Climate of Fear in the NHS

“The last chance to save the NHS” is how it has been billed. This Sunday thousands from across the country are expected to descend on London to launch a headline-grabbing demonstration against the coalition government’s proposed healthcare reforms.

Led by the anti-austerity group UK Uncut, the protesters plan to temporarily close down the iconic Westminster Bridge just days before a crucial parliamentary debate on the controversial Health and Social Care Bill. If the Bill is passed into law, campaigners say, it will open the NHS up to corporate interests, damage the standard of service and lead to the destruction of an equal and universal healthcare system.

But in the build up to the demonstration, an investigation by The Big Issue in the North has discovered frontline NHS staff across England are already enduring cutbacks that could be putting patient care at risk, with some surgeries being delayed due to tight budgets.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, Dr Stephen Smith (not his real name), said at one hospital in the south west of England staffing was at a “dangerous level” after the ratio of nurses to patients in each ward had been reduced.

“There is a climate of fear and a feeling that everyone’s budgets are under heavy attack,” he said. “Working in A&E for example there are signs up saying ‘how can we save money’, with people asked to give suggestions. But the amount that’s having to be saved each month is just crazy, and consequently rotas are being designed with less doctors in them because it’s cheaper. Which clearly puts patients at risk.”

Smith added that he believed the Health and Social Care Bill would send things in a “very bad direction”.

“There isn’t anybody I know in the medical profession that thinks it’s a good idea. Everyone has said that this is going to destroy the NHS and is just an attempt at backdoor privatisation. The only people who are pro it are the GPs who are going to make money out of it,” he said.

Jacqui Moore (not her real name), a specialist practitioner who is also a union representative at a hospital in the north west of the country, described increased levels of stress due to a string of job cuts.

“I see alot of staff going off with stress at the moment. The minute you start cutting staff everybody else is just expected to work harder and a lot of staff react to that. They just can’t cope with it. Just about every person I deal with seems to have either been off with stress or has just come back after a period of stress-related illness. Everybody is feeling the pressure.

“I think it’s just symptomatic of what’s going on in the health service as a whole. The whole agenda is very cost driven, and every decision that seems to be made is a financial one, rather than one that’s got patient care at the end of it.”

Shortly after coming to power in May 2010, the coalition government gave an assurance that its cuts agenda would not impact upon frontline services. And in April this year the government launched a “listening exercise” to address concerns about the scale of its NHS reforms.

Launching the initiative, prime minister David Cameron said the government wanted to “safeguard the NHS for future generations”, but added that it was only through “modernisation that we can protect the NHS and ensure the country has a truly world-class health service.”

Months after the listening exercise, however, the British Medical Association (BMA), which represents around 141,000 doctors and medical students in the UK, called for the Health and Social Care Bill to be “withdrawn or at the very least significantly amended.”

“The clear view of BMA Council is that the Health and Social Care Bill remains deeply flawed,” said Dr Hamish Meldrum, the council’s chairman. “The BMA will continue to publicly and vigorously highlight the concerns of doctors and patients, particularly to peers who have a real opportunity to protect the NHS by addressing the damage that could be done by many aspects of these reforms.”

One long-serving nurse at a hospital in south London, Mike Davey, told The Big Issue in the North the fear is that the standard of service – and ultimately patient care – will be severely compromised by the changes.

“There’s a nervous anticipation and a lot of staff are very concerned. It’s having a negative impact on morale,” he said. “This particular government is putting thumb screws on to the managers, the executives and the trust boards so they have to pretty much market test everything – which means services being privatised out.

“We’re told a private company can do things cheaper and better than our own in-house services. But previous experience, since the Thatcher government in the 80s brought in mass privatisation, has led us to see that this is not actually the case.”

At a hospital on the outskirts of Manchester, some surgeries may have already been rationed due to budget shortages.

According to Oldham and Saddleworth MP Debbie Abbrahams, a 33-year-old man in her constituency had an operation to fix his cataracts delayed because his sight was classed as "impaired" as opposed to "blind". The man, an engineer by trade, cannot work due to his condition and will have to wait until his vision worsens before he can undergo immediate surgery.

"Delays to simple and relatively inexpensive operations, like those for cataracts, can severely affect a person's life,” Abbrahams said. “I am very concerned about this situation as I have had several constituents come to me asking for help because they cannot get their cataracts treated in a reasonable time. Along with Michael Meacher and other Greater Manchester MPs I am asking Oldham's Primary Care Trust for clear answers about why this and other basic operations are being hit so hard by this government's ideologically driven cuts."

