Police PLC is nothing new but neither is a world without Police

Con/Dem Government plans to further privatise the police force have shocked even the Police Federation into making a response. But a long view of policing may help us understand what 'core policing' really is and why for governments that prioritise the interests of elites the privatisation of the police force is a natural evolution of the institution. 


Policing As Usual
As a priest I have lots of experience of working alongside PCSOs who are loved and trusted in our community. Though they were originally thought to be 'policing on the cheap' what they are to us is an encouragement for those involved in community organising around the estate. 


My experience of police, however, is rarely that good. When I got beaten up in night club they said, "well if you're injuries were worse we could find 'em but as it is we can't". When my bike was stolen and I found the person who did it on CCTV the police "forgot" to pick up the tape. When my neighbours attacked our visitors and stole our camera we asked the police to arbitrate they declined, "you can press charges if you like, but that's it." 

But when I exercised my right, with others, to protest the Iraq reoccupation they kettled us in telling us "this is for your own safety", in a loud hailer. When I joined a Critical Mass bike ride they gave out leaflets with intimidating misinformation and tried to provoke violence by pushing at the rear riders and stalling the ones in front. The police will defend the rights of corporate institutions to evict poor communities from the land or from property and will not discuss the matter with anyone less they be deemed as getting 'involved'. 

So the privatisation of the police force is terrible but it does not mean a huge change in policing. Yes, it will be far more expensive for the tax payer, that's a 'no brainer'. Yes, it will decrease accountability and transparency of policing. But the tax burden of policing will always be born by those with the least to gain from their presence and the number of unaccountable deaths in custody in the UK continues to rise without much investigation. Write now the Leveson inquiry is looking at issues of endemic police corruption over recent years because of the corporate interests of the media. 

Police who Protest!
But even the police are taking a strong political position now. And that's almost without precedent. Vice chair of the Police Federation Simon Reed writes, "This is not a solution. Chief officers must no longer bury their heads in the sand; they should instead stand up for what is right for the public and protect the police service from any further dismantling by this government." 


Police PLC (Business as usual)
Former (disgraced) London Met. Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair - no stranger to bullshit - claims that what is taking place is "not privatisation" at all; it's "outsourcing" which is different; apparently. What has forced this issue into public consciousness recently is the move by West Midlands and Surrey police to contract out not only the work but the oversight of the work of what is often considered to be core policing: this may include guarding prisoners and taking witness statements and other tasks that rely on what we have come to believe to be the political neutrality of the police force. 

So how did it all begin. One of the most important Christian writers on the subject of policing is co-founder of 'Jesus Radicals' Andy Alexis-Baker. Andy is a Mennonite and has been sharply critically of the way the Mennonite tradition, with origins and a proud identity as a peace church, has given concessions to the violence of the state.

Alexis-Baker traces the police back as far as the estate-manager roll of the Norman Sheriff, imposed on the people under William the Bastards reforms from 1066 onwards. But we needn't go that far back to discover that policing has always been about preserving an unjust status quo. In 1829 when the Home Secretary Robert Peel introduced his more formalised Metropolitan Police Force it was met with huge resistance from libertarians of all kinds and was seen as an infringement on human rights and an attempt entirely focused on what was seen as social disorder among poor people without reference to the rich. Indeed, it was often possible to buy ones way into the police force in its early years.

Whether directly governed by the state or sold off to the private sector the police force has always primarily to persuade ordinary people to follow rules set by a ruling elite who have been bought out by an even more elite class of landowners.

A World Without Policing is Possible
We struggle to imagine a world without police mostly because we have hardly begun to build a world without police. Our dependence is such that we cannot imagine what we do, in situations of conflict, were it not for their intervention; even if they too are helpless in response to crime.

Saint Francis's refusal to accumulate possessions, or have anything to do with money, was, in part, a deliberate refusal to be complicit with the violence of those who took the role of protector. He realised that if he did not possess then he could not be stolen from and, for the most part, the issue of good or bad policing becomes a moot point.

When the police failed to help me with violent neighbours it was the local residents group and the Church I turned to for support, both groups were already an important part of my life and of the community. But we had built few mechanisms for helping one another with conflict: we relied on the police out of our own helplessness. In the end my partner and I chose to love and serve our neighbours, despite the continuing abuse. The apostle Paul was right: it "heaped burning coals on their heads" and as their brains warmed up a bit they learned to love back. Well, a bit, anyway!

