Police look on as protesters gather outside the Business and Trade department in London to show solidarity with Palestine, as they campaign against military arms being manufactured in the UK and sent to Israel, May 1, 2024
BATTLE was joined to defend the right to protest today as the government launched a twin-track attack on the Palestine solidarity movement.
Top cabinet minister Michael Gove launched a mendacious smear attack on the pro-Palestine protests while Lord Walney, the government’s “independent adviser” on political disruption, published his long-trailed report full of repressive measures.
Yet even while moving to attack democratic rights, the government was handed a stinging rebuke by High Court judges who ruled today that earlier measures by the Home Office to make it easier to ban protests were unlawful.
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The organisers of the Gaza ceasefire marches have written to the police protesting at the decision to allow an abusive group of Israel supporters to rally within feet of the march last Saturday.
In a letter the six organisations demanded a meeting with Met Commissioner Mark Rowley, saying that “the whole demonstration had to run a frightening gauntlet of abuse, insult and provocation, the aim of which was clearly to create a physical confrontation.
“We want an explanation of how and why this was allowed to happen and an undertaking that future counter protests will be properly policed.”
His review on ‘political violence and disruption’ suggests some groups pay for policing of their protests and calls to restrict protest groups organising or raising money if they ‘cause serious disruption’
An ‘independent adviser’ to the government has been grilled about accusations of impartiality over his lobbying links, ahead of launching his review recommending tougher action for protest groups including for Palestine liberation and against climate change.
… [‘Whore’] Walney, also know as John Woodcock, quit Labour in 2018, after being accused of sexual harassment, and is now a crossbench peer. He was made the UK Government’s ‘independent adviser on political violence and disruption’ and his report ‘protecting our Democracy from Coercion’ was laid before parliament today.
He was tasked by the government to lead its crackdown on protests, including ones against the climate crisis and global arms trade, however he was accused of a conflict of interest with links to both the fossil fuel and weapons lobbyists.
Woodcock chaired the Purpose Defence Coalition with members including one of the world’s largest arms manufacturers Leonardo, which has links to the Israeli government. Co-founder of campaign group Palestine Action, Huda Ammori, said it was a “sham” for the government to claim Lord Walney is an ‘independent’ adviser.
Ammori said: “By writing this report, he is working to protect the interests of Israel’s military supply chain, over the will of the British people, who overwhelmingly support an arms embargo on Israel.”
Zionist Keir ‘Kid Starver’ Starmer. Image thanks to The Skwawkbox.
It comes amid calls from former Prime Minister Gordon Brown as well as the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, to scrap the two-child benefit limit
A new poll shows that voters support calls to scrap the two-child benefit limit, a policy which charities and think tanks say has pushed hundreds of thousands of children into poverty.
The poll, carried out by Opinium, for Save the Children and shared exclusively with i, suggests that this would be a politically popular move for Labour, ‘with 39 per cent of the public claiming it would make them more likely to vote for whichever party made the pledge’.
It comes amid calls from former Prime Minister Gordon Brown as well as the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, to scrap the two-child benefit limit, with the archbishop calling it a cruel and immoral policy that plunges hundreds of thousands of children into poverty.
The two-child benefit cap prevents parents from claiming child tax credit or universal credit for any third or subsequent child born after April 2017. It was introduced by the former chancellor George Osborne in his austerity drive with the aim of encouraging parents of larger families to find a job or work more hours.
Shameful number of children getting to class too hungry to learn makes the case for universal free school meals
The ‘heartbreaking‘ rise of child poverty in the UK has been highlighted in a recent poll that revealed a shameful number of children going to school hungry in England.
Four in ten teachers said their students were showing up to class too hungry to learn, which rose to 63% in the poorest areas, a new poll by Teacher Tapp reported by the Mirror, found. For more than a fifth of teachers, the issue had become worse since September.
This has led to schools stepping in to address hunger where pupils don’t qualify for free school meals, with four in ten teachers saying their school is offering free school dinners to hungry children who don’t qualify. This rose to over half in the most deprived areas.
The poll has emphasised the argument made by campaigners that free school meals should be extended to all primary school pupils, as strict eligibility criteria means many children living in poverty miss out.
Just Stop Oil protesting in London 6 December 2022.
The Government’s ‘independent adviser’ on domestic extremism, Lord Walney aka former Labour Politician John Woodcock, has issued a report calling for organisations like Palestine Action and Just Stop Oil to be banned.
The report outlines that any group engaging in action where the maximum penalty is imprisonment should be restricted through sanctions, including removing the right to assemble and fundraise. The report also calls for new measures that would enable individuals to sue organisations like Just Stop Oil.
Last week, it emerged that far from being ‘independent’, Mr Woodcock serves vested corporate interests in the arms and fossil fuel industries, whose profits are being threatened by the groups he’s proposing to ban.
Amongst other roles, Woodcock chairs the Purpose Defence Coalition, whose members include Leonardo, one of the world’s largest arms manufacturers, with extensive links to the Israeli government. He is also a paid adviser to Rud Pederson, lobbyists, whose clients include the oil and gas giant, Glencore as well as Enwell Energy, which describes itself as ‘a highly focused oil and gas business’. He is also a paid adviser to the Purpose Business Coalition, whose members include BP.
Woodcock resigned from the Labour party in 2018 amid sexual assault allegations, and was subsequently granted a lifelong peerage by Boris Johnson after calling on the electorate to vote for the Conservatives.
The report has been laid before the House of Commons using the ‘motion for unopposed return’ procedure, which means there’s no scrutiny of it by Parliament, but it benefits from Parliamentary privilege, ie: Walney can’t be sued for defamation.
Shami Chakrabarti, a Labour peer and human rights advocate, said the government was hiding behind procedure.
“It is ironic that a government that consistently attacks protesters by press releases and reading the riot act to police chiefs now hides behind arcane procedure and abuse of parliamentary privilege,” she said.
The revelations echo a previous attempt by the so-called ‘think-tank’, Policy Exchange to brand climate defenders as ‘extremists’ in 2019. It later emerged that Policy Exchange was also being funded by Big Oil.
A Just Stop Oil Spokesperson said:
“Lord Walney is directly funded by oil and gas companies, as well as by the weapons manufacturers responsible for the deaths of countless innocent civilians in Gaza. His direct financial ties to the very companies whose profits are threatened by the groups he’s proposing to ban, means he is entirely compromised. It is yet another case of open corruption. As such, Just Stop Oil does not recognise the legitimacy of this report.
The governments’ climate strategy has been declared unlawful for the second time and their response has been to licence yet more oil, as our climate spins out of control. Who are we going to sue for the inconvenience of flooded fields, crop failure, spiralling food costs and empty shelves? Just this morning, the High Court has ruled that Suella Braverman acted unlawfully in making it easier for the police to criminalise peaceful direct action. History will come to regard the acts of this government and its cronies as the real criminals, which is why they will stop at nothing to silence those telling the truth and acting like we are in the emergency that we are in.”
Today’s report comes hours after the High Court ruled the Home Office’s threshold for “serious disruption” in the Public Order Act 2023 was unlawful.
dizzy: Looks like the title Whore would be more appropriate for Walney.
