On Tuesday evening, Youth Demand held a publicly advertised welcome meeting to invite the public to take part in peaceful civil resistance to protest government inaction and complicity in the Gazan genocide and the climate crisis. Their meeting was held at the Quakers’ Meeting House in Westminster, and the police raid was described as an “aggressive violation of our place of worship” by the recording clerk for Quakers in Britain, Paul Parker.
The police arrested six young people on suspicion of conspiracy to commit public nuisance. This arose from publicly advertised plans to cause disruption across London during April using a technique known as swarming.
In the past, police have used a ‘seven minute’ rule on road-blocking protests, in response to Just Stop Oil’s slow march protests in UK cities, describing this time period as a proportionate exercise in freedom of assembly and speech, but new public order offences brought in after pressure from oil-funded lobbyists and ‘think tanks’, have redefined the common law offence of public nuisance into a new criminal definition as “anything causing more than minor disruption”, which is clearly a catch-all and part of an anti-protest push from government.
Paul Parker said “Freedom of speech, assembly, and fair trials are an essential part of free public debate which underpins democracy.” So is a free press, but we are also seeing a wave of arrests of journalists recently, and Tuesday was yet another example. One of the six arrested was a young woman attending the meeting as a journalist. According to Dr Clive Dolphin from Defend Our Juries she was held for around 16 hours and her home was raided.
In response to this new low in repressive policing, at short notice on Thursday lunchtime, more than 200 people gathered to take part in an hour-long Quaker worship meeting held outside New Scotland Yard. As is common in meetings, most of the hour was spent in silent reflection, punctuated occasionally by someone feeling moved to stand and say a few words, or perhaps give a snippet of song. Dozens had also come with letters for the Commissioner Mark Rowley, but security at the entrance said they had been instructed not to accept any letters and suggested posting them.
Today, Youth Demand are going ahead with a planned meeting at 11am at Lincolns Inn Fields, prior to carrying out swarms across the capital, the first of many planned to cause disruption until the government act on their two simple demands. First, they want a full trade embargo with Israel, and second they want a government commitment to raise a trillion pounds by 2030 through taxation and other means from the super rich, the fossil fuel corporations and financial supporters to pay damages to communities and countries harmed by fossil fuel burning. They pledge to continue peaceful civil resistance in pursuit of these aims.
