Tescopoly goes to war with Bristol estate

Economy tanks, replete with the trademark blue stripes, have moved into the sleepy estates of Bristol. Residents last night saw a riot unfold in front of them as aggressive police tactics against a peaceful protest escalated.

Pic h/t Bristol resident Ian Bone

A two year campaign against Tesco moving into this area of Bristol culminated this week as Tesco moved in despite the desires of residents.

It appears that heavy handed policing including the use of dogs and riot police against a peaceful protest led to injuries and arrests that need never have happened.

Three eye witnesses to what then happened are really worth reading. There's the Indymedia report, an account on Our Kingdom, and at Neuro Bonkers. It's also worth checking out Ian Bone.

The press seem remarkably reluctant to report these incidents although the local paper could hardly avoid it.



There's one group of people who can really create a riot where none was before - and that's the riot police

Further reading: Adam's facts about Tesco. Sam Allen on why the council should support the community.

No Cell Off

I think it was Not The nine O'Clock News that did a joke about Thatcher giving prisoners the opportunity to "buy their own cells", well hurrah for the current trend of eighties nostalgia because it's actually happening. Sort of.

Two police forces in Scotland are, according to the Scotsman, farming out their cells into the private sector. The lucky winners in this game are Group Four (renamed G4S so that people forget that kept letting prisoners escape) who's comments in the press appear to have provoked the normally supine Unison into threatening strike action. Or at least not ruling it out, which is pretty scary stuff I'm sure.

Group Four's managing director John Shaw diplomatically said that "Police forces in Scotland have a great track record of being very forward-thinking, compared to England and Wales" who presumably have not had meetings with him about this exciting business opportunity which includes constructing and staffing detention units and "portable cells, something I said would never happen in February 2009.

As Unison's Peter Velden says "Privatising custody suite officers would concern us greatly. They are valuable public servants and they should be kept in public service. If this saves money, it will be through cutting the guys' wages and cutting their allowances."

I think, given the record of privatised public services, it could also mean a severe degrading of the service - which in this case may mean more injuries, deaths and legal mishaps. In fact it's fair to say that organisations like Group Four (G4S) that make their money profiteering from formerly publicly owned utilities are nothing better than a bunch of criminals.

However, while I've heard of people having to dig their own graves I've not yet heard of criminals building their own cells. We live in hope.

But surely the police don't frame people?

I've been following the case of Ali Dizaei for some time now. First, second, third, fourth. In short Dizaei was a leading black police officer and activist with the National Black Police Association who was the victim of an internal investigation called Operation Helios where the Metropolitan Police Force spent millions trying to incriminate him.

This investigation crossed the line many, many times. Illegal surveillance, intimidation of his family, friends and wife and ultimately presenting trumped up charges ranging from spying for the Iranian regime to overcharging on his mileage allowance. All charges were thrown out and Operation Helios became synonymous with perceived racism and corruption within the police force.

Earlier this year the Met finally got their man on a new charge and Dizaei found himself stripped of his rank and sent to jail for four years. Coppers lined up to tell the media how they knew he was a bad man all along and perhaps operation Helios *had* been justified. The media lapped it all up uncritically, as if the whole attempt to frame Dizaei had never existed.

So there's a new episode to a book that's meant to have had it's final chapter. Today it is revealed that the main witness in the case against Dizaei didn't exist.

The Met's key witness Mr al-Baghdadi from Iraq was not who he claimed to be. In fact he was Vaed Maleki an Iranian who has since vanished into thin air. It's claimed that the evidence this witness, al-Baghdadi, Maleki or whatever we want to call him, gave was untrue and that, as a key witness, the fact that he lied multiple times under oath fatally undermines the case against Dizaei.

Dizaei will be in court on Wednesday (tomorrow) seeking an appeal on his sentence which may result in a re-trial. I want to wish him the best of luck.

Guest post: The case against elected police commissioners

For a while now I've been in two minds about elected police commissioners so when I saw Brighton and Hove Greens had come out against them I immediately thought to get blogging councilor Jason Kitkat to write a guest post which, I think, raises some really useful and interesting points.

Greens in Brighton & Hove are opposing the introduction of a directly elected police commissioner for Sussex Police. Why? Surely we support democracy and public accountability... don't we?

