Hysterical eco-zealots including pensioners occupy London bridges and lie in the road
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Eco-zealots including pensioners occupied London bridges and lied down in the middle of the road as they brought the capital to a standstill.
Met Police arrested 31 protesters today after they paralysed the City on the second day of a planned month-long campaign of mayhem
Members of the group Just Stop Oil occupied four bridges in the capital, causing gridlock on busy roads, before converging on Parliament.
The protests were the start of an ‘October uprising’ revealed last week in an undercover investigation by The Mail on Sunday.
Just Stop Oil boasted it had ‘brought central London to a standstill by blocking four key bridges to Westminster – Waterloo, Westminster, Lambeth and Vauxhall.
Members of the group Just Stop Oil occupied four bridges in the capital, causing gridlock on busy roads, before converging on Parliament
A demonstrator lies down as he takes part in a protest in front of police officers in London
The protests were the start of an ‘October uprising’ revealed last week in an undercover investigation by The Mail on Sunday
‘This is not a one day event. This is not a symbolic day out, this is an act of resistance against this genocidal government’. In Hatton, Derbyshire, supposed human excrement was poured over a statue of £32 million NHS fund-raiser Captain Sir Tom Moore by a young woman demanding an end to use of private jets.
Just Stop Oil is a rag-tag coalition of Extinction Rebellion, Insulate Britain, Jeremy Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project and other groups.
Just Stop Oil is a rag-tag coalition of Extinction Rebellion, Insulate Britain, Jeremy Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project and other groups
Protesters hold up flags and placards at a protest in London on 1 October 2022
The Mail on Sunday can reveal that the Unite union, Labour’s biggest backer, is supporting Just Stop Oil
Police officers arrest a protestor as people from ‘Just Stop Oil’ protest in London
People from Just Stop Oil continuing to campaign and protest on October 2 as part of the planned October ‘uprising’
Four officers detained a pensioner, who was pictured with her eyes closed
The mob who blocked bridges were eventually moved on by police.
At King’s Cross, former Labour leader Mr Corbyn addressed activists who then set fire to fake energy bills in metal bins in protest at rising gas and electricity prices. One Just Stop Oil member warned activists plan bigger disruption today, saying: ‘It will be more spicy. We plan to get more people arrested tomorrow. Today it is just getting started.’
In Hatton, former medical student Maddie Budd, 21, poured what she said was human faeces on the memorial to Captain Tom, 100, who became a national hero during the pandemic.
Posting footage of her protest, Budd, who belongs to a group called End UK Private Jets, said: ‘Every time one [private jet] takes off, it pours a bucket of s**t and blood on to everything Captain Tom stood for.’
More photos of police officers in Hi-Vis uniforms tackling a Just Stop Oil t-shirt
Police officers detain a protestor as people from Just Stop Oil
At an online meeting on Friday night ahead of the protest, a union official pledged to help pay legal fees for members who are arrested at protests or face trouble at work because of activism
The group began its project on April 1 and since then has seen 1,296 arrests as the protestors demanded the government end new oil and gas projects in the UK
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was among the crowds as his Peace and Justice Project group joined the action as part of the ‘Enough is Enough’ campaign
RMT boss Mick Lynch was also at the protest on October 1 after joining picket lines outside Euston station this morning
Her action was condemned as ‘disgusting’ and ‘sick’ by social- media users.
The Mail on Sunday can reveal that the Unite union, Labour’s biggest backer, is supporting Just Stop Oil.
At an online meeting on Friday night ahead of the protest, a union official pledged to help pay legal fees for members who are arrested at protests or face trouble at work because of activism.
The group began its project on April 1 and since then has seen 1,296 arrests as the protestors demanded the government end new oil and gas projects in the UK.
‘The politicians have turned a deaf ear to petitions and protests and marches – they just don’t seem to care,’ David Pearson, who helped organise the march.
Speaking in front of the Palace of Westminster, he added: ‘We’re trying to shame a government that has no shame, so there’s a fundamental flaw in our theory of change.’
Meanwhile at around 3.30pm most marchers appeared to be responding to the police’s requests and had left the scene without being arrested.
In Leeds protesters gathered outside British Gas offices in a protest against fossil fuels and the cost of living crisis.
Julie Hesmondhalgh, who played Coronation Street’s Hayley Cropper, will be speaking at the Manchester rally alongside Lamin Touray, who played footballer Ashley Hardcastle on the street.
