Page Content | Events
Features
Newswire
Publish
Links
Regions
Other IMCs
Search
Leeds Bradford IMC | UK IMC | Editorial Guidelines | Mission Statement | About Us | Contact | Help | Support Us

(((i))) Leeds Bradford

Read It. Write It. DO IT!

Leafletters Face Harassment On Leeds Wilko's Picket

Campaign Against Prison Slavery | 19.12.2004 17:20

Campaign Against Prison Slavery protestors face harrassment from lickspittle stree-wardens.

CAMPAIGN AGAINST PRISON SLAVERY
Leafletters Face Harassment On Leeds Wilko's Picket

Why the officious manager of Wiko's Leeds branch has not received a warning for wasting police time would be a mystery to anyone unaware of the police's established role in protecting Capitalism. Every single time there has been a picket of Leeds city centre branch of the prison slave labour chain their manager has called the police to have us moved on, and each time the police have told him that, as yet, they have no powers to do so. Today, Sunday 19th December, shortly after the commencement of leafleting outside the store, he instead complained to a 'street warden'. The idiot in question (strret warden 07), despite not having a leg to stand on legally, tried to get our leafleters to move on, quickly getting flustered when they refused. Frustrated by this, and huffing and puffing like a diminutive bad wolf, 'Napoleon' summoned his colleague 'Oddjob' (street warden 09) to the scene. Both of these lickspittle's then tried to intimidate CAPS protestors into going away, with various threats, and veiled references to Leeds Council bylaws.

Eventually two slightly less officious colleagues were called as further back-up. On a pre-Xmas Sunday, with Millwall playing in Leeds, you'd think the 4 of them might have had something better to do with themselves than act as 'hired guns' for Wilko's, and the frustration of the 2 new arrivals with their dim-witted colleagues could hardly have been more apparent. The bylaw being quoted is one aimed at "Touting" - "No person shall in any street or public space for the purpose of selling or advertising any article or obtaining custom tout or importune to the annoyance or obstruction of passengers." Whoever this bylaw is aimed at it certainly did not apply here, not only were our leaflets not causing any annoyance to anyone except the management of Wilkinson's, but they were not touting for business. Refusing to budge our protestors then awaited the arrival of the police (incredibly, at this point, Oddjob tried to get them to leave, saying they were "making a mountain out of a mole-hill"!)

When the police arrived in the shape of a young constable, you almost had to feel sorry for him having to deal with the now almost-hysterical Napoleon and his even thicker colleague Oddjob, who were reduced to telling him all sorts of rubbish. But it was clear that, as yet, the Law still allows people to peacefully give out leaflets, whether Wilkinson's management likes them or not. But flustered by their own incompetence, and the fact they had been unable to intimidate our protestors Napoleon and Oddjob weren't having it. This lead, bizarrely, to an impromptu conference, involving the young copper, Oddjob, Napoleon, their two colleagues, two newly-arrived police support officers, a plain-clothes cop or store detective, a street-cleaner, and the Wilko's manager!

After a considerable period of time, our protestors were again informed by the police that they had every right to leaflet outside Wilko's. The matter looked resolved, much to the annoyance of Napoleon, but then he threatened to issue a 'ticket' "on suspicion of causing litter" ie littering 'by proxy'! This was despite the fact that there was no evidence of any of the CAPS leaflets being distributed having been dropped on the ground! Arbitrarily he demanded the details of one of our protestors, who refused to give them. Napoleon was huffing and puffing for all he was worth now, and managing to make himself look more and more ridiculous by the minute. Eventually he slunk off, no doubt to take his frustration out on some teenage skate-boarders or some homeless people. However, the fact is that leafleting of Wilko's was disrupted for an hour by this officious little idiot. Leeds CAPS will be consulting solicitors about the incident, and vow to continue their protests against Wilko's slave labour store, irrespective of jumped-up 'little Hitler's and jobsworth's like Napoleon and Oddjob.

You can show your support by attending the next Leeds CAPS picket.

Campaign Against Prison Slavery
- e-mail: againstprisonslavery@mail.com
- Homepage: http://www.againstprisonslavery.org

Comments

Display the following 3 comments

  1. article on leafletting rights — fB
  2. there's loads of these people being recruited — bobby
  3. grass — stefan

Write It
Publish your news

Do you need help with publishing?

Search

The Common Place - Leeds The 1 in 12 club - Bradford The Trades Club - Hebden Bridge

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

IMCs


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