Indeed we do, but there are many ways to deliver a public service whilst holding it accountable to the people it serves. I think an unfortunate aspect of the debate is that too many people are unfamiliar with how police forces are currently run. I must admit that I too was blissfully unaware until I was elected a councillor.

But without that knowledge of what we have now, comparisons are difficult. When contrasted with what many assume to be a faceless bureaucracy, of course an elected commissioner sounds positive. Yet police forces are already accountable to independent police authorities. In the case of Sussex Police it answers to Sussex Police Authority. This body is made of elected councillors and independently appointed members including local magistrates. The councillor membership of the authority follows proportionality rules so, as best as is possible, the seats must be divvied up to match the political representation on the local authorities in Sussex.

It's not perfect, but the authority's makeup does ensure a semblance of diverse representation for the communities Sussex Police seek to represent. Just as a local council does, the authority has committees and budget votes. These are open to the public and are webcast.

With a single directly elected commissioner many of the arguments Greens have used against directly elected local authority mayors hold true: Decision making will be less open, less accountable and there will be far fewer opportunities for a plurality of opinions to be heard.

Cllr Ben Duncan is the only Green on Sussex Police Authority, but his distinctive perspective has undoubtedly had a positive impact in winning commitments for more neighbourhood policing, more sustainable ways of working, for a different approach to policing hunts and much more.

The idea of directly elected police commissioners is one both Labour and Conservatives have borrowed from the American political system. There are many things to admire in the US constitution, but the results for everyday quality of life have been, at best, mixed. Indeed one could argue there has been too much of a good thing. Voters are asked to elect school commissioners, police chiefs, judges, municipal councillors, senators, congressmen, state governors, state secretaries of state and so on. Turnout levels in the US are incredibly low. I have often heard it said that in the US there are probably too many elections and too many things to vote on. Whether or not that is true, there's no evidence to show that simply having a directly elected head of the police makes any positive impact.

Some argue that we should oppose commissioners because 'undesirables' (I assume the BNP and such like) might win some elections for police commissioners. I don't believe that's a fair argument against commissioners, though the detail of the electoral system proposed is something I have yet to see mentioned. Ultimately I believe that Greens should oppose directly elected police commissioners because they are contrary to green values: They centralise power, reduce the diversity of views, make decision-making less accountable and are needlessly expensive.

What could be done to improve police accountability? We could consider returning control directly to local councils, which would offer a more direct connection with communities and their elected councillors. In the meantime I believe police authorities are a reasonable compromise position, but the authorities must continue to work hard to engage with the areas they represent.

Particularly in these times of austerity, when Sussex Police's Chief Constable estimates elections for a new police commissioner would cost upwards of £1 million, the case has not been made for this change.

Different approaches to the cuts

I'm not sure which approach I prefer from our public bodies. You have the special pleading which generally runs along the lines of 'cut *their library* not ours', which is something you'll always come across when you're part of a movement to defend public services. However, often official bodies have to come up with their own unique relationship with the government.

Take education. Ofsted this week helpfully told the government that most of the special needs teaching going on is completely unnecessary. How convenient. How craven. They might as well have said if you're going to cut the education budget take out on the thickos and the poor first.

Of course, their actual line was that you wouldn't need as much special needs provision if the quality of the education system as a whole was better. Seeing as that isn't on the cards though the effect of their position will be that cuts are directed towards the most vulnerable, the most in need of specialist provision.

The police though have taken a different line. One of the country's top police officers, Derek Barnett, has told the government that, because their policies will cause massive unrest it would be foolhardy to cut the police budget just when they are about to need a wall of shields and truncheons to protect them.

He may have a point. When Thatcher came to power in '79 she was very careful to make sure the police were happy and well equipped. After all she knew she was going to be calling on them to fight her political battles for her. It's only after she'd finished with her little wars that she finally started to stop featherbedding the cops, much to their horror. Perhaps Clegg and Cameron need to think about how much they'll need the police in the coming years before they cut the budget.

Just to prove the point, a planned trade union demonstration outside the Lib Dem conference has been banned. See Clegg, the boys in blue have saved you from hearing any nasty people who disagree with you. How damn liberal of them - I wonder how many of the civil liberties Lib Dems will be kicking up a stink about this at conference?

