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Riot Police Storm Lewisham Council Budget Cuts Meeting (NOW)

dennisr said:
Saw this point made elsewhere: "These are some of the same Labour councillors that Lewisham Right to Work campaign, set up as a clear rival to the Lewisham Anti-Cuts Alliance had on their platform at their founding public meeting. Perhaps the Lewisham SWP comrades can put all their herculean efforts to foist the local Labour Party onto the anti-cuts movement to good use and prevail upon their mates in the Labour Party not to set the riot police on working people trying to defend their jobs and local services?"
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anyone go to said meeting? I'd have no problems with Labour councillors attending one, as long as they had demands put upon them and were told in no uncertain terms that if they impletemented the cuts they, could fuck off.
 
belboid said:
anyone go to said meeting? I'd have no problems with Labour councillors attending one, as long as they had demands put upon them and were told in no uncertain terms that if they impletemented the cuts they, could fuck off.
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me neither. there's an online rumble over this issue on the socialist unity site (where I got the original quote from)
 
Twitter commentry from yesterday's protest:
"Lewisham council protest 2nite 6pm Catford town hall: fury @ Bullock’s huge cuts list for a deprived borough … Cops losing control at lewisham … Ppl screaming let us in … This is mad never seen protest like it … Ppl have broken past cops into town hall … Riot cops at a council meeting jesus … Now ppl fighting riot cops … Think yr going to need some bigger cops gideon … Jesus ppl r going for the police theyre fighting back … Whole street outside lewisham council is closed + full of coppers … Everyone at this protest sayng theyre inspired by the students … Gideon youve got a big fuckn problem here Ive never seen ppl take on riot cops … Lewisham is a Labour council too. Jesus man that’s anger … Lewisham is a v poor borough. What does the govt expect?"

from: http://socialistunity.com
 
riot police have been unleashed on protestors by "a labour council, a labour council" - grotesque chaos

(are they delivering the redundancy notices by taxi?)
 
dennisr said:
:) - let me tickle you some more. Being a pedant: 200 recent posts (cant be arsed going any further) and only one mention of the swappies - the one above
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what i've done here is not noticed the dates on the ra/iwca thread. i though the posts you made two years ago were recent. sorry, my mistake.
 
discokermit said:
what i've done here is not noticed the dates on the ra/iwca thread. i though the posts you made two years ago were recent. sorry, my mistake.
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oh yeh that thread - that was a resurected 'blast from the past' :)

(as was my crappy joke above - i just hope someones gets it - anyone...)
 
love detective said:
it was a full council meeting, these meetings are alway open to the public to attend & speak at - and in the past they have always accommodated those who either wished to be in the room or watch it on the broadcast outside - they told us a few days before the meeting that there was no plans to make the accomodations that they previously had, despite knowing hundreds would be turning up. The meeting was held in the town hall which has countless large meeting rooms that could accommodate higher numbers, they chose however not to hold it in any of these - so space was not limited by design, they limited space through choice to restrict public attendance at an event that we had a right to attend - people gathered outside to protest and assert their right of witness - the answer was riot shields, TSG, horses, dogs and brutality from police & private security

this was the number 2 item on BBC national news just now!
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Well it's hard to know whether they intentionally tried to limit space or whether there was another factor. It could simply be that the clerk booked the wrong room or another one was taken up, or that they were advised to limit numbers for health & safety or simply that they didn't think that many people would turn up.

I'm not saying it wasn't intentional, only that it is just one of several possibilities.
 
moon23 said:
Well it's hard to know whether they intentionally tried to limit space or whether there was another factor. It could simply be that the clerk booked the wrong room or another one was taken up, or that they were advised to limit numbers for health & safety or simply that they didn't think that many people would turn up.
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jesus fuck
 
belboid said:
Bollocks, of course it as deliberate.
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Why would you deliberately try making it into an even bigger scene? There being too many people to enter a public meeting is not a unique phenomena. They were probably just not prepared for an organised group of protestors arriving on mass.
 
LACA press release

Lewisham Anti Cuts Alliance
Press release re: lobby of Lewisham Council 29th November

Last night (29th November) Lewisham Anti Cuts Alliance lead a peaceful protest outside Lewisham Town Hall in Catford to protest against first wave of cuts (c. £20m in the first tranche – possibly up to £78m over the next three years) which Steve Bullock was presenting to full council. The protest gathered various trade unions, the NUT, Unison, PCS, UCU and Unite, users of public services such as local libraries and Opening Doors and students from Goldsmiths College. Already the council has announced the closure of five libraries, the Amersham Children’s Centre, the Opening Doors employment centres as well as making 466 council workers redundant.

Around 150-200 people gathered from 5.30pm onwards in the freezing cold, wanting to express their democratic right to oversee the council and attend the public gallery of the council chamber. Upon arriving we discovered that just 28 people were to be allowed in. An orderly queue formed, where people were searched by security guards and the police. At 7.30pm when the meeting was due to start our protest began to gather outside the doors of the Council to make our voices heard.