On 11 October the Health and Social Care Bill will be debated at length in the House of Lords. The Lords can propose amendments to the Bill, with some Liberal Democrat peers, led by Baroness Shirley Williams, expected to rebel against it. Writing in the Observer last month, Williams said that she had “huge concerns”, adding: “The battle is far from over.”

For Ben Jackson, a spokesman for UK Uncut, this Sunday’s protest will be crucial.

“It all depends on what they [the Lords] hear from the public,” he said. “So we need to take drastic action to make it clear that this isn’t going to be something we’re just going to lie down and take. This is something we really care about. It’s an emergency for the NHS."

This article first appeared in issue #896 of The Big Issue in the North magazine.

Business as Usual? Arms, Surveillance and Arab Dictatorships

A wave of revolution across the Middle East and north Africa this year has left tyrants and dictators clinging to the power they once took for granted. Citizens of countries including Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Syria have taken to the streets and in some cases fought and died in an attempt to overthrow their rulers. But as Britain has offered its support to the newfound freedom fighters, some have made accusations of hypocrisy. After all, like many other western nations, the UK has been doing business with authoritarian regimes in the Arab world for decades.

Little is known about the true extent of the relationship the UK has maintained with dictators and autocrats across the region. However, as the old regimes crumble, details have begun to slowly emerge. Last week the organisation Human Rights Watch released documents it discovered in Libya, revealing that UK intelligence agency MI6 collaborated with Muammar Gaddafi's security services to transport terror suspects to Libya for interrogation, where they were allegedly subjected to torture. MI6 continues to deny involvement, though the secret documents paint an altogether different picture.

Amid the uprising in Egypt earlier this year, protesters made a similarly shocking find. After ransacking a government intelligence agency headquarters in Cairo, they unearthed hidden underground interrogation cells, evidence of torture, and a stockpile of documents that outlined a paranoid government programme of industrial-scale mass surveillance. Most controversially, among the many files was a letter from an English, Andover-based IT-security company, dated June 2010, offering to sell Egyptian authorities spy technology that would enable them to intercept dissidents’ emails, record audio and video chats, and take copies of computer hard drives.

The company, Gamma International, denies that it sold the technology, worth over £250,000, to the Egyptian authorities. “Gamma complies in all its dealings with all applicable UK laws and regulations,” it said in a statement. “Gamma did not supply to Egypt but in any event it would not be appropriate for Gamma to make public details of its transactions with any customer.”

Many similar products, manufactured in western countries, are believed to be widely available to Arab governments facing uprising. An extensive recent investigation conducted by the Bloomberg news agency, for instance, found that Trovicor, a German company with links to Siemens and Nokia, had supplied “monitoring centres” to at least twelve Middle Eastern and north African nations.

Such technology is used by governments around the world, including in the UK. However its use in most western countries is strictly regulated and can only be used when authorities have grounds to believe it could help prevent or detect a crime. Authoritarian regimes in the Middle East do not have the same regulatory framework, though this does not restrict western firms such as Gamma International and Trovicor from selling them their products.

Since the discovery of documents showing British and other European companies had either offered or sold intrusive spy technology to regimes across the Middle East and north Africa, a group of concerned European politicians has taken action. Six MEP’s including Baroness Sarah Ludford, Liberal Democrat MEP for London, made a joint request to the EU’s head of foreign policy calling for a decision on whether European companies contributed to human rights violations in countries including Tunisia, Bahrain, Egypt and Syria.

“I don’t know whether the EU has paid sufficient attention to this,” Ludford said. “It raises very important issues about whether export of surveillance equipment from the EU is being used in repression and human rights abuses. The law is a mess: it’s not being properly or rigorously applied and that needs to happen alongside responsible companies that check what the ultimate use [of the technology] is going to be.”

According to Dr Andrea Teti, a specialist in international security at Aberdeen University, it is not possible to stop surveillance systems from being used for repressive purposes unless firm new legislation is implemented, controlling the countries to which it is exported.

“Just because the physical harm comes once removed from this particular technology, it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be concerned about it,” he said. “If there are safety implications for people in terms of their human rights or physical safety, then we should have some kind of controls. The problem that we have in the west is that in most cases those regulations are quite poor when it comes to export licensing. The onus is definitely on us to deal with that side of things – and we haven’t done so.”

Through the course of the Arab Spring the murky world of mass surveillance has undoubtedly been exposed by the fracture of once intensely secretive regimes. But important questions have also been raised about the UK’s role in arming state forces responsible for brutally repressing protests across the region.