At the end of the day we're being given a whole load of unacceptable choices, perhaps it might be all to the good if the thin blue line was a little bit thinner in the years ahead. It might make the fight for a saner economic policy a little bit less painful.

UAF leader convicted of assaulting a police officer

Martin Smith, leading Unite Against Fascism activist, national coordinator of Love Music Hate Racism and a central committee member of the Socialist Workers Party has been convicted of assaulting a police officer in what is, almost certainly, a miscarriage of justice.

Smith attacked his sentence of community service and a fine as an attempt to criminalise anti-fascist action.

Mark Serwotka, an old work colleague of Smith's and now head of the PCS union, said of the conviction that "I am shocked at the verdict delivered in a magistrates court today, in the absence of any evidence, that Martin Smith, national co-ordinator of Love Music Hate Racism, was guilty of assault on a police officer at the demonstration outside of the BBC on 22 October 2009, against Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time."

He continued that;

"There is a danger that verdicts such as these provide encouragement for the abhorrent views of racist and fascist organisations and therefore it is crucial that across the labour movement we stand united in our condemnation of it.

"At PCS we will re-double our efforts to campaign against the far right, including organisations such as the BNP and English Defence League and we will continue to support Martin and other anti fascist campaigners when they are treated in such an unjust, outrageous way.

"PCS will work with UAF and LMHR to fight the far right wherever we can and also to highlight the unequal way in which anti-fascist campaigners and activists are treated in comparison with racist and fascist thugs."

A worrying development but it's good to hear that people are not willing to be deterred.

Cops and Newsmen

Chester Stern, the former head of the press bureau at Scotland Yard, has an interesting piece in The Guardian today recounting his perspective on how the relationship between the press and the police has changed. Stern says it started with reforms intended at tackling police corruption, but it hasn't always worked out that well.

The Andy Coulson affair has not just revealed some of the illegal tactics that sections of the gutter press have been willing to stoop to, it's also provided an insight into the the relationship between the press and the Metropolitan Police. Let's look at a specific example;

Many people believe that the police were reluctant to take the investigation seriously, a claim they strenuously deny. Andy Hayman (CBE, QPM), who was the police officer in charge of the hacking investigation, has defended the operation which has left so many dissatisfied that News International was not properly held to account before the law.

In definitely unrelated news, when Andy Hayman left the Met he got a lucrative job with News International. It's nice to know that retirement does not always mean inactivity but can lead to media stardom.

Suggestions of corruption would probably be entirely unfounded, particularly when you have possible incompetence staring you in the face. Like the time he was criticised by the IPCC when "he misled senior officers by failing to tell them that the Brazilian electrician was not a wanted suicide bomber."

A better example would be the time under pressure "Hayman apologised to two brothers who were freed without charge after an anti-terror raid at Forest Gate, east London." A raid in which one brother was shot despite being both unarmed and, well, innocent of any crime.

He was also in charge of the sickening witch-hunt against Ali Dizaei which, among other things, involved the police indulging in potentially illegal phone tapping. But to be fair to him that was a meticulously planned and thorough investigation that used loads and loads of resources - so you couldn't accuse the attempt to destroy a fellow police officer as incompetent.

I'm glad he managed to find work after all of that. In short, everything is fine. No police officers are corrupt. No media corporations are breaking the law and no politicians are complicit in the whole stinking mess. Hold on, I'm getting a call from my non-existence legal department.

Ian Tomlinson: police escape prosecution

We're told today that the police officer who made an unprovoked attack on Ian Tomlinson from behind will not face prosecution. This is, we are told, because of the conflict between the two postmortems.

The first autopsy exonerated the police and claimed he had not been attacked and died of a heart attack, the second was conducted after witness statements and video footage came out showing that he had been attacked and said he had died of internal bleeding.

The police lied and lied again to cover up the actions of their officers - and on this occasion were caught out time and time again. How many other autopsies are as keen to deliver a result that the police want over the facts I wonder. Why does the law not see the first autopsy as a scandal?

What I don't understand is this, does the CPS's reasoning make sense even in their own terms? If the postmortems make it difficult to prove a murder charge (and I think we'd all prefer a jury to make that decision not an arm of law enforcement) why does that mean that a lesser charge could not be considered?

