater authenticity and I was sorry to see it go.
Local people came to view the parade, some waiting patiently on the pavement, others spilling out of packed bars drinks in hand as it arrived.
Local schools got involved, with children of all ethnicities becoming involved – and their families coming to watch.
I went to where the march was to start, at an Islamic Centre close to Willesden Green Underground Station, where the streets were most crowded and followed the procession as it made its way to the library in High Road Willesden where there were various musical performances and a bit of a funfair.
St Patrick was there of course, with the Mayor of Brent and others leading the parade. People walked with flags of the Irish counties (or at least the 26 of the 32 that are in the Republic of Ireland.)
I had to rush away shortly after the parade began to cover another protest.
All-Irish environmental and social justice movement Gluaiseacht were in London for the weekend, and on St Patrick’s Day itself gathered outside the Shell HQ at Waterloo, bringing with them a very large pipeline.
The protest was over the Corrib Gas Project in Mayo in the north-west of Ireland, which the Irish Government has given at a knock-down price to Shell, Statoil and Marathon. It’s a project estimated to be worth over 50 billion Euros, but the Irish people will hardly benefit from the profits – and Shell gets the largest share.
Even worse the people in Mayo will suffer from the pollution around an inland refinery and a high pressure pipeline that will endanger local communities. Protests in Ireland have led to innocent people being jailed.
According to the Chinese Authorities, they “exercised restraint” in dealing with the Lhasa protests, using only non-lethal weapons and only killing 13 innocent civilians. Monday afternoon’s demonstration in Portland Place opposite the Chinese Embassy was timed to coincide with the midnight deadline in Lhasa for protesters to surrender.
After protesting for around an hour on the opposite side of the wide dual carriageway, one man jumped over the barriers and rushed across towards the embassy door waving a Tibetan flag. Others followed and police were unable to stop them.
The stewards from the protest tried to get them to make back and were eventually able to persuade them with some gentle pushing to make back to the central island in the road where the protest continued, with some of the protesters sitting down.
Eventually police reinforcements arrived and after failing to persuade them them to move an officer read out something over a loudspeaker. The protest was too noisy for me to hear it, but I think it was a warning that the protesters would be arrested if they didn’t go back to the pavement. The stewards then persuaded everyone to move back to the pavement to continue their vigil, and I went home.
Santas, Sardines & Earth Strike: On Saturday 14th December 2019 the Santas were on BMX bikes raising money for charity, Italians were supporting a spontaneous Italian anti-fascist movement and Earth Strike, a small group of anti-capitalist and anti-imperialists against environmental destruction held their first protest in Brixton.
Santas BMX Life Charity Ride
If you are in London today look out for the 10th BMX Life’s Santa Cruise riding around the capital in a charity ride raising money for the Evelina Children’s Heart Organisation, ECHO. There is a link for donations on the page linked.
One rider had ignored the dress code, though he was wearing a Christmas jumper
The ride begins as it did five years ago in the graffiti tunnel under Waterloo Station and 10.30am and the dress code is Santa, Elf, Snowman,Christmas Tree or Reindeer.
So far by these rides and a number of raffles BMX Life have raised over £180,000 for ECHO and they hope that this year’s ride will be bigger than ever. When I took these pictures in 2019 there were around 700 riders.
From Leake St they moved off to Forum Magnum Square where some santas demonstrated their riding skills before the group left to ride around London.
‘6000 Sardines’ London protest – Parliament Square
The Sardines movement was a grass roots political movement which began in Italy in November 2019 after a flash mob in Bologna opposing right-wing leader Matteo Salvini packed the main square in Bologna “like sardines”.
People were appalled at the rise of Salvini because of his anti-immigrant policies, hate speech and Euroscepticism and the movement prompted other ‘sardine’ protests across Italy and by Italians elsewhere, with demonstrations, flash mobs and online actions.
14th December was declared ‘Global Sardine Day’, with similar rallies across Europe and in the USA as well as in many towns and cities in Italy. All of the speeches while I was at the event were in Italian.
