This Xmas there will be 40 political prisoners aged between 22 and 58 imprisoned for taking part or planning protests over the climate crisis or against Israel’s war in Gaza and the West Bank.
I cannot remember over the fifty years of my political activity there ever being as many with perhaps the exception of those imprisoned (some of whom were proved innocent) for supporting the republican struggle in Ireland. None of the current prisoners have any links with armed groups. You probably have to go back the Suffragettes at the beginning of the 20th Century to find an equivalent number.
Draconian
Reactionary legislation passed by the last Tory government gave draconian powers to the police and increased sentences for actions that in past may have resulted in a fine or a suspended sentence. The notion of disruption to the public has been expanded to ludicrous levels so a noisy demonstration can be deemed to be disruptive…if the police decide. Worse still anti-terrorism legislation has been used inappropriately, particularly in relation to the Palestine solidarity actions. This gives powers to the police to remand people for longer without charging them and leads to longer sentences.
Back in 1978, a few of us from the British Argentine Campaign disrupted an England versus Argentine rugby match at Twickenham protesting the fascist Videla dictatorship. Apart from confiscating our banner we were just turfed out of the ground without any legal prosecution. Peter, now Lord, Hain actually did a lot worse in organising the protests against the South African Rugby tour in 1979. He was not imprisoned. Recently two Just Stop Oil activists were jailed for two years and a 20 months respectively for throwing tomato soup over the glass covered Sunflowers picture by Van Gogh.
Labour voted against Priti Patel’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts bill, on the second reading but then disgracefully abstained on Suella Braverman’s later secondary legislation which further hardened the undemocratic measures. Today, there is no sign that the Labour government is going to repeal any of these laws. Further we should assume it will use these laws itself if and when there are serious mass struggles against its policies.
The new rules also mean you are restricted in your defence strategy. It is now deemed inadmissible to use arguments about defending humanity and the planet against the system that is responsible for it. Probably this was stopped because the establishment was finding that juries, when hearing such arguments, were finding defendants innocent.
People may think since these prisoners are not your usual ‘common criminal’ then they will have a special regime or benefit from a softer regime. Not at all, Novara Media has a story about how the medical treatment has been appalling for a number of the climate prisoners.
“Rosa Hicks, 29, is currently on remand at HMP Bronzefield in Surrey after being charged with conspiring to disrupt Heathrow airport in July. As first reported by Private Eye, Hicks, who has a chronic shoulder injury, had only irregular access to essential pain medication when first imprisoned. Her pain was so bad that she wasn’t able to get into her bunk, and had to sleep on the floor of her cell. At one point she was even unable to use the toilet, and had to ask for incontinence pads.”
Another prisoner, Chris Bennett, had a problem with a Deep Vein Thrombosis in his leg that was not seen too or treated until he was fortunate that one of his visitors was a GP who took the matter up. Of course the climate protestors are the first to publicise the fact that such patchy and inadequate health care is inflicted on your ‘ordinary criminals’ too, many of whom should not really be locked up. But Labour, rather than dealing with sentencing and community solutions are busy planning to build four new prisons.
The Guardian quoted leading barrister Michael Mansfield KC who stated that as more people became aware of the “violent global threats to our very existence”, namely the climate crisis and war, “it is hardly surprising that the increasing numbers trapped by these forces are compelled to make their presence and their objections felt as loudly and urgently as possible”.
He added: “If the non-violent exercise of freedom of speech, expression and assembly are to retain a meaningful central role in our democracy, there has to be a paradigm shift in appreciation and understanding of these particular needs by government and the law.”
Send solidarity
Rebels in Prison website has a full list and pictures of all the eco and Palestine activists with their email addresses You can use the name of the prison to send postcards too. There are so many emails that prison authorities are refusing to print them out. You can write to as few or as many as you like, during the Xmas period let’s face it there is a bit of dead time while staying with relatives or friends. Take a minute to make this simple act of solidarity.
Palestine Action has released this statement about those imprisoned for taking direct action against Elbit factories in Britain which are producing arms for Israel’s genocidal war in Palestine:
Ten actionists are imprisoned after six of them drove a modified prison van into Elbit’s research, development and manufacturing hub in Filton, Bristol. Once inside, the six dismantled Israeli weapons, including the same model of quadcopter drones used by the Israeli military to mimic the sounds of women and children crying, to lure Palestinians and kill them. The action allegedly cost Israel’s largest weapons firm over £1million in damages.
After the six were arrested at the scene, four more were rounded up by armed counter-terrorism police, in different parts of the country. All 10 are now remanded in prison. Whilst under arrest, each of the 10 were detained without charge for approximately a week and interrogated repeatedly under the Terrorism Act. Displaying the clear abuse of such powers, each were eventually charged with non-terror offences.
A very simple thing we can all do to show solidarity with these activists is to send an email via Palestine Action who will forward your message. All the information is at their website here.
Here is an example from the site;
Madeleine’s involvement in taking direct action against Israel’s Elbit Systems goes back a couple of years. They previously ‘locked on’ in front of the gates of Elbit’s drone engine factory in Shenstone, shutting down the Israeli weapons maker, whilst displaying a banner which read “Free Ahmed Manasra“, who is a Palestinian prisoner held since the age of 13.
In January 2023, Madeleine scaled the roof of Leonardo’s Edinburgh factory, causing extensive damage to the producers of laser targeting systems for Israel’s F-35 fighter jets. During a dramatic police crackdown, they were accused of also being connected to the action against Elbit’s Filton research hub and is now one of the Filton 10. Madeleine is currently being held in HMP Bronzefield and has been on remand since Friday 16th August.
To write to Madeleine, send an email to palactprisoners@protonmail.com, with the subject heading “FAO: Madeleine Norman”
You can write to as few or as many as you like, during the Xmas period let’s face it there is a bit of dead time while staying with relatives or friends. Take a minute to make this simple act of solidarity.
Imprisoning these activists is producing even closer links between people taking action against the Israeli government’s genocide of the Palestinians and against our rulers’ responsibility for doing little to halt the extinction of humanity and the planet.
Whatever our political opinion about the specific tactics of non-violent disruptive protest we should all condemn the increasing restriction of political protest and give full solidarity to all these prisoners.
Defend the Right to peaceful protest
Action on 29/30th Jan to defend the right to peaceful protest
At our first Open Call, over 100 people signed up to take action!
Will you join them at the Royal Courts of Justice in January as 16 peaceful activists appeal against extremely harsh sentences handed to them for their involvement in nonviolent direct action? The Just Stop Oil 16 received a combined 41 years imprisonment after unlawful clampdowns on those peacefully opposing UK complicity in genocide, ecocide and deadly government policy.
Sign up to take action here – https://actionnetwork.org/forms/january-appeals-free-political-prisoners/
Sign up for an Open Call reminder (next call Sunday 22 January at 11am!) https://actionnetwork.org/forms/january-appeals-free-political-prisoners/
Sign up for more info as plans develop – https://actionnetwork.org/forms/january-appeals-free-political-pris
Featured image: Scott Breen, Just Stop Oil, now in HMP Pentonville