Bristol 'Kill The Bill' Protest 21/3/2021

On Sunday 21 March 2021 violent disorder took place in Bristol following a demonstration against proposed new laws (the Bill people want to kill) which will restrict freedom to protest. The proposed Bill also places the safety of a statue at higher priority than the safety of women. By the end of the protest police vehicles were damaged and police dressed in riot gear were pelted with missiles in angry scenes.

If this blog is too long to read, this video is a good summary of the issues with this proposed Bill.

Two Sides to Every Story - But There is Only 1 Side on the BBC

The obvious response of main stream media (MSM), and of people waking up on Monday morning was condemnation of the violence. But lets remember that the presentation of the riots by the MSM and the Police is one sided and not a balanced review of what actually happened. It's only the Chief Constable who has multiple MSM platforms available to him, not the protesters. He can deliver his version of events which he said "comes from his officers on the ground" as if that makes it gospel, totally ignoring the woeful track record the police have at giving an accurate version of similar events.

The Police Can Do No Wrong

Obviously, the police men and women on the streets are mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters and ultimately I don't want to see any of them to get hurt. I remember watching the reaction of the police to the terrorist attacks in London and thinking how amazing it is that we have people brave enough to do this job, to respond so quickly and charge straight into danger trying to keep us safe.

The Chief Constable of Avon & Somerset police appeared on TV and was very upset about how his officers had been treated. He said that his officers were terrified as they were being attacked by people he said, who went to cause trouble. Some of his officers even had broken bones! Who wouldn't condemn this! (A few days later and without any fanfare the police admitted that this was a complete lie).

For the Chief Constable, this was a straight forward case of naughty people attacking poor police officers.

But sometimes the dangers faced by police officers are because they are put in danger by the Chief Constable and those in charge. Sometimes its politicians and their lockdown rules that place them in danger. Sometimes it’s the attempt by politicians to restrict protests even more that put officers in danger. I want to keep these officers safe. But to do this we first need to understand where the danger really comes from without being as simplistic as the Chief Constable.

Ultimately, police officers have chosen to do a job where sometimes they face angry crowds. That is their choice. What is not their choice is being pawns in political games where sometimes that game gets nasty because their superiors, the Chief Constable and the Home Secretary make decisions which pour fuel down, then light it!

Vilify the Protesters

I also want to say that I have heard lots of negative comments about the protesters, about them being students, far left, far right, stupid, not washing the whole range of standard insults for a group of people simply exercising a core democratic right.

History shows us that people with a point are often vilified. Women wanting rights were given the insulting term (at the time) of suffragette. Anti Apartheid supporters were terrorists. Gay men (illegal) were faggots and hung (legal!) These people are all extremists, until they are not.

Sometimes those who are called names end up dying for what turns out to be something we all end up supporting. Sometimes this is necessary because the police and politicians are not always correct, and it is we, the people who ultimately have to keep them in check.

I will say up front, I am not a left wing student. I do not really identify with the left, but no, I am not a Tory voter either. I would say my politics match 80% of British people which is we don't care who is in charge, neither side is much good, but they should just try and do a good job, try and represent us, we all work hard, please do not pander to much to big business or oppressive regimes against our interests, we don't think things should be given to people for free, but also we don't want people to suffer in poverty, and we do not believe that Governments should needlessly remove our civil liberties and freedoms. That's 80% of British people in my view.

Rewind To See The Bigger Picture

To see what really happened in Bristol the Chief Constable and MSM needs to rewind.

2020

We started 2020 relatively normally. Whilst it is a low level concern for most people, we know that we have a problem with Government (via big tech and social media and the security services) and the intrusion into our private lives. We know we moved into a CCTV society with echo's of 1984 a long time ago, a gradual and pernicious move towards a surveillance state that we don't tend to think about on a daily basis, but we know is slowly happening and creeping up around us.

Lockdown

Then in March 2020, we have a lockdown. Despite our natural caution about Government control, the majority of British people obeyed the lockdown rules because people wanted to ensure that our NHS did not become overwhelmed. But these were temporary measures, or so the Government promised, and they promised that the rules would be removed as soon as the NHS was not at risk of being overwhelmed, for example when 50% of adults are vaccinated.