We know Tomlinson was the victim of an unprovoked attacked, it's on film from several different angles for a start. We know that Tomlinson was the victim of an attack from behind while he had his head down and his hands in his pockets. He could have done nothing more to pose less of a threat.

Why were lesser charges not being considered?

It turns out it's because the CPS took so long to make up it's mind. They could have brought a charge of common assault within a few weeks of the incident (when the officer finally came forward) but they chose to string it out and once six months had passed no lesser charge could be brought.

At the end of the day if it had been Ian Tomlinson who had attacked a police officer from behind who then died later that day there would have been no question of him escaping prosecution. He'd have been behind bars long ago. What a disgraceful double standard, utterly corrupt.

The sweet aroma of justice

Sergeant Smellie has been acquitted of assaulting a protester at the G20 after the key witness failed to show up at the trial.

According to the CPS "Smellie lost his self-control because of Fisher's irritating, aggressive and confrontational actions."

Good to know. The next time the police are irritating, aggressive and confrontational (which apparently does happen occasionally) you are perfectly within your rights to slap them in the face and then whack them about the legs with a piece of metal. It's all good, the CPS says so.

Footage at the Guardian of the incident shows that the police were refusing to allow protesters to leave an area in a particularly aggressive way and had, moments before, used physical force against one person who, I believe, had actually been accidentally caught in the quarantined zone.

The protester who was attacked had stepped up to the Sergeant to remonstrate with him about the police behaviour and was certainly agitated, but Smellie's defense that he was frightened of being attacked by her appears laughable.

However, the fact that the officer was acquitted should come as no surprise when the woman at the center of the controversy, Nicola Fisher, seemed more interested in embellishing her story than seeking justice. Not only did she hire the publicist Max Clifford in an attempt to make money out the episode she also clearly embroidered the truth to make it more sensational, for example saying that she was attacked out of the blue rather than after she'd shouted at the officer.

Clifford said. "She sees it as a total miscarriage of justice. She was convinced that she wouldn't get justice." Well, you wont if you lie to the papers but don't even bother showing up in court. How was the prosecution meant to make the charges stick without the victim of the assault there to give evidence?

Only Fisher knows the real reason why she didn't show up in court. Perhaps she was intimidated, perhaps she's ashamed that she'd exaggerated to the press or perhaps she's just gutless but it's difficult to see the acquittal of Sergeant Smellie as a flaw in the justice system when she did not show up in order to give evidence and face cross examination.

Weyman Bennett arrested on anti-fascist demo

Weyman Bennett, the joint secretary of Unite Against Fascism (UAF), was arrested this weekend in Bolton along with dozens of other anti-Nazi protesters. John Millington reports in the Morning Star that "Around 1,500 UAF members had descended on Bolton to oppose an EDL rally in the city's Victoria Square" where they were confronted by a police force determined to target UAF activists.

The BBC footage shows protesters shouting "shame on you" at the police as they pull demonstrators out of the crowd and at one point seize a dangerous looking Peace flag which they disarm by snapping its pole in the cause of justice and order.

It states that the police made 74 arrests and sent two UAF supporters to hospital with head injuries. Protesters were described by the police as coming with the "sole intention of committing disorder", which for anyone who knows the UAF is simply not credible.

The English Defence League (EDL) had organised an anti-Islam rally in Bolton with the sole intention of inflaming tensions between our communities. The anti-fascist protesters were absolutely right to ensure that they could not get away with this, even though they understood that the police and the far-right would be less than welcoming.

However, that does not excuse the behaviour of the police who, as this picture from the Daily Mail shows, like to choke young people who don't fancy seeing their fellow citizens scapegoated.


The Mail is surprisingly very supportive of the UAF who interviewed "Second World War veteran Bertie Lois, 89, who lives in Farnworth, Bolton, protested with the UAF. He said: 'I fought the Second World War against these Nazis. What did I fight for if we let them [march]? The EDL are the enemy. I would say to them 'you are the guys we fought for, what are you doing?'"

That question could equally be applied to the police. We can at least hope that the war veteran that the police knocked over (footage here) was alright.

