right to protest

Greenpeace urges govt to restore right to protest

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Commenting on the lengthy jail sentences imposed on climate activists for planning a peaceful protest, following a trial where the defendants were prevented from fully explaining the reasons for their actions, Greenpeace UK’s programme director Amy Cameron said:

“This is a dark day for the right to protest, a pillar of our democracy. Without it, we would have no votes for women, basic workers’ rights or an end to coal and commercial whaling. What sort of country locks people away for years for planning a peaceful demonstration, let alone for talking about it on a Zoom call? We’re giving a free hand to the polluting elite robbing us of a habitable planet while jailing those who’re trying to stop them – it makes no sense. 

Just Stop Oil protesting in London 6 December 2022.
Just Stop Oil protesting in London 6 December 2022.

“These sentences are not a one-off anomaly, but the culmination of years of repressive legislation, overblown government rhetoric and a concerted assault on the right of juries to deliberate according to their conscience. This judicial crackdown on climate activists has gotten out of hand and is now a major international embarrassment. It’s part of the mess the Labour government has inherited from its predecessor and they must fix it by giving back to people the right to protest that’s been slowly being taken away from them. 

“Starmer’s ministers should repeal the gagging laws brought in by the Conservatives and instruct the Attorney General to meet with campaigners and the UN rapporteur on environmental defenders to discuss a way forward.”

Continue ReadingGreenpeace urges govt to restore right to protest

New government urged to scrap anti-protest laws to restore freedom of expression

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/new-government-urged-scrap-anti-protest-laws-restore-freedom-expression

Demonstrators during a ‘Kill The Bill’ protest against The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill in London, January 15, 2022

LABOUR was urged today to scrap Tory anti-protest laws and reject harmful rhetoric used to stigmatise peaceful demonstrations.

Peace, pro-Palestine, environmental and civil liberties groups called on ministers to champion the rights to free speech by repealing the draconian legislation aimed at silencing dissent.

Amnesty International led the calls as it published a new report warning of an increasingly wide range of means to quash peaceful demonstrations and silence free speech across Europe.

It called on Home Secretary Yvette Cooper to urgently scrap the public order elements of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act as well as the entirety of the Public Order Act and the Serious Disruption Regulations.

Kerry Moscogiuri, of Amnesty International UK, said: “The new government must seize this moment to halt the alarming march towards repression in the UK by repealing the anti-protest laws pushed through by the previous government and ending the harmful rhetoric being used to stigmatise those who peacefully protest.

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/new-government-urged-scrap-anti-protest-laws-restore-freedom-expression

Continue ReadingNew government urged to scrap anti-protest laws to restore freedom of expression

Jeremy Corbyn publishes his manifesto

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Image of Jeremy Corbyn MP, former leader of the Labour Party
Jeremy Corbyn MP, former leader of the Labour Party

Former leader of the Labour Party Socialist Jeremy Corbyn publishes his manifesto as independent candidate for Islington North.

https://www.votecorbyn.com/manifesto

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This manifesto is our manifesto – it belongs to every single person who has written to me over the last 41 years, met me at a community event or simply stopped me in the street. Meeting people, talking to people and working together to bring about a fairer society – that is what being an MP is all about.

The issues facing people in Islington are part of a much wider set of crises. There are more people living in desperate poverty than I have ever known. More rough sleepers struggling to survive. More refugees fleeing the horrors of war and climate catastrophe. We will not solve these crises unless we build a new kind of politics. Our people-powered campaign will demand a redistribution of wealth, ownership and power. For rent controls. For an end to the two-child benefits cap. For a Green New Deal. For safe routes for asylum seekers. For a fully funded, fully public NHS.

This future is no pipedream – our community is proof that a kinder world is possible. I visit community centres which are welcoming, creative places, where people can meet each other, learn, eat together, receive support when they need it, and give it when they are able to. I meet carers doing all they can to support relatives or friends, often in the most difficult circumstances. I meet members of mutual aid groups who are building a new economy, one act of solidarity at a time. If we applied these basic principles across the board, we would create a society that cares for each other and cares for all.

When I vote in Parliament, I do not vote alone. I vote with my community – and this campaign is bringing together people of all ages, faiths and backgrounds in pursuit of a better world. We are offering people something very precious: hope.

Join us at www.votecorbyn.com to prove that when we come together to fight for a better society for everyone, we can win.