Jesus and the apostle Paul said we should "love our enemies," it is difficult to see how locking someone up, beating the shit out of them, or using restraining techniques that are proven to cause fatalities is an act of love. If we want a safer, happier world then state policing or Police Plc neither will create the changes needed. That's our job. Or as Gandhi put it: be the change you want to see in the world. A world without policing was possible and could be possible again.

ASBO Activist Calls Time On War

ASBO Activist Calls Time on War

ASBO to ban anti-war activist from City of Westminster for 10 years

Chris Cole, (Right) at Downing Street in October. 

A Christian peace activist has been served notice by the Metropolitan Police that they are seeking an anti-social behaviour order (ASBO) to exclude him from the City of Westminster for ten years.   

Chris Cole (48) from Cowley, Oxford was served with papers as he attended a pre-trial hearing following a demonstration at Downing Street on October 7^th to mark the 10^th anniversary of the Afghanistan War.  

Cole, along with Catholic Priest Fr Martin Newell face charges of criminal damage following the pouring of paint on the Downing Street pavement.

The ASBO seek  to ban Cole from being in the City of Westminster except while passing through as a passenger on the London Underground;  being in possession of any can of spray paint, tin of paint, marker pen, chalk or charcoal in any place outside the city of Oxford or being in possession of bolt croppers in any place outside the city of Oxford.   

The application for the ASBO sites fourteen occasions over the past twenty-one years that Cole has been arrested at anti-war protests involving spray paint or bolt croppers.

Chris Cole said “Waging war is the great anti-social behaviour of our time.  Thousands of people have been killed and injured in the great follies of the Iraq and Afghanistan war, while billions have been wasted on preparations for nuclear war and arms companies continue to make vast profits from hawking  weaponry around the globe.  Rather than spraying bullets in Iraq or spilling blood in Afghanistan, I have spilled paint on the Downing Street pavement and sprayed paint on the MoD walls.  In all honesty, which is the real anti-social behaviour here?”  

The application for the ASBO on Cole will take place at the end of his trial for the protest at Downing Street, a date for which is yet to be set. In 2005, a District Judge refused to impose an ASBO on anti-war activist Lindis Percy. District Judge Anderson said: "I am firmly of the view courts ought not to allow anti-social behaviour orders to be used as a club to beat down the expression of legitimate comment and the dissemination of views of matters of public concern."

London Catholic Worker jailed

Zelda Jeffers appeared at Bedford Magistrates Court on Monday November 2nd. She was sentenced to 16 days in prison for refusing to pay a fine of £450 for a 'No Borders' protest at Yarlswood Immigration Detention Centre.

She has been sent to HMP Peterborough. Asuming Zelda gets half off for 'good behaviour', she should be released on Monday 9th November, probably in the morning.

If you want to write to her or send her a card of support, you can

- post a letter (although the postal strike obviously makes it seem unlikely to get through before Monday )

- either to the prison at:
Zelda Jeffers BD3976,
HMP Peterborough,
Saville Road,
Westwood,
Peterborough PE3 7PD

- or to us at :
London Catholic Worker,
16 De Beauvoir Road,
London N1 5SU

Gloucester Curate in nonviolent confrontation with Christian Zionists

Click here for the Gloucester Citizen's report of my arrest on Monday night.

The Anarchist "Movement" Conference

I went to the first of two days of the Anarchist Movement Conference in London but having just moved house three days before I had to hot-foot-it back to Gloucester on the Sunday.

We were split into groups of as diverse as the organisers could manage and allocated rooms and facilitators. If the group wanted to change the facilitators they could but they were asked to stick to the same groups all weekend.

We were suggested topics to cover like whether or not there is an anarchists movement in Britain and whether talk of 'class' is still relevant.

Our group had some interesting conversations on race, gender, class, and 'what works and what doesn't'. Few of us were particularly excited by the idea of an anarchist 'movement'.

I was dissapointed that some had the same mentality as the centralists "we need greater unity" they said: except the mantra of fascists and national socialists everywhere.