In February the Foreign Office said it was conducting an “immediate and rapid review” of all UK arms export licences to affected countries. Between February and June, however, arms sales to Libya, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia totalled over £30m – 30 per cent more than for the same period in 2010. Weapons exported included sniper rifles, shotguns and submachine guns, according to an investigation by The Times.

The government has since blocked the export of arms to Libya and Syria as part of an EU embargo, and also revoked a number of military export licences to Bahrain. But Oliver Sprague, director of human rights group Amnesty International’s UK arms control programme, said it was a case of “closing the stable door after the horse had bolted,” and called for tighter regulations.

“Countries are entitled to purchase weaponry for legitimate defence and policing purposes, but was it ever remotely sensible for the UK to sell weapons and crowd-control equipment to countries like Gaddafi’s Libya?” he said. “The key question is: are our existing risk-assessment procedures tight enough when it comes to sending arms overseas? The lesson of countries like Bahrain and Libya is that they’re not and we could still end up sending weapons to human rights abusers in the future.”

The Foreign Office said that there was no evidence of any misuse of controlled military goods exported from the United Kingdom, though admitted “further work is needed on how we operate certain aspects of the controls.”

A spokesperson said: “We do not export equipment where there is a clear risk it could be used for internal repression ... Respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms are mandatory considerations for all export licence applications. HMG [Her Majesty’s Government] reacted quickly to the events in the Middle East: we reviewed licences and moved swiftly to revoke where they were no longer in the line with the criteria.”

This article first appeared in issue no.893 of the Big Issue in the North.

Some Kind of Revolution

On the evening of May 15, a small group of Spanish protesters demonstrated in capital city Madrid against high unemployment and austerity measures across the country. Marching towards the city’s main square, Puerta del Sol, a number of the protesters were involved in a conflict with police officers who tried to prevent them from entering. 24 were arrested and taken to Madrid’s largest police station, where they were interrogated by members of a specialist police información unit and held for 48 hours.

While the activists were in custody, their friends continued to protest at Puerta del Sol, refusing to leave. They felt the arrests had been unjustified, and claimed the police had used heavy-handed tactics that sparked the initial conflict. They posted videos on the internet of the police allegedly 'ambushing' protesters from behind, and used social networks to encourage others to join them in the square.

Before long, the numbers were snowballing at an astonishing rate. Taking inspiration from the uprisings across the Arab world, within a matter of days tens of thousands were in Puerta del Sol. But the demonstration was no longer just about the arrest of the protesters – it was about unemployment, political corruption, the Spanish government’s multi-million Euro bailout of banks at the height of the economic crisis.

Dubbed 15-M by the Spanish media (named after May 15, the first day of the protests), the activists built makeshift tents with tarpaulin and wood, divided themselves up into various working committees, and started drafting proposals for change.

Now thirteen days since the conflict with police that sparked the demonstrations, Puerta del Sol continues to be occupied by thousands of protesters, some of whom say they will stay indefinitely. Below is a detailed account of the structure, organisation, ethos and goals of the camp, featuring insight from some of those behind the movement…

Inside the Camp

The camp at Puerta del Sol functions like a micro-society. Food and water is provided for free, donated by sympathetic local businesses; there are fully functioning kitchens; toilets; a media and communications tent; a children’s nursery; and even a library.

It is divided up into six key working committees, each tasked with a specific area: politics, economics, education and culture, social policy and migration, environment, and health. Every committee has a ballot box outside, into which people are encouraged to deposit suggestions for change. Every suggestion is looked at and discussed, with conclusions taken forward to a meeting with heads of each respective committee. After more long and gruelling discussion, the conclusions are then eventually brought before a general assembly – during which the entire camp (or anyone else for that matter) is able to vote on each commission’s suggested proposals.

There is no distinct leader or figurehead; all decisions are made by consensus, meaning every single person has to be in agreement. If one person does not agree, the group will simply keep discussing until they form a compromise and are able to move forward. The meetings often take hours, with the activists working through the night, debating, discussing and pouring over the hundreds – perhaps thousands – of suggestions they receive daily through the ballot boxes.

“The leadership is our assembly, where the decisions are taken by consensus,” said one of the activists, Juan, 22. “Many people think that this doesn’t work – the reality is we are where we are because of this consensus.”

Ethos

A key element to the success and growth of the camp seems to have stemmed from its rigorous organisation and serious ethos. The media-savvy organisers are keen to discourage alcohol consumption in the square, because they feel it could be used to negatively portray them as irresponsible young people, just looking for a good time and an excuse to get drunk and party.