CONTENTS


ACTION ON THE COST OF LIVING
End the energy and water rip-off
Fair pay for Islington workers
Abolish the two-child benefit cap
Universal basic income
Wealth tax


HOUSING IS A HUMAN RIGHT
Security for renters
Build social housing
Housing insulation
Leasehold reform
Cladding justice


DEFEND OUR NHS
End privatisation
Support our doctors and nurses
Mental health
A National Care Service
Reproductive health


A GREENER ISLINGTON
A Green New Deal
Protect our parks
Save our buses
Walking and cycling
Animal welfare


EDUCATION FOR ALL
Save our schools
Education is not a commodity
Lifelong learning
Update our curriculum


A SAFER ISLINGTON
A public health approach
Tackling hate crime and extremism
A fairer criminal justice system


HUMAN RIGHTS ARE UNIVERSAL
Peace
Reparations
Refugees are welcome here
Migrant justice


OUR DEMOCRACY
The right to protest
The right to strike
Decentralisation
Local public ownership
Media and sport

Click here to download the manifesto

Continue ReadingJeremy Corbyn publishes his manifesto

Morning Star: Cynical attacks on the peace movement are fuelling brazen racism

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/cynical-attacks-peace-movement-are-fuelling-brazen-racism

People take part in a Palestine Solidarity Campaign rally outside the Houses of Parliament, London, as MPs debate calls for a ceasefire in Gaza, February 21, 2024

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Braverman is continuing her bid to ban peace marches even though the demand for a Gaza ceasefire commands majority support in Britain and indeed right across the world, where Britain and the US stood shamefully isolated this month as the only countries not to support a ceasefire resolution at the UN security council.

Lee Anderson, in the guise of moderating Braverman’s claim (“I don’t actually believe that the Islamists have got control of our country”) actually took it a step further (“they’ve got control of [Sadiq] Khan… He’s actually given our capital city away to his mates.”)

Leftwingers will be incredulous at the implication that peace demonstrators are Khan’s “mates” — the London mayor is no socialist and enthusiastically joined in the character assassination of Jeremy Corbyn when he led Labour.

But Anderson’s subtext is clear: Palestinians are Muslims (not all are, of course, but nuance is not Anderson’s strong point), people marching for justice for Palestinians must therefore be controlled by Muslims, the big marches in London haven’t been banned, and this must be because its mayor is a Muslim.

This is incendiary stuff. So rattled are British authorities that they have repeatedly misrepresented Palestine solidarity demos: the attempt to ban the huge Armistice Day demo rested on a baseless assertion it posed a threat to the Cenotaph (which the fascist thugs riled up by Braverman’s propaganda actually did).

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/cynical-attacks-peace-movement-are-fuelling-brazen-racism

Continue ReadingMorning Star: Cynical attacks on the peace movement are fuelling brazen racism

‘More culture war nonsense from the government as children go hungry and the planet burns’

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/more-culture-war-nonsense-from-the-government-as-children-go-hungry-and-the-planet-burns

Police during an Extinction Rebellion demonstration blocking Vauxhall Bridge in central London, April 10, 2022

Right to protest comes under fresh attack as Tories unveil new measures and fines

THE right to protest came under fresh attack today as the Tory government unveiled new measures directed at demonstrators.

Rattled by the repeated huge solidarity marches with Palestine in recent months, ministers presented amendments to criminal justice legislation designed to make protesting harder.

Among the acts now to be criminalised are wearing masks at a demonstration, climbing on war memorials or the use of flares or fireworks.

Protesters engaging in any of these activities now risk fines of up to £1,000.

Nor will they any longer be able to use the right to protest as a defence if they cause serious disruption, a change driven by the refusal of a jury to convict anti-racists charged with hauling down the statute of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol.

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Leading human rights lawyer and peer Shami Chakrabarti said: … “This is more culture war nonsense from the government while children go hungry and the planet burns.”

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Suella Braverman, who lost office trying to ban a Gaza ceasefire protest on Armistice Day, has demanded further measures.

These would include giving ministers, rather than the police, the power to ban marches they do not approve of; prohibit the use of particular slogans or phrases and proscribe groups deemed “extremist” even if they are entirely peaceful.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/more-culture-war-nonsense-from-the-government-as-children-go-hungry-and-the-planet-burns

Continue Reading‘More culture war nonsense from the government as children go hungry and the planet burns’