A few other places not already mentioned: Dave Osler, Rivers Stream, Mancunian Green, Ian Bone, Permanent Revolution... Expose the BNP, Counter-fire, Third Estate, feel free to let me know of others I should know about.

Ali Dizaei convicted

The conviction of high ranking police officer Ali Dizaei on corruption charges has become an opportunity for certain elements within the police to smear the National Black Police Association and to claim that this case vindicates operation Helios, in which the force bent Heaven and Earth in order to secure a conviction, any conviction, against Mr Dizaei.

It does no such thing. Dizaei was accused of spying for Iran, but there was no evidence. He was accused of using prostitutes, but there was no evidence. He was accused of fiddling his fuel mileage, but there was no evidence nor any reason to think that he had. Just as there was no reason to believe he was an illegal drug user.

The resources the force poured into Operation Helios were phenomenal.

They bugged his phones, his family's phones, his friends phones. They followed him, taped him, watched him like a hawk with a team of officers assigned to his case round the clock. They even followed him to the US when he went to speak at a convention there. They intimidated his friends, lovers, even owners of restaurants he ate in. They tried a clumsy attempt at a sting operation. Even MI5 were brought in on the act.

When all of these efforts failed to turn up one scrap of evidence worth mentioning they still tried to convict him.

Whatever the merits of the current case it does not prove he was "always a wrong 'un" because if he did abuse his powers on this occasion it hardly shows he was working for a foreign power or forging his expenses documents like a cross between James Bond and Elliot Morley.

We have had coppers lining up to tell the media that they always knew he was a bent copper. Just as they used to say they always knew Winston Silcott really did kill that police officer even after the case was over-turned or that Jean Charles de Menezes was a rotten apple even if he didn't happen to be a terrorist.

The Met bears grudges long and hard. There will be many police officers celebrating this week that Dizaei, who dared to criticise the force, has been convicted. Not least among them will be the racists, the fit up merchants and the idiots who swallow canteen gossip years after the courts have shown the charges to be flimsy bullshit.

Dizaei may well have been guilty on this occasion, and having been victimised before should be no immunity from the law into the future, but this case is the culmination of years of attempts to destroy this man. The charges that finally felled him though were not around spying for Iran or leading the life of a mafia don, but revolved around whether he was poked in the stomach with a hookah pipe.

Boris finds crime too time consuming

When Boris Johnson was campaigning for the post of London Mayor he said he was going to take personal charge of crime and policing as it was a top priority. Not halfway through his term and he's stepping down from chairing the Metropolitan Police Authority, his fellow Conservative Kit Malthouse will take over the role.

The Mayor has found the position far too time consuming on top of his other commitments, he has a lucrative newspaper column to write for a start. However, it might be worth reminding 0urselves of what Johnson's manifesto said; "Provide strong leadership: by taking responsibility and chairing the Metropolitan Police Authority and using my influence to tear up red tape and needless form-filling, so we can get more police out on the streets".

Jenny Jones, one of the Green Assembly Members reacted to the news by saying; "The Mayor made a clear commitment to Londoners in his election manifesto to personally take charge of the Police Authority. He has now gone back on his word, realising that being both Mayor and chair of the MPA is just too much for one person to do properly. It was an ill thought out promise, and one that showed his lack of experience.

"The Met are facing difficult times ahead, with budgets being cut in all areas. The chair of the MPA needs to take the time to understand this complex organisation to provide effective leadership. Boris Johnson has not really been involved from the beginning and perhaps feels it is time to stop pretending".

Dee Doocey, the Liberal Democrat policing spokeswoman, also had some sensible comments saying: "This is welcome news as the mayor has never been on top of this incredibly important job. I just hope that, unlike Boris Johnson, Kit Malthouse actually reads and understands the Met's budget and then sets out to immediately reverse the damaging cuts in police numbers which the mayor has for so long denied."

What's worse, making a promise and breaking it or making a stupid promise that you could never keep in the first place? I can't quite make up my mind.

Corrupt police: a bit more background

In the last few days you may have noticed that a high ranking police officer is in court over the misuse of his position. There have been a number of reports about Commander Ali Dizaei who allegedly arrested a man because he had a personal dispute with him about a website and falsely alleged he'd been assaulted.