In order to counter any negative perceptions, they keep the square meticulously clean and actively encourage pacifism and non-violence. Volunteers sweep the area almost constantly and remarkably most people adhere to the no-alcohol rule – at least until well after dark.

While most of the key activists in the square are young – between around 20-35 – there are also many older people spending time at the camp. Its rigorous organisation and serious ethos seems to have won the demonstrators the respect of many older members of the Madrid community.

One 66-year-old man, Manuel Ferreira, described how the scene reminded him of Paris in 1968 – though he said it was “more peaceful” due to less conflict with the authorities. Ferreira also said he believed the Madrid protests were of greater historical significance, something he attributed to the way internet technology today can propagate movements and make them global within such a short space of time. “I think I am living a new world order,” he said. “I am sure it will spread.”

Policing

The peaceful nature of the camp must to some degree be attributed to the police’s response, for they stay behind barriers to one side of the square. So long as Puerta del Sol is full of families, children and older people, the activists believe the authorities will be likely to stay away. Only a few days after the protests began, the police tried to block off the square – but this only encouraged more demonstrators to come out into the streets. As such, the authorities appear to have realised that their presence within the camp only antagonises protesters, and so have been forced to simply let them get on with it.

“They saw that they could not control this with police,” said Beatriz Pérez, a 29-year-old spokesperson for the movement. “So I think they took the opposite strategy: to let the movement be pacifistic, because we are a pacifistic, non-violent movement. They cannot move us out, so the police have no duty here.”

Political leanings

One of the most striking things about the camp at Puerta del Sol, aside from the size and scale of it, is the diverse array of political perspectives represented. There are people within the camp who would class themselves as radicals – anarchists, socialists and anti-capitalists – but the movement itself appears to be much broader. At its core, it is pro-democracy, united by a collective disdain for the current state of things. It is not driven by a desire to demolish the current political and economic system; rather, it aspires only to change and reform it. “We are not against the system,” said Juan. “We want to change the system – so that the people can be better represented.”

(N.B. There is no doubt that many within the movement want to see a shift away from the capitalist economic model, but that is something they do not want to talk about at this stage. They feel that they have to take one step at a time – and, for now, they simply want their voices to be heard.)

Goals and demands

The movement’s central demands are fairly modest. They want to have a referendum on electoral reform, and call for the dissolution of the Spanish parliament’s second chamber, which they believe is a waste of time and money. They also want to see an end to a policy of ‘salaries for life’ for Spanish politicians, and demand greater media freedom. The media in Spain, they say, is too heavily influenced by the political and religious right, with ownership of the most powerful broadcasters and newspapers concentrated in the hands of a few. The movement also believes that there is a major problem with corrupt politicians, and have produced a list of those they claim should be investigated for taking money in return for favours (in some cases, allegedly, from large Spanish corporations).

A key aim is simply to make the current system more representative. They feel that neither of Spain’s two main political parties – the Socialist Party or the Partido Popular (People's Party) – can offer that substantive change that is required. This feeling was summed up last Sunday, May 22, on the eve of local elections across the country – as people at the camp simply did not care about the outcome.

“In the end, no matter the colour of the party, they all end up doing exactly the same thing,” said Raul Bartolome, 38. “If you listen to politics here, all the time they are just yelling at each other about doing nothing at all and, in the end, they just keep on doing whatever they want to – no matter what you vote them in for.”

But in spite of the bleak cynicism about the current political system, people at the camp are intensely optimistic about the future. They believe that their model of organisation could spread across Spain and beyond, and the prospect of it happening does not look like a mere pipe dream. At the time of writing, in more than 60 Spanish cities there were similar protests taking place, with few of them showing signs that they were about to lose any steam.

Many of the demonstrators think this is the start of something that could even be global. When speaking to them you can sense their hope and see it in their eyes; there is an energy around the camp that almost defies description. They feel that they are part of some kind of epochal shift from something old to something new – and none of them is willing to let the prospect of change slip from their grasp. “We want to do the same thing in every neighbourhood in Madrid and across Spain,” said Bartolome. “I really think we’re living some kind of revolution.”

Prospects and staying power

For the organisers at Puerta del Sol, occupation of the square represents only the first step in what they foresee as a long and probably gruelling political battle. Given the degree to which the movement in Spain has taken off over the course of the last two weeks, it theoretically carries enough weight to transform Spanish politics. The crucial factor is whether the protesters will be able to maintain the momentum that has carried them this far. By forging formal organisational links with other groups across the country they will carry substantial clout, and the more unified they are the more likely they will be to force the Spanish political establishment to make concessions.