The movement ended with the elections in January 2020 in the Bologna region of northern Italy, which resulted in a resounding victory for the centre-left who almost doubled the vote they had received five years earlier.
The protest by Earth Strike South London began ther protest against environmental destruction with speeches and handing out fliers at a street stall on the corner of Coldharbour Lane and Brixton Rd, where members of the Revolutionary Communist Group taking part were also selling their newspaper.
The fliers pointed out that many companies who trade on our high streets are still making a huge contribution to global warming and environmental destruction and they went on to march up Brixton Road stopping for speeches and to protest at some of the major culprits.
They began by going into Barclays Bank who still have huge investments in fossil fuels and are major backers of fracking in the UK. They ignored bank staff who told them they could not protest inside but handed out leaflets and made a speech about the bank’s activities before leaving after a few minutes.
Next stop was H&M where they pointed out he fashion industry is the second largest producer of greenhouse gases, emitting 1.2 billion tons a year and textile manufacture creates 20% of all water pollution. They stood outside and ignored a security man who told them to go away.
A couple of police officers arrived and talked to the protesters who assured them that their protest would be peaceful. The officers then went away.
The protesters moved on to EE where they pointed out mobile phones and other similar electronic produces all need minerals such as Coltan, and the fight for these is behind the horrific wars that have taken place in the Congo region. Mining companies are also huge exploiters of African labour, create large amounts of pollution. lay huge areas to waste and evade taxes on a huge scale.
Further along the road they stopped briefly to point out that Boots avoids paying taxes in the UK, cheats the NHS and sells palm oil products made by clearing forests, destroying ecosystems. They make huge profits from the NHS, and are said to have charged charged them £1500 for pots of cream they sell for £2, as well as selling palm oil products grown on land cleared from ancient forests, disrupting ecosystems and resulting in the loss of species including orangutans.
At Sainsbury’s they reminded customers that it sells many products that harm the environment and lead to global warming, including beef that comes from ranches made by burning the Amazon Forest, destroying ecosystems and displacing indigenous tribes.
They held another protest outside Vodaphone, also a tax avoider and as well reliant on those minerals fuelling wars in central Africa before walking on to Brixton Police station.
Here they held a brief vigil for those killed by police in Brixton, including Ricky Bishop and Sean Rigg who was beaten to death inside the police station in 2008.
I left the group here as they were to continue their protest at shops on the opposite side of Brixton Road.
No to Heathrow Expansion: When Zac Goldsmith was elected as MP for the Richmond Park constituency in 2010 he had promised he would resign if the government support a third runway at Heathrow. And when they did so in October 2016 he kept his word, forcing a by-election in which he stood as an independent candidate. The election took place on December 1st 2016, a couple of weeks after this rally.
As a part of his campaigning against Heathrow Expansion – and his election campaign around this issue, he called a public meeting on Richmond Green on Saturday 19th November 2016.
Zac Goldsmith
Many groups campaigning against airport expansion came to support, including Richmond Heathrow Campaign, Teddington Action Group, SHE (Stop Heathrow Expansion), Residents Against Aircraft Noise(RAAN), Chiswick Against the Third Runway and others campaigning against the noise, pollution and catastrophic climate change the third runway and expansion of aviation would cause.
But also at the meeting where Green Party and Lib-Dem supporters. All major candidates in the by-election were strongly opposed to Heathrow so although many admired Goldsmith for keeping his promise Heathrow was not really at issue in the election. The Green Party, strong in the area, did not put up a candidate as the local party instead voted to support the Lib-Dem candidate Sarah Olney, who beat Goldsmith by 1872 votes. Her major campaign issue was opposition to Brexit, which Goldsmith supported.
The Conservative Party had also not put up a candidate, feeling correctly that to do so would result in a large split in the Tory vote, leading both to to a humiliating defeat for any official Tory candidate as well as giving the seat to the Lib-Dems. Although Goldsmith was standing as an independent, many leading Tories backed him.