Now, we know this sort of thing happens. Some police officers have been known to take advantage of the powers the state lends them to assault, stitch up and otherwise do over members of the public. It is also the case that police officers do occasionally find themselves in court over this kind of behaviour.

However, it seems to me that the reports of this latest episode do seem to be deliberately skirting round a particularly salient fact.

Now, I do not want to comment on whether Commander Dizaei has been guilty of wrong doing or not in this case. I have no way of knowing one way or the other. I do happen to have a memory though and using this possibly unique ability I recognised Dizaei's name from a previous police corruption case.

However, that case was quite different. As a leading member of the National Black Police Association and outspoken critic of institutional racism in the force Dizaei found himself the subject of an extraordinary surveillance operation, Operation Helios.

Helios cost the taxpayer millions upon millions, used up thousands of hours of time of the fifty police officers involved and ended up in one of the most ludicrous court cases you could possibly imagine. A barrage of charges were made against Dizaei ranging from fiddling his petrol expenses, using prostitutes to spying for Iran. Honestly! They charged him with some of the most serious crimes on the books alongside some of the most petty.

The operation was a travesty and a clear example of a police command structure that wanted someone out who it did not regard as "one 0f us". They abused their position to cook up a shopping list of charges as an attempt to destroy one of the leading anti-racist police officers. All the charges were either thrown out or dropped. Not a single one was upheld.

Surprisingly Dizeai did not attempt to screw the Met for every penny they had and focused on being re-instated as a police officer, something he eventually achieved. To my knowledge no police officer was ever disciplined for their part in Operation Helios and whilst Dizeai may have been re-instated he was a marked man.

Back to the present day. Once again Dizeai is up on charges of corruption, once again the press simply prints the state's case against him and seems to have developed amnesia over the extremely relevant fact that Dizeai was previously the victim of false accusations cooked up by the state.

Now, I am not saying that because he had false accusations levelled against him before that he is a saint that could not possibly have done the things that he is accused of today. He should not be immune from prosecution simply because of the way he was treated before. That is a given.

What I am saying is that if the press want to provide balanced coverage the fact that the Metropolitan Police tried every dirty trick in the book to get his head only a few years ago deserves at least a footnote when he is once again charged with corruption.

People might like to read Dizaei's account of Operation Helios in his excellent book 'Not One Of Us'.

Three stories from today's Guardian

Today's Guardian is full of really good stuff today.

First we have the German banker who's been taking money out of rich people's accounts and transferring it to the poor.

Get in! I wonder if she's one of these German's I spoke about a while ago who have asked the government to tax them more.

Then we have lying cops getting caught out again.

The police chief in charge of the G20 counter operation explicitly told the Commons that there were no undercover teams on the day. Turns out Commander Bob Broadhurst is a complete liar and there were 25 plain clothes police officers mingling with the crowd that day.

Don't worry Bob, you wont get fired. I mean nothing happened to coppers who made up all that stuff about the camp for climate action. Parliament genuinely doesn't care if you lie to it - it really doesn't.

And lastly we have a possible case of sub-editors revenge. John Crace writes an article on how to deal with bullying and stress at work. There's an interesting choice of first words to the piece which bear little relation to the rest of the article, namely; "Change a word and I'll kill you."

Pardon John? Is this a post-modern meta-deconstruction of an article about bullying at work where you fake bullying the sub-editor, in which case it's very subtle... or more simply is it just the sub taking you at your word and leaving in every damn word. I can't decide.

Met apologises for assault and false imprisonment on protesters

According to the BBC five protesters have been awarded a substantial pay out of £85,000 and have been given an apology by the Metropolitan police.

The demonstration in question was in 2006 outside the Mexican embassy where the protesters were concerned at the killing of Indymedia journalist Bradley Will in Oaxaca City. They were assaulted and then falsely imprisoned by police officers.

The police apology includes this;

"It is accepted that your arrest was unlawful and that any forced used on you during your arrest was therefore an assault and battery.”

One of the protesters said;

"This is a democratic country, supposedly, and people have a right to protest and for me it appears that the Metropolitan Police has some sort of policy that prevents people from protesting even if it is perfectly legal and peaceful."

Goods news if we are moving to a point where we are beginning to hold the police to account for their actions.

