This saturday activists picketed and shutdown the vodafone shop in central Bristol in protest against coporate tax evasion and government cuts.
After a very successful demo last week, which closed vodafone for the day (https://www.bristol.indymedia.org.uk/article/697351) activists decided a repeat performance was in order!

This time a public callout was sent out in advance and announced at the meeting of the Bristol & District Anti Cuts Alliance, in the hope that different people would be attracted to the demonstration. This did, of course, result in further police attention with two mounted officers following us from the castle park meetup to the vodafone store and 3 officers on foot keeping watch. However they kept their distance and didn't interfere.

When the first of us arrived at the vodafone store we found it was already shut in anticipation of our arrival! This raised the spirits of the five of us that had turned up, but not as much as the arrival of another dozen or so activists over the next twenty minutes. A guadian journalist interviewed a couple of the people present (Article: http://bit.ly/c6n4V7), and a BBC cameraman attended, but with no BBC journalist due to the strike, not that we would've spoken to a scab anyway!

A wide variety of people, including anarchists, trade unionists, students and members of the anti cuts alliance kept the shop shut for a total of two hours. Several hundred leaflets were handed out, which explained vodafones tax evasion, government complicity and the fact that we are definately not "in this together", since whilst we pay with our services (and tax) the rich pay as little as possible.

Vodafone opened up again around 3pm, and we were 'ordered' by them to move our picket from the front of the shop to the side, which we refused to do. After a brief disscussion it became clear that a number of people present were not up for the level of confrontation involved in blockading the shops doors, so a peaceful picket was kept up instead. We continued to engage with members of the public and some potential customers were turned away (and others encouraged to demand a free phone).

Austerity measures and capitalist greed arn't just going to go away - but neither are we.

Keep your eyes pealed and your ears to the ground for more up coming anticuts demonstrations and direct actions around Bristol, we're just getting started.

While your at it, why not show solidarity with our friends & comrades down the road in bath and attend the anticuts demonstration their on tuesday the 16th: http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/698026