John Stewart of HACAN
A few of Goldsmith’s supporters objected to me taking pictures, insisting it was a private meeting, which was of course total nonsense – it had been called as a public meeting and was taking place in a very public place. One man followed me around trying to get me to stop. Perhaps they realised that although the rally showed considerable opposition to Heathrow there was little if any support for their candidate.
I left after most of the campaigners had spoken and before various local government representatives spoke. All but one of the local authorities in the area are against the third runway. You can read more about the rally and the speakers in my account – with many more pictures on My London Diary.
Climate Crisis rally against Airport Expansion – Heathrow
Harmondsworth resident Neil Keveren of Stop Heathrow Expansion speaks again at Heathrow
I left before the end of the rally on Richmond Green to get to a protest taking place at Heathrow by public transport.
Activists from Rising Up were blocking the Heathrow spur from the M4 and local campaigners were holding a family-friendly demonstration in support on the Bath Road overlooking the airport.
Campaigners met at the Three Magpies on a part of Bath Road which would disappear under the Third runway and I had time for a quick pint and a few words with the barmaid who I knew from previous Heathrow campaigns before we walked the short distance to the Bath Road bridge over the airport spur from the M4
Police would not allow me through to photograph the road block, which I could just see in the distance with police vehicles surrounding the activists who were blocking the road into the airport – too far away to photograph with any lens I own – and we could hear their sirens.
There was a large police presence at the rally on the pavement of Bath Road which organisers had made clear would be entirely peaceful and legal. This seemed a considerable waste of police resources, and more like an attempt to intimidate the protesters rather than as police usually claim is their role – to facilitate the protest and ensure safety.
Most of the speakers at the rally were those I had already heard on Richmond Green earlier in the day, although there were none of the Conservative Goldsmith supporters who were presumably still busy campaigning in Richmond. But there were also others, including from Grow Heathrow who were still in occupation of a derelict local nursery, from Occupy and environmental campaigner Donnachadh McCarthy.
George Barda
Speakers argued that expansion at Heathrow would mean the UK breaking its own laws on reducing carbon emissions, and undermine the Paris agreements. The new runway would devastate local communities with many families losing their homes bring chaos to transport already highly stressed in a wide area around. It would increase the dangerous levels of air pollution both from the flights as well as the traffic increase in a wide area, as well as noise pollution across much of London under the flight paths.
Donnachadh McCarthy
They pointed out that as well as the actual runway the development would need a huge spending on infrastructure in the area with important roads having to be re-routed – and that Heathrow was expecting the taxpayer to pick up almost all the bill, which Transport for London predict would be around £18 billion. And the actual cost of all such large projects always turns out much higher than projected.
Local resident Christine Taylor of Stop Heathrow Expansion
As I wrote then, “We need to totally rethink the aviation industry and evaluate the contribution it makes to our economy, and to remove its privileged status and subsidies which currently allow it to expand and pollute for the benefit of its shareholders and the convenience of rich frequent flyers. The industry greatly inflates the contribution it makes to the economy while refusing to acknowledge the many problems it creates.“
But even more importantly as I also pointed out, “We don’t just need to stop airport expansion, but to reassess much of they way we live. We need System Change if we are to avoid the disastrous effects of Climate Change.”
Eight years later there has been no start on expanding Heathrow, but there is very little evidence that this reassessment is taking place, and the election of Trump for a second term makes it even less likely that the world can avoid an unthinkable disaster. Perhaps the only question now is when rather than whether it will happen.
Climate Rush Protest Heathrow: On 4th September 2009 I joined Climate Rush at Sipson, one of the villages immediately north of Heathrow under threat from the plans to build a third runway.
Their 3 day stay here was their first stop on a one month tour of South West England and they were staying at the Sipson ‘Airplot’, bought by Greenpeace in what was planned to be the centre of the new runway. The legal owners of the plot were now “Oscar winning actress Emma Thompson, comedian Alistair McGowan and prospective Tory parliamentary candidate Zac Goldsmith and Greenpeace UK.”
Greenpeace had invited others to sign up to become ‘beneficial owners’ of small 1 metre square plots within the site and I was among the many who did so. They had hoped this would make it harder for the developers as they thought we would all need to be served with legal notices for the development to go ahead.