At the end of the day most people become political activists to make the world a better place, not to get into constant battles with the police. The cops should not be the story - but until these injustices stop they'll unfortunately remain on the news agenda.

The police terror raid charade

In politics, as in comedy, timing is everything. For example, take the serendipity of the terror raid that arrested numerous Pakistani nationals and produced countless column inches on the death and mayhem that had been prevented. God bless the police, let's move on from all that nasty protest repression and dead paper seller business.

The press in particular seemed rather well informed about what these near-do-wells were about... in which case they might want to pass any evidence they have on to the police because the suspects have all been released without charge. Not a single one of them charged, let alone convicted, of any crime at all. Arrested days after a death at the hands of the police and released for budget day - that's pretty sweet media work.

Brown claimed a "very big plot" had been uncovered. Perhaps he was referring to an unusually large allotment these men had been clearing.

One officer told The Times "these men were planning something major. It was not clear when or where they would strike, but they were collecting material for a large explosion." Is possession of large amounts of explosives no longer an offence - or was this bollocks?

Local newspapers across the nation were able to run unusually juicy stories rather than the normal "pig wins prize" fare. For instance the Manchester Evening News said that "RAIDS by anti-terror police across the north west were part of an operation to prevent al-Qaida launching a 'spectacular' act of mass murder, the M.E.N. can reveal." The paper has a handy list of places where you might get blown up any moment now. "Supporters of al-Qaida have previously targeted shopping centres, public venues, public transport and airlines." Well thank goodness the police got there first then.

CNN were splendidly double thinky in their coverage when they breathlessly announced that a plot had been foiled but that "The new plot was not believed to be targeting national infrastructure, such as rail lines, airports or utilities, nor was it clear if the plot was to involved bombs or an assault involving gunmen". Maybe the plot involved sarcasm? Or yogic flying? As yet CNN is still at the 'narrowing down the options' phase I guess, so we'll have to wait and find out exactly what dastardly deeds were afoot.

The Express declared that the raids proved that Britain is a "haven for fanatics". Do these releases prove that it isn't? The Express appears to have no opinion on this at the time of writing. Intriguing.

When the Evening Standard said that "POLICE smashed an alleged al Qaeda bomb plot" perhaps they would have been better moving that alleged so that it read "POLICE allegedly smashed an al Qaeda bomb plot" because right now there appears to be no evidence that the police have smashed anything - apart from a few faces, obviously.

I think the Daily Mail has the quote to end all quotes though;

One student, Nicholas Higgins, who was working on his dissertation, said: 'The tannoy said, "Students, please keep away from the windows, log off and move away from the windows", so at first we thought it was to do with drugs.

'But they came on again and told us what was going on - there were terrorists outside, and to keep away from the windows because they may have got a bomb on them.

'I saw two men lying on the floor, hands behind their back, surrounded by police, police all around with their guns round them.

'They looked like students, they had combats on, outdoor jackets like a Berghaus-type on. I was stunned, I was terrified.'

That's just the perfect Zen quote for the Mail. "They looked like students... I was terrified."

But here's the thing. Nine of the eleven men arrested are to be deported in the interests of "national security". Now, this is blatantly and absolutely the wrong thing to happen for one of two reasons;

Either they are plotting a terrorist spectacular in which case sending them home with a little cake simply allows them to continue their evil work or...

They aren't terrorists and therefore should not be the subject of this kind of action.

Deportation allows the police to distract the press from their incompetence either way. I mean they wouldn't deport innocent men would they? If these men are terrorists they should be locked up, not sent to the terrorist training camp capital of the world surely?

New Ian Tomlinson Pictures

New pictures at the Guardian show that Ian Tomlinson had prior contact with the police even before the video footage where he was attacked and then pushed from behind by a police officer.

Here we see a policeman giving Tomlinson a friendly tap. Tomlinson was on his way home when these officers refused to allow him through and he was forced to find an alternative way round.


Remember the police line was that Tomlinson died without any contact with the police. That looks less than true.

The police insisted Ian died of natural causes. That's a very confident statement to make in the light of the evidence.

The police said there were no CCTVs in the area. That turned out to be, if you'll forgive the pun, a porky.

What will the police say next do you think?