But in the coming days they will face their biggest challenge to date as pressure mounts to evict protesters in squares across the country – particularly in Madrid, the heart and soul of the movement. Yesterday Spanish newspapers reported that regional authorities were demanding the central government take action against the occupation, while in Barcelona police used brutal violence in a botched attempt to evict protesters from the city’s main square, Plaça Catalunya.

The Spanish government is also faced with a serious problem, in that it is dealing with no ordinary demonstration or protest. What is taking place within Spain at present is part of a wider narrative that police repression will simply not be able quell. A historic social and political shift appears to be taking place as an entire generation of young people attempt to take control of their own collective destiny – both in Europe and across the Arab world. And while there much to contrast between, for instance, the context of the uprisings in Egypt and what is happening in Spain, the fundamentals are the same. It is about a craving for greater democracy, for choice and, in essence, for a better, more equal and egalitarian society.

At this stage it is almost impossible to predict what the fate of the 15-M movement will be. But among demonstrators at Puerta del Sol there is little doubt who will prevail. “They do not represent us!” they cry in unison. “The people united will never be defeated!"

This article originally appeared at: http://www.opendemocracy.net/ryan-gallagher/some-kind-of-revolution

"If I Stop, They Win"

While in Spain last week covering the protest that has been taking place in Madrid’s main square, Puerta del Sol, I spent a great deal of time speaking to some of the activists and demonstrators whose action has sparked a wave of similar protests in more than 60 cities across the country.

It all began on May 15, when police arrested 24 political activists who were marching through the city, as part of a protest against mass unemployment and austerity measures.

The arrests sparked more protest, and numbers snowballed. Within a few days a handful of around 100 protesters had become a mass demonstration of tens of thousands.

By chance, in Puerta del Sol I met one of the 24 activists who had been arrested on May 15. He was handing out pamphlets that detailed his and his fellow protesters’ ordeal while in police detention. Though he did not want to give his name for fear of police reprisal, he agreed to give me a short interview.

The activist, a 22-year-old sociology student at a Madrid university, spoke about the harsh treatment he faced while in police custody. He detailed what he believed could be next for the movement, and gave a fascinating insight in to the origins of a demonstration that has since sparked protest across Europe – in London, Italy and Greece.

Audio of the interview along with an edited transcript can be found below by clicking "read more".

Inside the Spanish Revolution

There are thousands of people in Spain right now who feel that they are on the cusp of something very important – a revolution, even. The streets of Madrid are thick with a sense of optimism and hope, crammed with protesters of all ages carrying placards and posters, many scrawled with slogans such as "They do not represent us!" and "In defence of our dreams!".

The city's main square has become a tent city, occupied by groups inspired by uprisings across the Arab world. Everywhere you look, there are banners demanding change and "real democracy".

No one had seen it coming, not even the activists. What started as a fringe protest against rising unemployment and the Spanish government's multibillion-euro bank bailout escalated after several activists were arrested by police and held for 48 hours.

A demonstration against the arrests was organised in the city's main square, Puerta del Sol, and numbers soon snowballed when word got out over the internet. What began as a group of fewer than a hundred activists reached an estimated 50,000 within less than six days.

The protesters whose arrests had sparked the initial demonstration were released and immediately returned to the square. By the time they arrived, the demonstration was no longer just about their treatment at the hands of the police. It was about government corruption, lack of media freedom, bank bailouts, unemployment, austerity measures and privatisation.

"We cannot find a job, we cannot find a house, we cannot find health from the state," says Alejandro Jalón, a 20-year-old student. "I am here because I think we can change something."

The young people's sense of optimism is sincere. The protesters at Puerta del Sol are interested only in action, not rhetoric. In the square, they built a makeshift campsite, including everything from a children's nursery and a library to a kitchen offering free food donated by local businesses.

In the space of a few days they had created separate working commissions to form proposals for change to current government policy. A social and migration commission would look at immigration policy, the health commission would focus on how to deprivatise health-care services. Other commissions were formed to handle politics, education, the economy and the environment.

Among the camp's immediate demands were calls for electoral reform, the dissolution of the Spanish parliament's second chamber, and an end to a much-despised policy of "salaries for life" for politicians.

The movement itself has no single leader or figurehead; all decisions are made by consensus at general assemblies, held twice daily. Hundreds, sometimes thousands, attend the meetings, and no decision is taken until every single person is in agreement.

The meetings are long and laborious – occasionally lasting more than four hours at a time – but seem so far to have been successful.