I’d long been opposed to the expansion of Heathrow. It remains clear that this is an airport that was set up in the wrong place, to close to London in a fairly densely populated area and with flight paths over the centre of London. And with the increasing threat of climate change and global extinction one of the last things we should be doing is increasing the carbon emissions and pollution from aviation; instead we should be looking at ways to cut down both the number of flights and the pollution from traffic and congestion in the area surrounding the airport.
I’ve lived most of my life close to Heathrow. As I wrote on My London Diary:
“I grew up under the main flight path in use for landing a couple of miles from touchdown. Although I was a plane spotter at an early age, all of us living there felt the disruption it caused in our lives, even back in the 1950s.
My teachers often had to stop and wait in mid-sentence for a plane to go over. We could often smell the fuel, and see and feel the oily grime although I don’t think the term “pollution” had then really entered normal vocabulary.
At a deeper level, I still sometimes have nightmares about planes going over in flames (as they sometimes did) and crashes, although since Terminal 4 blocked one of the existing runways (Heathrow was built with six though only two are now used) thankfully planes no longer shake my present house as they come in low on landing or take off. “
I wrote more about this back in 2009, as well as the continuing history of lies and deceit by which the airport was established and has since grown and grown. And also about the area as it was before the airport, rich agricultural land with market gardens and orchards. Of course I didn’t know it myself but my father did and cycled through it.
In the 1950s on my own bikes I cycled through the villages which would be destroyed by a third runway, particularly Harmondsworth which has retained much of its original charm, with a village green with a pub and church and, a few yards away, one of the finest medieval tithe barns (2 pictures at bottom of this page.) There is much more to read on My London Diary.
Climate Rush had organised a procession from the Sipson Airplot, led by local residents from NoTRAG, though most were at work today – more were expected later in the day and at the ‘Celebration of Community Resistance’ at Sipson the following day. “Suffragettes (including a ‘token’ male) wearing ‘Deeds Not Words ‘ and ‘Climate Rush’ red sashes carried three banners, Justice, Equity and Truth; Equity traveled on a horse-drawn cart along with a violinist. “
The banners read: JUSTICE: Rich Countries must recognise historic responsibility for climate change. EQUITY: Emission quotas must be per capita; the rich have no more right to pollute than the poor. TRUTH: Emission caps must be set in line with the latest climate science.
The procession went down the Heathrow and along the Northern Perimeter Road beside the perimeter fence, where we were joined by a police car, which stopped traffic for us before retuning to the Airplot.
There it was time to rest, and to eat some of the apples from the side of the plot. “A couple of the suffragettes climbed a tree to pick some more, but they turned out to be cookers. The kettle had been hanging over the embers of a wood fire and a few more sticks soon brought it to the boil for tea.”
I’d come to Sipson on the bike which I had ridden through there fifty years earlier – a present on my thirteenth birthday – and had got a puncture just a few hundred yards short of my destination.
“I sat down to mend my puncture. Unfortunately I its a while since I checked the repair kit in my pannier, and having found two largish holes found I didn’t have a large enough patch to cover the two of them and the rubber solution had dried up. It was time for me to walk the six miles home.”
The Future For Aviation: The protest at London City Airport on Monday 21st July 2014 by ‘The Future‘, a campaigning group set up to fight climate change and ecological devastation by non-violent protest along with some local residents addressed specific issues related to that airport, but also wider questions about the future of aviation, both still very much with us. A decision is expected shortly by our new Labour government on further expansion plans for the airport following a public inquiry which closed in February.
The group used a painted circle around one eye as a symbol that the people are watching those in power, calling on politicians and others to take action rather than let themselves be bought by corporate interests. And they stated “we will judge them if they choose the toxicity of London City Airport over the health of local people and of London.”
Ten years later, ‘The Future’ are forgotten, and while there has been nothing like enough action the growing signs of the coming catastrophe are just perhaps beginning to get some movement, though still too little and too late.
