'Brian Cass, the head of Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS), said: "So much of the activity [from animal rights campaigners] has gone away - and a lot of the activists are behind bars."

He called for "one final push" from the police [...]'

'SHAC NATIONAL MARCH AND RALLY

SHAC National March and Rally
Saturday November 10th
Meet 11am, Riverside Car Park, Huntingdon.

There are just a few weeks to go to the National March and Rally in Huntingdon. Please make every effort to attend this very important demo, transport is being arranged from around the country. Please contact us for details of transport from your area, or if you are going and can offer transport to other protesters.

The national March and Rally to the labs at Huntingdon next month will be the first such march for several years. Protests have been limited to 50 people, once a week, after HLS obtained a temporary High Court Order. Earlier this year, the Order was finally granted to HLS, but the terms were varied, allowing for the return of large demonstrations at the site, as well as the use of megaphones during protests.

However the ban on large protests at the sites did not succeed in any way in stopping the campaign. In fact in the face of this repression the campaign to shut down the labs has continued to grow, and has now become a global phenomenen, unprecedented in the history of the movement.

Indeed this is a campaign which under normal circumstances would have been successful several times over. The UK government has repeatedly stepped in and used hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers money to bail out HLS. The government now provides banking and insurance facilities for HLS, the only company in the world with access to such priveleges.

Many have asked us why the government is going to such lengths to keep this digraced and discredited company in business. It is no coincidence and no secret that the government has for many years been funded by a small band of wealthy biotech and pharmaceutical entrepreneurs such as David Sainsbury and Christopher Evans. It is widely accepted now that in exchange for these huge donations, these people received honours (both Sainsbury and Evans became
Lords) and even political power in exchange for these huge donations (the so-called "Cash for honours" scandal). However there has been a lesser known payback; the massive input of resources, the hundreds of millions of tax payers' money, spent on defending the biotech and vivisection industry.

And despite all this, HLS remains $100 million in debt, and doesn't even own its buildings. Only 2% of HLS shares are currently being traded, and even then only on an obscure and little used trading scheme, since all the major stock exchanges still refuse to list them. Even the very few companies who recentl bought shares in the company, are now getting rid of their shares just as quickly. Recent large investors who have been added to the long, long list of companies who have stopped dealing with HLS include some of the biggest names in international finance, such as Dresdner/Allianz, Deutche Bank, Robeco and BNP Paribas.

Yet in recent weeks, HLS bosses have been claiming in the media and to anyone who will listen that the Shac campaign is over, while at the same time still whingeing that no companies are prepared to invest in the company. This is a blatant example of wishful thinking on the part of HLS management. The truth is that despite all the resources and the millions spent defending and shoring up this disgraced and nasty company, HLS is as bankrupt and dependent on government handouts as it ever was.

Hence the recent attempts by the authorities to shut down the Shac campaign by other means, by the use of massive police raids on premises across the country and even abroad, by the widespread confiscation of large amounts of campaign materials and personal property, by the targeting and repression of the campaign organisers, the imprisoning of some, the strict bail conditions
imposed on others.

But all their efforts have failed again. The number of protests and actions since the crackdown has actually increased, and even more countries have joined the campaign, and even more companies have ditched HLS.

It's vital that on Saturday November 10th we send a clear and unmistakable message to HLS and their collaborators, that we turn up in huge numbers, that we stand shoulder to shoulder to with those Shac campaigners who cannot be there for unavoidable reasons. We must not fail them or the animals.

Be there.

Contact us for any more details, for details of transport from your area, or if you are going and can offer transport to other protesters.

SHAC
 info@shac.net
0845 458 0630'