I was disappointed that we didn't break new ground as a group and all the more disappointed not to make it to the Sunday when perhaps we might have. I may never know.

The conference was due to end with all the groups re-joining for a plenary and I hear back from two others that this was a much more constructive day. I suspected as much.

We were promised at the outset that a written report would follow. When it does you will see it here...

On a personal note I met Gerrard from Tolstoyans (UK), and Dan from Jewdas.org . Also I left about 25 copies of 'A Pinch of Salt: Issue 19' on the table and they went like hot cakes. If they were removed by someone anti-Christian then I hope they recycled them! At least one made it into safe hands since I got an email from a new reader who happens to have been the protestor mentioned in Dan Stork Banks' report on AWE. He's going to pen a reply.

The Revolution isn't over in Nepal

There's no such thing as a complete revolution, a utopian end-point, as the Nepalese people are demonstrating at the moment (Links 10 May 2009)

After years of struggle; national strikes, Maoist and military imposed curfews, the bloodiest asassination of royals since the end of the Russian Tsars, and riots on the streets of Khatmandu, the Nepalese people finally overthrew the Royalists (2006) and last year and the communists stormed to power in a new federalist system.

Almost exactly a year later and the prime minister and some other goverment minister's are resigning in what Link and blogger Ben Peterson are calling a "soft coup" that suggests that Maoist and popular reform in favour of greater social justice are still being frustrated by monarchist military elites.

Video from Kathmandu

From Link:

"The UCPN (M) [Maoist party) has called for protests in the streets until its demands have been met. "The protests have been many and all over the place”, Peterson said. “They are organised by a whole range of different groups. Every different group has its own protest. The mood is angry.”

The protests ranged from involving hundreds, to tens of thousands, he said. However, he emphasised that these protests occurred simultaneously — there could be dozens of protests in Kathmandu at any one time. “Many of the people I have spoken to at the protests were not Maoists”, Peterson said.

As example of the mood, he explained: “The other night I was at the bus park, and about 20 people just waiting around for a bus spontaneously started chanting against the president.”

The foreign media have attempted to play up protests by right-wing NC supporters. The Sydney Morning Herald even featured a photo of an NC supporters protest with the caption “People’s Power”. Peterson said that before the UCPN (M) left government, there were some tiny protests involving a few hundred people at most. Since then, no such protests had occurred.

In some cases the police have attacked protesters, including tear gassing a demonstration by the pro-UCPN (M) Young Communist League. Police repeatedly attack attempts by protesters, mostly Maoist women, to demonstrate in front of the president’s offices. Protests in that are have been banned, resulting in regular clashes.

However, the state has held off from trying full-scale repression.

So far, the UCPN (M) has also held back from full-scale mobilisations. It has yet to organise a centralised, all-out demonstration that calls the greatest numbers onto the streets together. However, as the likely futile negotiations by the anti-Maoist parties drags on, that could be about to change."

Policing the crisis

"We will not pay for their crisis" has been called a bad slogan, because it is not anyone's fault in particular that the system is grinding to a halt. That is right - but it stil is their crisis since every form of (re-)producing dominant ideology has been selling the system as the best, nay the only possible world. And they are still trying to sell it that way.

This being said, let us have a look at the policing indeed. How convenient that the highly dangerous terrorists of Pakistani descent have been released on the day the UK budget was getting all the attention. They were not charged of anything.
Apart from being Pakistani apparently, and to be thrown out of the UK because of that.

And of course the officer that beat Ian Tomlinson to death, or Nicola Fisher to the ground, or the officer who was looking forward to beating up long-haired "hippys" (!) at the G20-demonstration of April 1st are all just bad apples in a very sound - erm - orchard.

Let the poster speak for itself. Click on it for a good viewing.

Police involved in death of innocent bystander

The Guardian has revealed footage of police at the G20 protests bringing a man to the floor as he walked away from them with his hands in his pockets.

They then stood over him but offered no help as he sat dazed on the floor.

Minutes later Mr Tomlinson collapsed and then died.

People say we are lucky not to live in an oppressive regime. It's true that we live with relative freedom but is only relative and it is never inert. We are always either gaining or losing our corporate freedom to the Other.

See for yourself: here. It looks like whoever did the post-mortem and gave a verdict of "natural causes" may need investigating too.