Newcastle’s event has been backed by Si King, one half of the Hairy Bikers, as well as poet Tom Pickard.
Award-winning comedian Rob Delaney will join the Rail Maritime and Transport union’s Mick Lynch and Dave Ward of the Communication Workers Union, at the London event.
Rob Delaney said: ‘Does a chief executive need an extra zero at the end of their salary, or should nurses, posties and teachers be able to heat their homes this winter? Enough is enough.’
Meanwhile at around 3.30pm most marchers appeared to be responding to the police’s requests and had left the scene without being arrested
In Leeds protesters gathered outside British Gas offices in a protest against fossil fuels and the cost of living crisis
The protests are coinciding with picket lines being mounted by railway workers outside major stations across the country as part of the latest strike in the long running dispute over pay, jobs and conditions.
Former Coronation Street actor Lamin Touray said: ‘I saw the Enough is Enough campaign and just thought, that’s exactly what everyone is feeling.
‘I don’t think anyone remembers when times have been this hard. (The) Government needs to sit up and listen to the people – it can’t go on like this.’
Hairy Biker, chef and presenter, Si King said: ‘Millions of hardworking people and families across our country are being forced into poverty and utter desperation due to the cost-of-living crisis.
‘We have a system that favours corporate power and wealth over normal people. Those in power have neither the will nor the empathy to change it.’
The protests are coinciding with picket lines being mounted by railway workers outside major stations across the country as part of the latest strike in the long running dispute over pay, jobs and conditions
A Just Stop Oil spokesman said: ‘We are currently witnessing the breakdown of all we hold dear. Our government has not ‘got this’ – they are increasing the grip of fossil fuels at our throat
A Just Stop Oil spokesman said: ‘We are currently witnessing the breakdown of all we hold dear. Our government has not ‘got this’ – they are increasing the grip of fossil fuels at our throat.
‘If the government won’t stop approving new oil and gas projects then we will make them stop. Come to Westminster from October 1 to peacefully join thousands of other ordinary people in civil resistance because our lives depend on it.’
Jeremy Corbyn, the founder of the Peace and Justice Project, said: ‘Record breaking weather is happening everywhere and everything is too expensive. That’s the crisis. You can’t separate out the cost of living and climate crises. The whole system, which creates billionaires and starves hundreds of millions, is the crisis. It can’t be resolved, it must be overcome and transformed.’
Stuart Bretherton, 24, Energy For All Campaign Coordinator, Fuel Poverty Action said: ‘The climate crisis and the cost of living crisis are a direct result of how our economy is run for the benefit of an energy industry that will chew us up and spit us out.
Jeremy Corbyn, the founder of the Peace and Justice Project, said: ‘Record breaking weather is happening everywhere and everything is too expensive.
‘But at the same time we have common solutions to both these crises. Climate justice doesn’t mean further hardship, it means warm homes, lower bills, cleaner air and a better economy for every one of us.’
The protests were the start of an ‘October uprising’ revealed last week in an undercover investigation by The Mail on Sunday.
Lee Jasper of Blaksox, said: ‘The west relentlessly pumps out its carbon gas to feed its insatiable consumer economies, while the poorest people on the planet, in the global south endure climate catastrophe, famine and drought, whose people are being sacrificed to maintain unsustainable western lifestyles. We need climate change and climate justice.’
Zita Holbourne, chair of Black Activists Rising Against Cuts, (BARAC UK) said: ‘The issues of climate displacement, environmental injustice, migration, colonialism, reparations and systemic racism are all interconnected and part of the same struggle for racial justice and human rights globally. There can be nothing about us without us and until all of us are free, none of us are free.’
Kate Hudson, from the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament said: ‘Fossil fuels have contributed to the two greatest threats facing humanity – climate catastrophe and nuclear war.’
Liam Norton, from Insulate Britain, said: ‘The government’s plan to open new oil, gas and coal projects is the biggest act of government criminality in our history. They are participating in the destruction of this country and the murder of countless people around the world. What else can you call it? In order to stop new oil and gas we need to Insulate Britain. Now.’
The Metropolitan Police said a total of 31 people were arrested in central London, including 29 who were arrested on suspicion of obstructing a highway after a protest on Waterloo Bridge. A police spokesman said: “The protest has now finished. We thank the public for their patience.”