Anti-Lockdown

For right or wrong, some people have been brave enough to be vocal about the lockdown measures, saying they are unnecessary. This has been in the face of significant negativity! These people are 'extremists' in the MSM. During lockdown Avon & Somerset police have aggressively policed the anti lockdown protests, snatching people from the crowds. They do this they tell us, to keep us safe from Covid! My Lockdown 2020 blogs here cover this in more detail.

In addition to this, Avon & Somerset police will approach anyone under the age of 25 and question them about why they are sat on a bench eating chips with a friend.

A friend of mine saw police asking students to prove their address by showing letters, bills, and even telling them to show apps on their phones to prove their delivery address!

Obviously later in the day when families and lovely middle class people are all out together mixing, the police are no where to be seen and under no circumstances are vaccinated pensioners questioned at all, the generational gaslighting continues though lockdown.

It's very easy to police face mask wearing, whereas investigating a real crime like rape takes effort, skill, commitment and training, so the police avoid crimes like this for face masks compliance. Its “to keep us safe from Covid!“ Although there seems little point in surviving Covid only to be killed on a Saturday night because it's not safe to be out.

Black Lives Matter Protests

The Black Lives Matter protesters were called stupid and reckless. In Bristol, the police decided not to police the protest heavy handily despite the protesters apparent stupidity.

In fairness to the police, they got it spot on. 10,000 people marched peacefully through Bristol. No significant arrests on the day. No protester or police officer hurt. The police mingled quietly at the back keeping the crowd safe.

Admittedly, the Colston Statue came down, and I will do a blog about this later in the year, but even with this, no one got hurt. Some people involved were dealt with after the event. The police got it right on the day.

People say the police are damned if they do and damned if they don't. Not in this case they're not (assuming you ignore Priti Patel who was desperately angry about the removal of the statue celebrating a man responsible for more deaths than Hitler).

The public, the people whose consent is given for policing, did not damn the police for their actions in this case. They can and they do get things right. In this case a well organised, lightly policed protest, even with Covid!

Rangers

Another little snippet to add in was Rangers, a football team apparently, they won something, the highly paid people involved helped the crowd celebrate. You can see the police in the video, despite this horrific Covid breach, they have decided not to keep these people safe from Covid.

Sarah Everard Vigil

Then, there was the awful murder of Sarah Everard. This post is not about that crime, nor the dangers women live with daily, but it led to a vigil, not a protest, A VIGIL, or in other words, women walking into a park and laying flowers on the floor in a bandstand.

Women's groups spoke to the police about the event with a view to making sure it was properly organised, and perhaps even more importantly, to keep women safe, given the fact that the police have shown themselves totally unwilling to do this. This would involve crowd marshals helping keep the crowd distanced (if Covid is the danger here!)

The police have discretion under Covid regulations to ban gatherings, one way they could have exercised this discretion would have been to allow the vigil, but no, they didn't take that route. They banned the gathering.

They then become violent towards women during the vigil, they mishandle women, not for causing a disturbance, but... "to keep them safe from Covid." With friends like this keeping you safe!

The Home Secretary Priti Patel was equally outraged by these scenes and demanded an explanation from the Police for their heavy handedness. For a while it looked like the Met Police Chief Constable, Cresidda Dick may have to quit. The MSM were told that people in the crowd wanted to cause trouble and were extremists. Although information has subsequently come out which sheds light on the Police acting on the Home Secretary's instructions and then being hung out to dry when they did.

There are clearly political games at play here between the Police and politicians and this would have an effect on how the Police behave in subsequent protests, if they are being hung out to dry by their boss, perhaps they may show her what happens when they don't take action, and whichever city sees the next protest would find out what this looks like.

Outdoor Gatherings And Covid

Aside from protests, the UK Chief Scientific Officer Patrick Vallance, when he was giving evidence to MPs, was asked whether these protests and gatherings were in fact dangerous due to Covid, his response:

So the whole rhetoric around the police breaking up protests outdoors due to Covid safety is baseless. It's SAFER outdoors than in. In reality, this science isn't new, its just that it can be said more confidently now, a year into lockdown. Perhaps its now time to ensure that peaceful and organised, legitimate protests are facilitated safely, rather than trying to stop them for fake reasons? Perhaps it is having to enforce unnecessarily restrictive laws, not violent protesters who are putting the police in danger?