"The leadership is our assembly, where the decisions are taken by consensus," says Nadia Moreno, 29. "Many people think that this doesn't work – the reality is we are where we are after six days because of this consensus."

Although the movement is driven by highly political young people between the ages of roughly 20 and 35, a large cross-section of Spanish society appears to support the occupation of the square. There is a festive atmosphere, with families, music and workshops of every kind imaginable taking place throughout the day. Everyone who attends is encouraged to submit suggestions, using ballot boxes, to each of the commissions. All of these are later scrutinised, tabled and debated.

The organisers say that they think the huge success of the camp, which has since spread to more than 60 other Spanish cities, stems in part from what has taken place in Tunisia and Egypt.

"Egypt and Tunisia was a very important catalyst for the movement in Spain," says Beatriz Pérez, a 29-year-old spokeswoman for the movement who also acknowledges the influence of the recent UK student protests. "I think the people are in the street because they have hope – that's the most important thing."

The feeling of hope is such that many at the camp believe it could be the start of a social and political revolution. It is the first sign, they say, that the uprisings across the Arab world are about to spread across Europe.

Manuel Ferreira, a 66-year-old retired engineer, says the scenes at Puerta del Sol remind him of the student protests in France during the summer of 1968. "It's the same war against capital, against power, against politicians, against the establishment and so on," he explains. "It [the Puerta del Sol protest] is more significant, because through Facebook and the internet, this movement is worldwide . . . I think I am living a new world order."

The start of the demonstrations coincided with regional elections across the country, which the right-leaning Partido Popular (People's Party) won by a landslide.

At one point last week, an electoral committee assembled by the government declared the camp "illegal". But even though there were strong rumours of an impending police "clean-up" operation, and seven riot vans gathered at one side of the square, protesters have remained at all times in a defiant spirit.

"If they take us from the square tomorrow, the only thing that they will get is that they will make us stronger and we will come back stronger," says 22-year-old Juan Martín. "We want a new society. This one doesn't work any more."

This article originally appeared at: http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2011/05/puerto-square-spanish-work

On the Frontline with the Black Bloc

There was a carnival atmosphere in London’s Trafalgar Square early yesterday afternoon, but it didn’t last for long. As part of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) organised anti-cuts demonstration in the capital, thousands had gathered to ‘March for the Alternative’. Children were dancing to the sound of samba drums and policemen were smiling and chatting among themselves. Not all groups, however, came for what the TUC had billed as a ‘family event’.

As a crowd of between 250,000 to 400,000 moved slowly from the Victoria Embankment towards Hyde Park, a large splinter demonstration broke off in another direction. It was a group made up of those usually cast in the media as ‘anarchists’ or the 'Black Bloc' – rule breakers with little interest in establishment approved methods of protest. Carrying red and black flags, they walked through the streets with no predefined destination or plan. Some armed with smoke bombs and paint balls, their main intention seemed to be to outsmart the police at any and every opportunity.

It started out as a game of cat and mouse. Running from street to street, chanting and generally causing a spectacle. Tourists and shoppers looked bewildered on Oxford Street as the group, many with their faces covered, some wearing yellow helmets, marched down the road chanting about “Tory scum” and “class war”. The police tried to keep up, but the anarchists managed to stay one step ahead by shifting direction at times almost spontaneously. Their leaderless structure seemed to confuse the police who, at least early in the day, appeared to have been caught entirely off guard.

What started as a game, though, quickly became much more serious. The first sign that things were about to get ugly was at around 3pm, when there was a scuffle between protesters and a police Further Intelligence Team, who were trying to film for surveillance purposes. Moments later a riot van was attacked and spraypainted and events quickly began to spiral. The women’s lingerie shop Ann Summers had its window smashed and was left daubed with graffiti saying “fight sexism”. A member of the shop’s staff stood outside, inspecting the damage. Her face was pale with shock.

What followed was a series of events that ended in several violent confrontations with the police. Banks accused of tax-avoidance, Lloyds TSB and Santander, were paintbombed and had their windows smashed. Then, not long after the group had been chanting “1, 2, 3, 4, escalate the class war”, the five-star Ritz Hotel had metal poles thrown through its windows. Like the poll tax riot of 1990, the wealthy had themselves become an explicit target. Running through prosperous Mayfair with police helicopters hovering above, a Porsche garage had its windows broken. At one point an affluent looking gentleman hauled his children inside his townhouse and slammed the door shut. Neither he nor his children’s safety was at risk, but the fact that he seemed to feel threatened spoke volumes.

