Day 7 Report from Tarpaulin Revolution – Occupy Democracy Protest The Hero *15 peaceful pro-democracy protesters arrested. *Green Party Peer Jenny Jones arrested. *Former Deputy Chair of LibDems Donnachadh McCarthy arrested for possession of tarpaulin under his arm! (Under new law attacking free speech in Parliament Square enacted by Lib Dems/Tories). Having spent a night in a real bed, I returned to Tarpaulin Square yesterday morning, having heard the overnight protesters had successfully survived the storm, wrapped in tarpaulin. Yet again, I found the seated peaceful democracy protesters besieged by huge numbers of riot police. They were violently removing them one by one, until there were just 4 young women left, distraught and in floods of tears. They too were brutally removed. As this was happening I scribbled out a slogan on a piece of paper “The Tarpaulin Revolution – Free Speech RIP”. I held a folded up tarpaulin in my other arm. 3 aggressive officers from Westminster Council immediately approached me and stated that possession of the tarpaulin was a proscribed item in “Parliament” Square’s footpaths and either I removed it or they would serve me a confiscation notice. I said they were trying to arrest me for peaceful protest in front of “parliament”. They said they were not but filled out a notice and threw it at me. It fell to the ground. I saw Green Party Peer Jenny Jones and shouted at her that they were trying to arrest me. Jenny came over and I asked her to hold the plastic with me, which she did. The police sought to forcibly steal it from me. I felt that this was not accepted in a peaceful protest, so I held on. Jenny asked the police to leave me alone, that everybody was completely over-reacting. The chief superintendant heard her and lost his temper completely and screamed at Jenny that she could not tell his officers what to do. He then screamed at the officers to arrest all of us. Six officers then attacked me and threw me to the ground and jumped on top of me, forcing metal handcuffs onto my wrists. It was terrifying. I had no idea how many injuries my body was going to receive. I was given no opportunity to accept arrest without physical attack. The hand-cuffing was excruciatingly painful. They then carried me to a wagon and took me to Brixton Prison. I was held there for 7 hours in solitary confinement. Upon release, I was bailed to come back in six weeks to face a charge of being in possession of plastic sheet in Parliament Square! As I was the last of the democracy protesters to be arrested, whilst in jail I worried that they had violently suppressed the protest. It was 8pm by the time I was released and I headed straight back to Tarpaulin Square. I was amazed to see more people had flooded in to replace the arrestees! Even Churchill’s Statue was occupied on behalf of reclaiming back our democracy. But Boris Johnson had ordered the caging in of “Parliament” Square and it was being patrolled by riot police and guard dogs!! I was the first of the arrestees to make it back and got lots of loving hugs which were really welcome! Volunteers had arrived from all over Britain – Glasgow, Birmingham, Cardiff, and Brighton!! There was a fresh new group of 20 heroes volunteering to hold the space overnight. A people’s assembly had been held as normal and decisions made on how to continue the democracy festival of Occupy Democracy talks every day. I gave a quick report back on the arrests to the protesters. But I also added that Gandhi set fire to a peaceful revolution that toppled the British Empire’s hold on India by the simple peaceful symbology of taking some salt without paying the British Salt Tax. Boris Johnson’s violent obsession with removing sheets of plastic had shown that the simple tarpaulin was our peaceful revolution’s handful of salt! I shared a lovely spiritual healing meditation under a beautiful old tree on the side of Tarpaulin Square and then headed home to sleep in my bed, hoping the overnight volunteers would not be too violently treated by Boris by the morning. Luke Holland one of the overnight volunteers just texted me to say that as of 7am, Tarpaulin Square was still occupied by Occupy Democracy! We have lived to protest for democracy another day! Check out the timetable of pro-democracy festival events on all week on Occupy Democracy Webite. Yes We Are!! https://youtube/watch?v=W77mnfAM2uk#t=908
Posted on: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 06:58:15 +0000
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