And the Police should withdraw the lie that breaking up gatherings outdoor is to keep us safe. It does not keep us safe. Sending us home to be indoors is less safe. What the police are doing is enforcing the law, but it does not keep us safe from Covid.

Police & Crime Bill 2021

Then the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill is submitted to Parliament for debate.

We are constantly being told that this year has been one of suffering. One where families have lost loved ones to this awful new illness. Some of these deaths have been directly related to Government incompetence, £37billion on track and trace for example, the very thing we were told would stop the need for a lockdown which has failed to avoid a lockdown 3 times!!! Nearly twice what we spend annually on our armed forces! Breath-taking stuff.

So in this time of death, suffering and political incompetence, and in this time when our freedoms have been removed, and where we are told that even the Prime Minister is worried about restrictions on our freedom as these rules go against his libertarian principles, why would they choose now to make such changes? The Government can surely see that this is totally inappropriate?

The bill gives discretion to the police to fine and imprison organisers of protests. Protests that are noisy or disruptive can lead to a fine, isn't noise and disruption the point of a protest? The police label anyone who currently goes on a protest an extremist. This bill will just allow the police the discretion to criminalise people.

All Extinction Rebellion protests are noisy and disruptive, but haven't most been effective in raising the profile of the climate emergency? Aren't these the people we should be supporting even though the MSM label them as extremists? Greta Thurnberg is disruptive, but shes effective, shes more effective than the people I have voted for who should be sorting out climate change. Even US Presidents class her an extremist.

What if a pensioner with no money decided to sit down in the road or glue themselves to a TV in John Lewis because they don't like changes to their TV licence? They could end up dying in prison just for protesting about something they feel strongly about if the police think they're a nuisance.

What about students who protest? Are we going to criminalise our future taxpayers? Who will fund future pensions and vaccine discoveries?

Perhaps the right thing to do is not to pass stupid legislation like this, if it is put it forward to Parliament, perhaps MPs should amend it and rebel against the party whip if necessary as it's clearly not what British people want, especially those Tory MPs who claim to be protectors of freedom, and finally, if we have people in power hell bent on removing civil liberties, perhaps our elected MPs should warn loudly, that there will be civil unrest which could lead to people getting hurt.

No one wants anyone to get hurt, but that's the situation that has been created by the politicians who then expect the police to enforce baseless, insensitive and unsupported rules. There are mindless thugs in this story, there are extremists, but they are in Westminster, not Bristol.

The Bristol Protests

And with this backdrop we get back to the protests in Bristol. Was it really as black and white as the Chief Constable made out?

Police Opt For No Organisation

So a protest is set up in Bristol. Because the police will not allow protests, no one can take responsibility for arranging it as they could get fined or put in prison. So it grows organically. There are no road closures, no marshals, no one trying to keep people spaced out, this is a conscious step by the police to start chaos, it is the first step towards unrest.

Aggressive Start

The protest was scheduled for 2pm. But for people arriving before that, when there is no real crowd, young people, students carrying banners, have banners ripped from their hands by the police, and were told to go home, that it was illegal to protest. This is Britain 2021! This aggressive posture by the police was taken until the crowds get too big, so their confrontational bravery dies away for now.

Peaceful Protest

The gathering on College Green at 2pm is peaceful and largely spaced out. It's outdoors - so from a Covid perspective, virtually no chance of transmission. A normal protest would then be controlled by marshals who would lead people through a predetermined route, agreed with the police, with roads closed to traffic for safety.

Due to the awkwardness of the police, none of this was possible. So people started walking. Buses were trapped and delayed. Cars tried to barge dangerously into the crowd. In other words, chaos. There were so few police that they couldn't even keep the crowd safe from the disruption caused by the police refusing to constructively engage with the protest. Part of the crowd stopped in the centre, part broke away, creating more chaos. It moved towards Broadmead shopping centre and Castle Park.

Disorganised Protests

There was a distinct feeling that the police wanted to kettle the protest into a single place, but without the organisation, and multiple break away groups there were insufficient officers to kettle the multiple groups.

The police aggressively probed the crowd but had to retreat due to the numbers. An organised march would have circled the centre, caused disruption and then dispersed, leaving the city. But this was disorganised chaos with pockets of groups each coming up with their own idea of what to do next.