We were met with harassment and abuse from the council employed security guards and the police, who were illegally preventing us from undertaking our democratic right to attend council meetings. Riot police then assaulted protesters and cleared the public gallery of all visitors and violently cleared the lobby.

By not allowing us into the pubic gallery or providing a video link in an overspill area the police were preventing our democratic right to observe a public council meeting which is making a decision which will drastically affect our lives as our public services are slashed or else abolished.

The lobby demonstrated our unity that we are all in this fight to save our public services, welfare benefits, EMA and prevent the rise in tuition fees together. Our level of anger is doubled by the fact that in Lewisham it is a Labour council, which is carrying out the coalition government’s dirty work for them.

In a previous response to our appeal for the Labour Council to pass a “no cuts” budget Cllr Michael Harris said that these cuts are necessary and “democratic and socialist”. Lewisham Anti Cuts Alliance believes there is an alternative. Simply cutting the amount spent on consultants would save c. £36m in the next three years. We have called on Labour Councillors to reject this budget and to join us in the fight these cuts imposed on us by the Tories and LibDems.
 
moon23 said:
Well it's hard to know whether they intentionally tried to limit space or whether there was another factor. It could simply be that the clerk booked the wrong room or another one was taken up, or that they were advised to limit numbers for health & safety or simply that they didn't think that many people would turn up.

I'm not saying it wasn't intentional, only that it is just one of several possibilities.
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Its not very plausible is it? Your grasping at straws.
 
moon23 said:
Well it's hard to know whether they intentionally tried to limit space or whether there was another factor. It could simply be that the clerk booked the wrong room or another one was taken up, or that they were advised to limit numbers for health & safety or simply that they didn't think that many people would turn up.

I'm not saying it wasn't intentional, only that it is just one of several possibilities.
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It's irrelevant. The voters of Lewisham have a right to attend full meetings of the council. If that right was curtailed, for whatever reason, the council should be starting from a position of being apologetic... not calling in riot police to prevent people from exercising their democratic right to oversee the actions of their elected representatives.

Councillors, MPs, and MEPs, are elected representatives of the people, not our rulers. Unfortunately there is pretty much nobody left in any of the main political parties who doesn't accept the line that democracy works on a basis of a leadership telling followers the policies they must accept through blind loyalty. Now they have the political parties working that way they are set on making the entire system follow suit.
 
moon23 said:
I'm just saying that there are a multitude of possibilities, you shouldn’t always assume a conspiracy.
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this from the man who, upon readnig one single statistic, thought it proved causation.

A change from what has been done in previous years, despite knowing that this meeting will be more popular....what could the most obvious explanation be?
 
moon23 said:
Why would you deliberately try making it into an even bigger scene?
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I suspect that they believed the tactic would discourage attendance. It's a pretty widespread practice by local authorities, unfortunately.
In this case they made an error of judgement about how easily they could brush aside local concerns about the cuts.
There being too many people to enter a public meeting is not a unique phenomena. They were probably just not prepared for an organised group of protestors arriving on mass.
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Because obviously no-one at Lewisham town hall had any idea of what has been happening in terms of anti-cuts protest over the last month or so. :facepalm:
 
Because obviously no-one at Lewisham town hall had any idea of what has been happening in terms of anti-cuts protest over the last month or so
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Indeed - the mayor & cabinet meeting about the cuts two weeks prior which they managed to hold in a room that held around 100 public who turned up, plus broadcasting it to an overflow room outside clearly indicated that no more than 40 people would possibly want to attend the actual meeting where the cuts were being voted on
 
love detective said:
Indeed - the mayor & cabinet meeting about the cuts two weeks prior which they managed to hold in a room that held around 100 public who turned up, plus broadcasting it to an overflow room outside clearly indicated that no more than 40 people would possibly want to attend the actual meeting where the cuts were being voted on
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This is point that lends credibility to your interpretation.
 
Bugger! All the protests I've attended outside that Town Hall over the years and the one night something kicks off is the evening I decide to give it a miss:oops::mad::D
glad no one was seriously hurt but also very pleased that the councillors got given a hard time
They have been pissing over their electorate for far too long.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/nov/30/lewisham-anti-cuts-protesters

The local context is vital. Lewisham's Labour-run council wasn't exactly munificent even before the cuts. When I lived in the borough, there were few amenities and local people had to struggle to keep those available. School closures were the subject of repeated local campaigns and the threat to Ladywell swimming pool galvanised a sustained campaign that helped cost Labour control of the local council in the 2006 elections.

What money was being spent on services was too often squandered on costly and inefficient PFI schemes. The arrogance of Labour mayor Steve Bullock in the face of any opposition was on display when he called anti-cuts protesters "fucking idiots"
 
I was pretty fucking disgusted after watching some of the news footage, and seeing at least two coppers jabbing members of the public in the neck with the edges of their riot shields. Fucking murderous irresponsibility. :mad:
 
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