Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Democracy Live? It looks pretty dead to me...

Louise Almond | 14.11.2010 17:10 | SOCPA | Repression | World

Article about a recent House of Lords debate of 8th Nov 2010. Following a question by Baroness Trumpington of the Conservative party asking: "Is any agency responsible the removal of those occupying the pavement in Parliament Square?" , Home Office Minister Baroness Neville-Jones declares the UK government's intention to bring in new legislation to remove the Parliament Square protesters.

Public Notice
Public Notice


House of Lords debate. 8th Nov 2010 Following a question by Baroness Trumpington of the Conservative party asking: "Is any agency responsible the removal of those occupying the pavement in Parliament Square?" , Home Office Minister Baroness Neville-Jones declares the UK government's intention to bring in new legislation to remove the Parliament Square protesters.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6ficguPTIY

By Louise Almond 14/11/10

I actually feel nauseous having just watched 7 minutes of a House of Lords debate in which peers refer to the protesters of Parliament Square as 'squatters' and 'litter'. How else is one supposed to feel upon watching the tiny elite of British society - an elite which has facilitated two illegal wars in 9 years, and so is therefore an elite populated by war criminals - chortling and guffawing their way through a discussion of how best to proceed in limiting the right of public protest. At the bottom of the screen we are told that we are viewing 'Democracy - Live', a democracy where those discussing are unelected and those being discussed have no formal right of reply.

If the 'noble' Lords had bothered to seek out an informed opinion in order to balance out the debate, I believe many of those involved with the Parliament Square protests would have raised the following points:

1. Access - The 'honourable' peers seem to feel it is their duty to seek to evict the parliament square protesters on account of the perception that the protest prevents public access to a world heritage site. If access is such a concern, why then does the GLA persist in fencing off the square when, by the admission of the peers, all reconstruction work has been completed? Furthermore, why have none of the several bodies responsible for the management of Parliament Square ensured that their is a safe way to access the site? At present one has to brave three lanes of traffic without the aide of a pedestrian crossing - something which is quite obviously a violation of equality laws as it prevents wheelchair users accessing the square.

2. Current legislation - The peers posit that the issue with current legislation is that each authorised protester is allowed up to 20 more people under their permission. At a guess I imagine such a provision was allowed for under SOCPA in order for the legislation to be compatible with Article 11 of the Human Rights Act, and perhaps also to save the police a logistical nightmare when granting permisssions to protest. The peers feel that this provision is leading to a violation of the acceptable boundaries of peaceful protest? Well let me first suggest their are no boundaries to what is an acceptable level of peaceful protest when citizens are trying to stop a government committing war crimes. Let me secondly suggest that having to apply for police authorisation to protest is a violation of human rights, whether or not the European Courts find it acceptable.

In fact, as someone who recently stayed at Parliament Square, I would argue that the issue is not that current legislation is too liberal, but that the authorities are failing to enforce their current legislation. Whilst Peace Strike and Brian Haw's protest have SOCPA authorisation, there are several inhabitants at the square who have no interest in peaceful protest and behave in ways which are detrimental to the 'legitimate' campaigns. Despite an awareness of this, the powers that be have failed to check the authorisation of those camped out, and so are allowing the very squatting that the honourable peers are so appalled by. That said we must be aware that those camped without authorisation, are a representation of some of the most disenfranchised members of society, whose addictions and 'anti-social' behaviours are a direct result of social inequality, so perhaps their very presence outside the institution that upholds inequity is a legitimate protest.

The authorities' lack of enthusiasm for enforcing their own legislation is not new to Parliament Square. If we rewind to the days of Democracy Village, one may remember that it had no authorisation under SOCPA and so could have been cleared by the police at any time. By the polices' own admission, however, they were told to stand down (an order which stretched to allowing acts of extreme violence to occur unchallenged).

So in the summer we saw the State was unwilling to enforce its own draconain legislation for fear of revealing the lie which is Britain's democracy, choosing instead to quash peaceful protest through the high court so that it can be claimed D.V. was given a fair trial.

Knowing this I guess I should have a stronger stomach, and that it should have come as no surprise to see a house of unelected representatives busying themselves with finding new ways to silence the voice of legitimate dissent. In fact on closer examination it is not a feeling of nausea that I have at watching the clip, it is a fire in my belly - and that fire is one I know is shared by the many people I have met through visiting Parliament Square. It is a fire that will ensure that whatever new legal fictions the dishonourable peers dream up to protect the interests of the international war machine, there will be honourable protesters challenging their every lie and showing that the power of peaceful protest is something that can never be suppressed.

See also:

people's assembly and more fence jumping (25th July)  http://london.indymedia.org/articles/5330

Activists stages Westminster Sit-in (9th November)  http://london.indymedia.org/articles/5916

Louise Almond
- e-mail: lady.almondo@gmail.com

Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech