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Since the 1980s police in the UK have been allowed to suppress protests by using aggressive tactics—from batons to horse charges to kettling. Military-style tactics were sanctioned by the Thatcher government and, over the next forty years, those protesting were subject to brutal treatment at the hands of the police.
Charged: How the Police Try to Suppress Protest is an essential investigation into the role of policing protest in Britain today. As the UK government tries to suppress all forms of dissent, in their pursuit of more control, how do the police manage crowds, provoke violence and even break the law?
In this Verso podcast episode Ben Smoke, journalist and editor at Huck Magazine, speaks with Matt Foot and Morag Livingstone, authors of Charged: How the Police Try to Suppress Protest.
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Already the backsliding begins. ITV news is reporting that the Government has changed one point in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. They have accepted that academies will retain their ‘freedom’ to set their own pay scales for teachers. So the criteria in the School Teachers Pay and Conditions document will only apply to teachers in Local Authority schools. Why have the Government climbed down on this issue? It’s not as if this is a major financial problem for academies. But what will be the next change/climb down by the Government? Will academies be exempt from the National Curriculum? Will Local Authorities be able to build schools according to the needs of their communities or will all new schools, as at present, have to be academies?