As you can see from this clip taken from 'Bristol.Live' Facebook page, you can see there was a peaceful and spontaneous breakaway from the Castle Park group outside Bridewell Police station, when they got there, all they did was sit down. There is clearly no violent intent in this crowd. Just a group of people in a protest with no direction (because the police did not allow that).

By early evening, a small group were sat peacefully outside Bridewell, the main central Bristol police station (the chief Constable called this a 'community station' like it was some small and weak station innocently going about its business, as opposed to 'main stations' which I assume are big and strong and can take on any bullies!?).

Sitting Down Outside a Police Station

Remnants of the crowd were scatted throughout central Bristol. None of these people had sticks or weapons. None of these people were dressed for a fight. The people sitting in the road were causing a nuisance for sure, they were blocking the road. But thats what a protest is. Causing a nuisance is not the same as looking for a fight, until the crowd starts to get kettled in.

Contrast the image in the video with the message from the Chief Constable who said that there was a group of people in Bristol that day who were armed with weapons and looking for a fight. He is in fact correct, later in the day there was a group of people armed and ready to fight, but it wasn't the protesters.

One thing however does seem to be true of young people in Bristol, every other one seems to carry a spray can and unfortunately, a police van parked up in the middle of the kettled crowd and unprotected by the police gets damaged and sprayed on and the crowd attempts to turn it over prompting the police to move on the crowd.

Take An Aggressive Position

The fact that these people are not threatening the police station is clear from the next move taken by the police. Bridewell Police Station is a glass fronted building as you can see from the picture.

The glass runs from the wall on the left, to a glass revolving door entrance, then to an under ground car park behind the red gates before ending in the wall to the right. So the protection of the building would need a line of officers from left to right. But this is not what the police do. Instead, a team of police officers in riot gear and face the kettled in protesters to the right of the station and they focus their energy on agitating with them, while leaving those on the left, mainly people filming, watched over by a thin blue line holding batons.

It is also strategically strange. I'm no military genius but I would imagine that even Roman legions will tell you that if you face the opposition, you don't leave your rear exposed. But this reflects the safe nature of the crowd. Those kettled on the right hand side, are angry when pushed by police lines. Of course they would be, where can they go! Whilst the group on the left hand side, the group not kettled, were passive and merely watching and filming. The protesters are not looking for a fight.

Crowd Agitation Tactics

The tactics of the police get stranger from here. Or perhaps they are not strange if your actual desire is to agitate and gather a crowd. However, it is fair to say that at this stage, the atmosphere in the city and within the protest is not one of a group of people who want a fight.

Judge for yourself in the video clips. When looking at the police from behind their lines, you can see agitation. Police shields hit protesters. Protesters respond with anger but are hit with batons. When the crowd settles down and becomes quiet, the agitation starts again, pushing starts. Its almost as if the police want the crowd to gather and become angry but the crowd doesn't get like this, it settles down. If there were no riot police you wonder if the crowd would even stay. But the crowd cannot really leave as they are penned in, however, others protesters are allowed to join, this makes no sense at all.

I cannot imagine that the officers on the ground are making these strange decisions. They are already outnumbered so why allow the crowd to increase? Why agitate the crowd? But someone is allowing it. Someone is directing this action. The crowd has been disorganised all day, unlike the Police, they have no plan and no view from the sky of what is going on.

Pointless Horses

The police are still not affected by crowds from the left hand side of the building, the crowd on the left gather, passively watching the police roughing up those on the right side. From nowhere, 4 police horses arrive. The crowd is unhappy about this and chant "get the horses out". There appears to be nothing the horses can do but the police line opens and the horses make pretend attempts to move towards the crowd. The reason for this tactic seems unclear, it does nothing to disperse the crowd, scatter the crowd or calm the crowd, and surely one of these must be the aim of crowd control right? In fact, even the hoses look reluctant to do these manoeuvres.

This action has the effect of making the crowd on the left hand side of the station become agitated at what they are seeing. Bottles are thrown but in reality, they do not hit the horses or the police lines but fly over into the crowd the other side. The numbers of riot police seems low and the police realise they are exposed from the back to a group of people now throwing bottles.

The station itself is not under any real threat, but the police now create 2 lines protecting the left hand and right hand side of the station and holding the road clear in front of the station. The horses seem ineffective and retreat in between the police lines.