Somewhere on Davies Street in Mayfair, a policeman named Inspector Wood was trailing one of the splinter groups while speaking to a colleague on his radio. “They've had a pop at us already,” he said, “so we're well up for it." It wasn’t long before he got his opportunity. In several chaotic incidents between Oxford Circus and Piccadilly, police became increasingly aggressive. Using their shields as weapons, they forced back anyone who got in their way. One middle-aged woman was hit across the face at force with an officer’s shield and I was dealt a blow in the chest as I tried to record a video. Attempting to show my press card I was shoved backwards and tripped over the pavement, held upright only by the crowds behind me. “I don’t care!” one of the officers shouted back in my direction.

The worst was still to come. As darkness fell, there was an air of lethargy among the protestors, who had now convened at Piccadilly Circus. Marshmallows were being toasted on burning placards and there were a few drunks dancing round the fire. Eventually there was movement. A group shuffled down towards Regent Street and others sharply followed. Suddenly there was a confrontation with the police. Black-clad riot officers wielding shields and batons emerged and objects were thrown towards them. The police had blocked off Regent Street and this caused animosity. “Whose streets? Our streets!” the protesters chanted.

The police tried to push people back. It wasn’t just the anarchists now, but various other stragglers including some who appeared to have just tagged along to see what the noise was all about. I was forced down a dark side street as the police attempted to form a kettle and immediately sensed danger. Several of the riot police, who had their faces covered with black masks, could be seen lashing out with their batons. There was an occasional yelp of pain as the police lunged forward and shouted in unison, “MOVE!” I noticed couples in a nearby restaurant looking out at the scene over a glass of wine, watching as if it was all some kind of twisted reality television show.

Suddenly, and without warning, the police charged forward into a sprint. I tried to pull myself into a doorway in the hope that they would run right past me – but I never made it in time. Before I knew it a line of police were right behind me and swinging their truncheons. I glanced back just in time to catch the eyes of one of them, his face hidden by his mask, truncheon held in the air. There was a moment of sheer panic and total fear. I turned again to run and felt a thud and a sharp pain ripple across my back – then again … and again … and again. A young woman was on the ground and people were scrambling over the top of her to escape from the police. I was trying to run but couldn’t move because of the crowds. Eventually I managed to get away, sprinting until I was clear of the police. At the top of the street I fell to my knees, my whole body shaking, my back throbbing with pain.

I spoke to others, many of whom had also been beaten as they tried to flee. One girl in her early twenties lay crying against a concrete pillar in a state of shock. I checked the street for CCTV cameras – there was none in sight. I tried to question police about the incident, but was fobbed off. None of them claimed to have seen what happened and even told me they doubted my version of events. “Take it to the IPCC [Independent Police Complaints Commission],” I was told dismissively.

Today, like after the student protests last year, the focus and the debate has been on the trouble and the troublemakers. The scenes at Regent Street later spread to Trafalgar Square, and the natural impulse of most people has been to jump to the defence of police officers. They have a hard job, ultimately, and when people are smashing up banks and throwing paint and other projectiles all day, surely a few baton charges here and there is to be expected. In reality it is far more complicated.

From what I seen yesterday, police tactics seemed to directly antagonise protesters and inflame violence. The rigid dichotomy between police and protesters (particularly 'anarchists') is a false one. There are protesters who are trouble just as there are also policemen who are trouble. Like Inspector Wood, whom I overheard telling a colleague he was “up for it”, there are officers who like a scuffle; they enjoy the thrill of chasing protesters through the streets and they may even be exhilarated by the prospect of violence.

If a policeman hammers a woman across the face with his shield, it is likely some protesters will react by throwing a few objects in retaliation. If an innocent, law-abiding person is battered across the back and legs for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, he or she will begin to question the legitimacy of police authority. Until the police and the wider public realise this and respond accordingly, we will continue to see scenes like we did yesterday at every single large demonstration.

Many of this morning’s newspapers are unsurprisingly filled with moral indignation at yesterday’s scenes. The Telegraph describes “mobs of masked thugs” and Scotland Yard Commander Bob Broadhurst is widely quoted condemning “mindless yobbery”. But this lacks balance and misrepresents the perpetrators. The targeted acts of disruption and property damage were carried out and cheered on by large numbers of (predominantly) young people who appear to be both politically engaged and intelligent. However you judge their actions, bear in mind first that they are responding in such a way because they feel detached, alienated and disenfranchised from a society and a political system that to them appears unjust, unequal, broken and hopeless.