It should now be clear to every thinking person that we have to find ways to reverse the growth in the aviation industry. To end airport expansion and increasing numbers of flights. Not ideas like changing to bio-fuels or specious calculations over planting trees to compensate for the CO2 generated by flights, nor on the pipe-dream of electric aircraft but quite simply reducing the number of flights.
Quite how this can be done is a matter for discussion, but some measures, such as removing the subsidies for aviation and banning incentive schemes with air miles and discounts could be simply implemented.
Heathrow and London City Airport also pose other problems, generating pollution and noise pollution both from their flight and from the traffic and congestion they generate in urban areas of our heavily polluted city.
The history of London City Airport is a case-study in how the aviation industry has operated by deception. When set up it was to be a low traffic site providing limited services between European capitals for business travellers from the nearby Canary Wharf and the City of London using small, quiet aircraft specially built for short take-off and landing.
Even so the Greater London Council opposed its setting up in the former Royal Docks in Newham, surrounded by densely populated areas but were overruled by central government.
Those initial promises have been long been superseded and by 2014 passenger numbers were 25 times as great with the airport no a a major commercial airport, its runway extended to allow use by larger and far more noisy aircraft, including some scheduled trans-Atlantic flights. From a handful of flights a day there were by then around 15 per hour in its allowed operation times. And more new housing in the surrounding areas had made the airport’s site even less tenable.
The airport was then about to make a planning application for further expansion. Then London Mayor Boris Johnson directed Newham Council to turn this down, but in 2016 transport secretary Chris Grayling and communities secretary Sajid Javid overrode the decision and gave the £344 million scheme the go-ahead.
In 2023, Newham Council again turned down further expansion plans but the airport again appealed. A public inquiry took place in December 2023 to February 2024, and a decision was expected by 23rd July 2024. But the general election means that the decision will now be made by our new Labour government. It will be a key indicator in demonstrating if our new government is really serious in its announced intentions to combat climate change and pollution.
Climate Rush Palm Oil Gala: On Wednesday 1st July 2009 Climate Rush protested outside the Millennium Hotel in Grosvenor Square where industries deforesting tropical forests to grow biofuel crops including palm oil were holding a Gala Dinner and Dance.
Palm oil production is causing a particular problems in Indonesia, where indigenous people have seen their traditional lands taken over by companies for palm oil production under unfair laws.
Primates not Palm Oil; Food not Fuel
The forests were their land and the living and many who have been moved off have been left in marginal land often without clean water supplies and the promises made by the palm oil companies to the people have not been kept, and the regulations which offer them some very limited protection have not been enforced by the authorities, with many sufferting violent attacks by armed security forces and police.
Police offer Tamsin Omond and Climate Rush a nice safe protest pen
Palm oil plantations disrupt natural drainage and bring problems of pollution and flooding. Destruction of their habitats eliminates most of the wildlife and species including the orangutan and the Sumatran tiger are under threat.
A detailed report, ‘Losing Ground’ for Friends of the Earth looked in particular at the human rights issues and concluded that “The EU target to increase agrofuel use is misguided, risking environmental damage and human rights abuses on an even bigger scale.“
Climate Rush’s flyer for the event stated “90% of orangutans have disappeared since the Suffragettes first appeared 100 years ago.“
They began their protest with a picnic in the park of Grosvenor Square opposite the hotel entrance, and people got ready for the protest.
When their Jazz Band began to play, people moved out onto the street and blocked it dancing outside the hotel. They rejected police requests to move into the pen which police told them was created “for your safety“.
The police concentrated their actions waiting for the expected “rush” to the hotel, protecting the hotel with a small line of officers.
After around half an hour of dancing on the street the “rush” came, though I think it was really only ever a token attempt to enter the building. Most of the police seemed fairly relaxe or even amused by it, but there were a few who reacted rather violently and a couple of protesters were rather roughly thrown to the ground when a small group of police charged into them.
After this, the protesters moved back and sat down on the road in front of the doorway for a while.
Eventually they decided to get up and briefly danced a conga, before deciding to go back into the park to continue their picnic, and I felt it was time to go home for my own dinner.