More evidence: police obstructed Tomlinson's ambulance

Video footage has emerged of a police line obstructing the ambulance as it rushed to the scene. Protesters are clearly heard shouting "Let them through" as the police line blockading the street remains motionless even as the ambulance sits right in front of it with its sirens blaring.

It looks like the police reluctantly move in the end (although that's not entirely clear from the video, but I'm happy to accept that they do) but this is another piece in the jigsaw that shows the police version of events where protesters supposedly obstructed medical aid whilst the Met did all they could is looking ever more shaky.

Meanwhile my local MP accuses the police of not telling the truth. It includes this;

"We know that some officers were talking about being "up for it" and there are various reports of precisely that on the day. Any investigation of what happened to Tomlinson should ask searching questions about whether police command and control were undermined by a macho public relations strategy that ultimately increased the risk that serious injuries would occur."

We still await the police officers responsible to come forward. They must know they'll be identified so what are they waiting for? Why don't they want to give evidence? Are they getting their story straight, or just waiting to find out how much we can prove before deciding how much to admit?

But they have apologised for over the top restrictions on journalists preventing them reporting on events.


How ironic that today we are approaching the anniversary of the death of anti-nazi protester Blair Peach at the hands of the police. Plus ca change.

Proof: Police Assaulted Ian Tomlinson before he died

The Guardian has damning video footage of the last moments of Ian Tomlinson. Nothing could be clearer.

Ian is shown walking away from a police line calmly and with his hands in his pockets. He is making his way home with his head down, tired from the day.

A police officer attacks him from behind in a completely unprovoked action. There are no protesters near the officer at the time and Mr Tomlinson has not been caught up in any "heat of battle" that might justify a mistake.

Two protesters rush to his aid. The police stare at him. Is the officer who attacks him reprimanded? Not a bit of it, the senior officer on the scene is relaxed about the casual violence under his direct command.

No bottles. No bricks. No protesters between the injured man and the police.

The police caused his injuries and he died not long after. Whether or not it was a heart attack the press verdict of "natural causes" now comes with a very large caveat - a heart attack after an assault is murder.

Shock news: the police are liars

Just to recap on police mendacity around the camp for climate action last year;

Confiscated weapons: toilet roll, camping equipment and board games. The weapons stash (as it was described by the BBC) is pictured right. It's like a game of Where's Wally isn't it - can you spot the WMD children?

Injured cops: top cops blamed protesters for over seventy injuries. Turns out that not a single one of those injuries had been caused by protesters. Boo boos include bee stings and heat exhaustion. The one I like the best was "officer injured sitting in car"... wtf? The BBC shakes its head in a disappointed manner.

Monitoring journalists: first they said they didn't target journalists, then they said it was okay, be cool, today Bobbies say it was wrong. I'm sure they really mean it, after all if it took them this long to come clean they must have thought about it long and hard, having a real change of heart.

The police tried to say they filmed journalists by accident - in the hurly burly of a large, complex protest. But the footage shows clearly that the police camera man knows exactly who he's filming and that they work for ITV, Sky and other broadcasters, taking great interest in the showing of press identification. In fact, he makes it clear his opinions on the freedom of the press to come and go from the protest and journalists are later followed to a restaurant where they file their reports using wifi.

It also appears that the Metropolitan Police may have lied in court about the practice which isn't just naughty - it's imprisonable. Well it would be if the courts cared about policemen lying to them.

Police targeting journalists for surveillance is not cool. Lying about it takes that not coolness and adds an extra pinch of tut. Do watch the Guardian's sample footage of the films the police took, fascinating stuff.

Is it cos they are horrid? Yes. But it's also because they want to justify their actions, and if you pump up the threat in the press - making out protesters are tooled up and are nasty to good, honest coppers by stinging them with bees it allows you to rough them up, intimidate them, make protesters life a misery and generally behave like arseholes.

The police have a material interest to lie because it gives them more scope to abuse their powers - which means we need to introduce a material interest for them to tell the truth - like sacking those who tell pork pies. Apologies really are not enough when it is clearly *policy* to lie to both Parliament and the press. The police can't be trusted to uphold the law until they are subject to it.

Climate campers can be found later this year giving it some to the city whilst the G20 is in town.