When the police attack protesters, it only reinforces this sense of isolation and injustice. For every baton charge, for every shield across the face, the anger deepens. What I observed on the streets of London yesterday reaffirms a belief I have held since I witnessed similar scenes in Edinburgh during the G8 protests six years ago: that there is simply not enough independent scrutiny of police tactics and the mainstream media are far too quick to uncritically adopt the perspective of the authorities.

In the months ahead there will no doubt be more unrest on the streets of London. The anger is yet to peak – youth unemployment is at its highest ever recorded level and the cuts are still to fully bite. Unless the police are subject to the same criticism and scrutiny as are the protesters, next time there is a similar protest more windows will be broken and the police will continue to issue out indiscriminate beatings down dark side streets when they think no one is watching. This is something that should give us all cause for concern. We must remember, after all, that it is the role of the police in any democratic society to serve, not to subjugate.

This article appeared originally at: http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ryan-gallagher/baton-charged-by-police-on-frontline-with-black-bloc

Police, Protests and the Media

At the student fees protest in London last week, a young man with cerebral palsy was allegedly twice hauled from his wheelchair and dragged across the ground by police officers. Footage of the incident soon appeared on the internet, while the man, a 20-year-old activist and blogger named Jody McIntyre, was invited onto BBC News to recount his ordeal. “Did you shout anything provocative, or throw anything that would of induced the police to do that to you?” he was asked by the presenter, Ben Brown. “There’s a suggestion that you were rolling towards the police in your wheelchair, is that true?” McIntyre kept his calm and replied. “Do you really think a person with cerebral palsy, in a wheelchair, can pose a threat to a police officer who is armed with weapons?”

The BBC has already received a number of complaints about the interview. But the sneering tone of Brown’s questions, which repeatedly punctuate the 7-minute interview, are typical of how the mainstream media have responded to protests and the policing of them both past and present. Their automatic assumption is that the police are protectors of our best interests, defenders of public order, righteous upholders of the law. Protesters, on the other hand, are automatically perceived as a threat and a potential destructive force – they are folk devils: outsiders, troublemakers and vandals of decency.

The police are therefore at an immediate advantage in the media realm, for they are always given the benefit of the doubt. Officers may have had to crack a few skulls during the fees protests, however only because they were provoked by what David Cameron described as "feral thugs". And it is for this same reason that McIntyre was repeatedly placed on the back foot throughout his BBC interview. Was he a “cyber-radical?” Did he want to build a “revolutionary movement?” The police would never just attack a defenceless disabled man in a wheelchair, would they?

This problem is not a new one. For years protesters have been jarred by the gulf between the reality of protests and the way they are reported by the mass media. During the G8 summit in Gleneagles in 2005, for instance, I witnessed firsthand unprovoked police baton charges on Edinburgh’s Princes Street. Dressed in all black, wielding shields, batons and with their faces covered, riot police lunged indiscriminately at anyone within arm’s length – male or female, adult or youth. The sight was shocking. Yet the next day, there was not a whiff of it in the newspapers. “Those seeking to cause disorder laid down the gauntlet to police officers who were determined to keep control,” reported the BBC.

Likewise, when Ian Tomlinson died after being assaulted by a policeman at the G20 protests in London last year, almost all media outlets initially reported the police’s account of events uncritically. Tomlinson had collapsed and stopped breathing, we were told, so officers quickly sprung to his assistance. Police medics tried to revive him as hell-bent protesters threw bricks, bottles and planks of wood – but it was already too late. Of course, none of this was true. There were no bricks or bottles or planks of wood, and neither did the police attempt to assist Tomlinson as he fell to the floor. In fact, as it later turned out, Tomlinson was pushed to the ground by a policeman and it was protesters who helped him to his feet.

It is a difficult thing to accept – that the police, the very individuals whose role it is to protect us, can occasionally perpetrate hideous acts of violence. But those who witnessed police tactics at the recent fees demonstrations will know that the friendly British bobby has a darker side, too. A new generation of young people is consequently now waking up to the grim fact that all is not as it seems. However, unlike in previous eras of mass civil unrest – such as during the 1960s and the 1980s – this generation has technology at its disposal.

As in the case of Jody McIntyre and Ian Tomlinson, camera-phone footage can hold the police to account for their actions like never before. If the reality of the protest is absent from television reports, the truth will eventually surface via the internet. Mainstream media outlets may still continue to negatively portray protesters, but their credibility will slowly begin to wane and disintegrate if they do so for much longer. With the advent YouTube, Twitter and Facebook, there is now, finally, a platform from which both sides of the story can be told.

This article originally appeared at: http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ryan-gallagher/media-police-and-protest-now-both-sides-of-story-can-be-reported