Catholic Worker report from the City

Spotted on Indymedia UK and also to be found on Ciaron O'Reily's own weblog. Not being Roman Catholic admittedly I had to look up what he means with "sorrowful mysteries". Please find out yourself if you do not understand it.

G20-Circled & Shaken Down During the 2nd Sorrowful Mystery

Sometime during the second decade of the sorrowful mysteries, I had a sense we were not alone. Martin, Katrina and I were sat alone in a small East London park facing the Excel Centre where the G20 of the most powerful government leaders were gathered to rearrange deckchairs on their sinking ship. Thousands of police had been deployed around the Excel Centre keeping the few hundreds of protesters who gathered a quarter of a mile from the site. A case of overcatering evidently.
We had somehow managed to get through to this small park for a face off with the building. We were praying seated at a park table when this big guy leaned over me, I looked up to see an automatic rifle in his hands and a pistol strapped to his knee. He told me to stand up slowly. As I did I went to place a paper in my pocket he said “Keep your hands visible”. This guy was serious, I extended my arms away from my body for a frisking and looked around to see 4 other guys and a gal in paramilitary uniforms circling our table all similarly armed with rifles and pistols. 6 of them with 12 weapons, 3 of us with a bible, rosary beads and liturgy sheet. I like these odds.

As Martin stood up he kept reciting the rosary, didn’t break stride. My copy of the Guardian began to flutter in the breeze under the park table I thought I should step out and stand on it so it wouldn’t blow away. I then thought, I really like my left kneecap, stayed stationery, refused to give my name and was detained under anti-terrorist legislation, 5th time in the past year in 3 jurisdictions!

The cops paced around methodically as they checked Katrina and Martin’s bags….these folks were the real deal, the last card in the cop deck. After the 4 million CCTV’s, the fluorescent jacket guys, the riot squads with shields and batons, come these folks I guess.

Our visitors seemed satisfied that our liturgy sheet was not indeed a map of the Excel Centre as reported by their Intel. After we were released from the mystical anti-terror detention and the super cops departed, we returned to prayer and further reflection on these dark times we’re in and what small human response we could muster.

Outnumbered, outresourced, outflanked, but not out of the game - Katrina produced a rainbow PEACE banner and Martin drew up a placard with a quote from Catholic Worker founder Dorothy Day “Our Problems Stem from our Acceptance of this Filthy Rotten System!” and made our way toward the G20 gathering.

Across the city others were being raided, arrested, recovering from wounds and long hours of detention/kettling from the previous day’s scene outside the Bank of England. A lot more good folks, following weeks of media hype and scaremongering, were internally migrating away from expressing dissent in this historic moment wherein the climate and the economy crash. Where this filthy rotten system based on production for production's sake rather than meeting human needs, that operates in the denial that the environment does not have limits to exploitation.

The only way out of this atomised fear and off this sinking ship is nonviolent resistance and solidarity.

http://www.londoncatholicworker.org

Confirmation of death demonstrator April 1st

Rumours abound at mass demonstrations which are attacked by the police.
Mainstream media reported earlier on this than the instant news medium Indymedia. But it has become an unavoidable piece of news, and we should not expect more honest reporting about it than about the death of Jean Charles de Menezes. We are not even informed about the name of the victim. [Update below]

In response to the death of a protestor during the demonstrations against the G20 in the City of London on the 1st April 2009, a solidarity demonstration will assemble at Bank at 1pm, today April 2d.

The aim of the assembly is to:

* mark the death of the protestor,
* call for an independent police inquiry
* show solidarity against the enormous police repression that happened against protestors outside the Bank, the Climate Exchange and elsewhere in the City of London.

Any witnesses to this event or any other act of police violence against demonstrators is advised to write a full statement as soon as they possibly can, sign and date it, and give a copy it to a trusted other party. These statements should be sent to
Email: g20witnesses [at] gmail.com

UPDATE

The Guardian states the deceased, 47 year old Ian Tomlinson, lived in the City and was on the way home from his Newsagents shop, no information if he was caught up in the demo or whether he took part.

