Be Kettled (for no reason) Or Else!
Guardian reporter Paul Lewis discusses the Met’s pre-emptive kettling attempt earlier today, and how it may itself not be legal (twitpic by Jonathan Warren):
In terms of the letter of the law, there is a chance that Scotland Yard overstepped the mark today. I’ve just been in touch with Louise Christian, the human rights lawyer who is bringing a test case against the Met’s policy of “kettling” to the European Court of Human Rights. The Law Lords previously ruled in the Met’s favour in the Lois Austin case , hence the force’s repeated claims that the tactics has been deemed “lawful”. But it is not as simple as that, as senior officers need to prove that containing people was “proportionate” to the threat posed by a crowd. The notorious kettling of climate camp activists at last year’s G20 protest is currently before a Judicial Review at the High Court over exactly this point. The stakes are high as the Met could lose money – and a lot of it – if it is shown to have arbitrarily imprisoned thousands of people.
If today’s reports are true, and the Met tried to kettle students before their march had properly even begun, the commissioner could find himself in the dock yet again. There i evidence to support those reports – lines of police and pre-prepared barriers suggest there was a pen in Whitehall, into which police planned to funnel students. A kettle needs to be a response to evidence of disorder, rather than an entirely preemptive tactic that suppresses protest before it has begun. “I think what has happened runs contrary to the Law Lords ruling in the Austin case,” Christian said. “It makes clear that they need to have an evidence-based approach. If they decide in advance that they are going to do it, then I suggest that would be unlawful.”
Legality aside, there is also the question of whether the apparent plot worked. It is clear that when the march saw the kettle awaiting them, they sprinted off in various directions. The Met is currently dealing with a public order nightmare; separated groups of protesters marching their way around the London, on an ad-hoc route. Tweet reports of “feeder” marches in the Oxford Street, the Strand, Victoria, Embankment and Tottenham Court Road. My colleague Matt Taylor said there were “shambolic” scenes. How do you deal with that?
And this is the public order nightmare they created, selected from a small number of tweets:
@OwenJones84 What an indictment of British democracy that demonstrators have to think outside the box to try and exercise democratic right to protest
@monstris Phalanx of horses coming up Whitehall. Traf Sq being kettled off at Nat Gallery.#dayx #demo2010 #dayx2
@CarlRaincoat Kettle attempt has done 2 things: made it harder 4 police 2 track; curbed the right to protest. Police failure.#solidarity #demo2010 #dayx2
@sofiebuckland Police are causing chaos chasing groups of protesters fleeing kettles, kids falling over and scared. We had agreement to protest. RT #dayx2
@eastlondonlines Police attempted to form a kettle on Aldwych. Strength of the massed protesters was too much and the kettle collapsed #demo2010
@guyaitchison Crowd dodged another kettle by aldwych and now heading towards City#dayx
@mrmatthewtaylor Police op looks increasingly shambolic as they chase 1000s on #catandmousedemo up regents st and into oxford st#demo2010
@nmec #dayx2 protesters kettled outside Buckingham Palace http://twitpic.com/3blxlw (that twitpic illustrates this article)
@copwatcher Seems to be no violent incidents on today’s student protests. That’ll be because the police are unable to orchestrate them.
Speaking of orchestration, here are the Met Lies of the Day:
The Met police worked with organisers in advance to agree a suitable route from Trafalgar Square down to Parliament Square for a peaceful protest.
However, today’s march set off at an earlier time than agreed. This meant that the march began without a police escort. The police escort was essential due to gas main works on one side of Whitehall.
As a result, a line of police officers formed a cordon across Whitehall. This line of police officers intended to steer the march to one side of the road and the agreed route. There was never any intention to contain the protesters.
The march then broke into small groups, travelling in different directions.
The march continues peacefully, however, it is causing some disruption for Londoners in the West End, in what are already difficult conditions due to the weather.
And yet the Met are kettling people, suggesting there’s not a single shred of truth to this press release. Even if the comment about ‘steering’ was true, how does it explain the picture above, or the many accounts of attempted kettles? If they acknowledge the march is continuing peacefully, it doesn’t square with their acknowledgement they were planning to do just what they say they weren’t, nor with their behaviour on the ground. As one protester said:
@Becca_Boot THE PROTEST STARTED EARLY BECAUSE THE POLICE STARTED TO CLOSE THEM IN ON TRAFALGAR! Please stop lying! #dayx2 #demo2010#UNIty #solidarity
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Setting aside personal opinions on the effectiveness (I think it’s more humane than water cannon or tear gas – the latter was used in Rome today against students): I think the issue of ‘kettling’ is going to be so difficult to ban by the European Court of Human Rights because it effectively means containment and I’m not sure there can be any legal definition which can remove the power of containment from every police force?
By the way, I was just reading something on kettling and my point the other day about football matches was one of the things which came out in court…
“Although not defined in law (it still is simply a police tactic) it was given the green light by the High Court after some protestors questioned the legality of their seven hour kettling in Oxford Circus on Mayday 2001. The courts ruled that the police could under certain circumstances detain people against their will for long periods of time to prevent outbreaks of violence and criminal acts – and typically a breach of the peace. The example they gave was the detaining of football supporters in the ground while opposing fans left the area”
Sorry to bombard. You’ll find this interesting. It’s as close as we’ll get to how the ECHR will make judgement which seems to back up how you feel.
http://www.criminallawandjustice.co.uk/index.php?/Analysis/public-order-policing-and-the-echr.html
It rapidly became obvious that the Met would not allow progress down Whitehall and a kettle or attack seemed imminent. Students were alert and wary enough to flee Whitehall and then disperse into scattered marches along unplanned routes including minor roads to avoid being kettled. Despite the denial of agreed route most of the day passed off peacefully – we even went past the heart of darkness at New Scotland Yard completely unguarded with not even a cross word or gesture in their direction.
Mark I’m surprised you feel entitled to unfettered access to demonstrate. I mean there has to be some containment; you have a democratic right to protest but I also have a democratic right not to have my passage through the streets of London hindered.
A trolling comment like that is unlike you James. There was an agreed route for that protest, which from all the evidence at the time clearly had a kettle set up to trap them in. How does evading it equate to ‘unfettered access to demonstrate’?
What you wrote flies in the face of the contents of this post.
It’s quite difficult to make posts in disagreement without risking being accused of trolling or worse. Maybe best if I leave this particular subject alone on your blog to avoid this kind of confrontation. I’m probably even more at odds with you on this since we started communicating a few weeks ago so I’ll leave it there.
@James
James, you are brave for trying, but no matter how reasonable your comments are, they will be shouted down if they challenge the status quo here even when that flies in the face of the known facts. There are still some that insist there was a ‘charge’ by police horses: they’ve clearly never seen such a thing, because even their own videos show what happened, which was the tactical use of the horses for crowd control. They will scoff, but even the most superficial research will reveal the real difference between the two.
For the record William I appreciate James’ contributions – my objections have come when he has repeated accusations which I believe have been proven erroneous. I’d also suggest that the video evidence plus the experiences of people I know who were injured by the Met’s horse charges, on #dayx2 and #dayx3, both trump you somewhat snide comment. But feel free to keep posting.