Jasper Jackson, 23, from London, who photographed Mr Tomlinson's collapse, said he had been standing in front of a line of police dog handlers minutes before he fell over. "The picture I have of him is of him stumbling in front of the protesters and in front of the police dogs looking dazed," he said. "He had a glazed look on his face. Then it was drawn to my attention that somebody shouted to the police with a loud hailer that there was a casualty and said, 'Can we get a medic?' "

The officers were white as sheets," said Andy Bowman, a 24-year-old PhD student. "The blood had drained from their faces. They were giving us conflicting stories about what had happened; some of the officers were saying he had a blow to the head and some were saying he'd collapsed of a heart attack.

Why are you watching this camera?

Just having finished a restyled re-publication of this magnificent piece on how to make surplus population into cops [it pays to learn the languages of your neighbours!] and then I stumble upon this. Synchronicity - or signs of the times.

Let's work indeed - against the surveillance state, against the policing simulation of work, against the paranoia propagated by the regime.

Dismantling The State

Please read the customer review comments on this. It is absolutely priceless. Well done to whoever put them there. Heheheh.

Comment from Les, now released from custody

Three arrests occurred yesterday at the nerve centre of british power (Northwood, North West London) where questions were asked about the authorisation of killings of civillian, and any militarised obedient persons from Gaza, and in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A number of nonviolent creative anarchists vigilled and memorised the killings of military and civillians and three were arrested for alleged criminal damage. Priest Martin Newell, Susan Clarkson and Les Gibbons were arrested for the direct entry of top secret NATO base.

Questions were aimed at asking who is responsible, who approved and who authorised the killings, the many killings - ..the ability to observe objectively is universal if blame is not apportioned through questions - this creates the climate for reflection and inner questioning.

We asked those authorising others to go to war, kill and be killed to reflect on Gaza and disobey to come forward instead they stayed hidden - maybe they make themselves the gods of earth doing fine in their killing mandates.

This nonviolent calm intervention - forced by starvation, injustice and need to breach in a flint faced fashion the inner circles of empire and low quality power for the sake of preserving innocent, the real treasures are people not oil or security.

HOPE HAPPENING
Hope will be Happening on 4th January in the first Palestine Cafe in Southampton - messages in arabic greatfully received for cards and pictures - no violent messages will be authorised for dispatch. Please ask your friends to assist with this - this is a human rights shout for assistance for palestine and particurly Gaza.

For further details please contact Les: 07766904547

Image: Les by Lizzie Jones

Political police

What would happen if the police were politicized and what are the principalities and powers so afraid of? It's the same fear that means the military have been traditiaonally banned from unionising.

If you get the sharp end of state-violence discussing their views and values, forming into groups, thinking about their rights and the rightness of their actions. If you had a grown-up autonomous police force doing some serious introspection then how could you maintain it's present role as living out someone else's agenda? You just couldn't.

"We need to be on the beat more?"
"Why?"
"It's what the voters want."
"It's not what we want we get hurt and abused"
"Why do we get hurt and abused."
"Because of all the fascists."
"What's a fascist?"
"Someone who subsumes there identity into a group in order to gather enough force to impose their morality on others and .... oh,.... I see."

Politicians spin Kingsnorth protest

Well done to the Lib' Dem's for forcing the issue when the home office claimed that heavy-handed police presence at the climate camp was justified by the 70 police officers injured by protestors.

It now turns out there were 12 reportable injuries none of which was caused by a protestor but one was caused by a bee and another by sitting in a car!

Anglican Priest Under Surveilance

Chris Howson has been under police surveilance at his home / Chaplaincy in Bradford, the Church Times reports. (Articles, Church Times 19 Sept 2008).

This is not the first time Chris' home has been under surveilance by the police. He had similar experience when living in a squat in Bradford many years ago.

It is interesting that this time it was provoked by his criticism of the relationship between the UK and US military and planned a protest which, among other things, highlighted this relationship.

There is also a suggestion, after a phone call from the MOD, that Chris' emails were being intercepted and read. A very cautionary tale!

No longer on bail

As of yesterday Keith and Les are no longer on bail for their development work at AWE Aldermaston. Building an animal sanctuary and permaculture area are still being considered.

The arresting officer was thanked for his participation in the event and we hope to see him again in the future for further brainstorming on how AWE Aldermaston can be transformed into a place of hope and prosperity.