A few days after the protest, the local BBC news adds to the police propaganda with an interview with the police woman who was on the horse, in a stable, out of uniform, stroking the lovely horse saying how awful it was being attacked.

Everyone agrees, it was awful, but the crowd didn't want you there, they shouted for you to leave, you and the horse did nothing to either calm the crowd, diffuse the situation, arrest anyone, or keep anyone safe, or help matters in the slightest, all the most basic jobs of a police officer. You served no purpose as a police officer other than to get the crowd angrier. You were there because your superiors told you to go there.

Perhaps you should ask yourself why you were there and who was to blame? Who really put you and the horses at risk?

Graff the Police

The atmosphere is getting worse, but for some reason the police are not as aggressive as they normally are. In fact, they appear embarrassingly ineffective. Protesters start spray painting the helmets and visors of the police. Graffiti is sprayed onto police shields. The crowds and police jostle each other and the police do the odd bit of battering, but the lines hold. The crowd is rowdy, but largely doing nothing other than responding to being pushed.

Pointless Dogs

Strangely, 4 police dogs then arrive. Much like the horses, you have to wonder why. The officers are not in riot gear and one of the dogs seems to hate his handler.

A bystander offers the dog some pizza and the dog genuinely seems interested. Its handler pulls it back and the dog tries to take his handler's arm off. Some effort is needed for the dog handler get the dog to appear like it was on his side.

A firework is thrown, scaring the crowd as much as any police officer. It looks dramatic, but like the dogs and horses, does very little, although it will sound a lot more dramatic when the Chief Constable whimpers about it, whilst ignoring the threat created by the dogs and horses and the battering being dished out by his officers.

Pointless Filming

Even more strangely for a police station, it has a flat roof just next to its front door, that is totally accessible, so protesters take up position on it. This is directly above the police line, and an incredibly dangerous situation for the police to be in if you think about the possibility of being showered with scaffold poles or blocks of concrete. But in a reflection of the crowd not actually being out to hurt anyone, the police never once had to take steps to remove these protesters. Although when officers from inside the station tried to film those on the roof, the windows were quickly sprayed over, again making the police look incredibly stupid and ineffective.

Create the Angry Mob

The police change their posture for reasons that are unclear. They break their two lines and create one in front of the station, protecting it from left to right. This also has the effect of joining the crowds from the two sides of their lines. One side having being subject to random batterings for the previous hour or so, the other side watching and becoming angry at what they saw. This united, angry crowd now has the police pinned up against the station.

This gives the crowd an added feeling of being in charge. It is true to say that the crowd was enjoying the destruction. This is criminal destruction of property and of course it is wrong. And if someone's father or mother got hurt, whether thats a police officer or protester its wrong, but the blame is not so clear cut, it's not as simple as the innocent police versus the naughty protesters. And equally, even with steel toe capped boots, a police officer may break bones from kicking too hard.

Its the Police with the best view of the overall situation and the officers on the ground seem to be being put in positions that make things more dangerous for all involved as it is egging the crowd on.

Creating Good Media

Given that the police have spent the evening defending the front of the station, why then does the police line move back exposing the plate glass window one side of the door? Why do this, and why hold this position until the protesters have had enough time to a) realise its exposed and b) kick the window in before being pushed back again?

For the officers in charge, this is either a deliberate move to allow destruction to be carried out which serves some purpose (of which you are aware of but which those on the ground are not aware of) or because you are utterly incompetent and do not know how to protect glass. Either way, if I were an officer at street level, I would be unhappy with the dangerous situation my superiors are creating on the ground.

But, it does create a good backdrop for the Chief Constable on the morning news.

Pointless Vans

The logical thinking at this stage would be to call for reinforcements. Police vans do arrive, but bizarrely, riot police do not spill out of the vans. Instead, the side of the van facing the crowd gets covered in graffiti and the tyres were let down, more humiliation for the police and more entertainment for the crowd.

Some vans appear in a street totally unprotected by riot police. One van was the mobile police station, rather than parking this away from the disorder, the police parked it in the middle of the crowd, and left it there. What the police were thinking in this instance is hard to see, although it does give the crowd some confidence that they can escalate in their aggression. The media optics the next day were also perfect.

Senior Officer Violence or Crowd Violence?

The police officers on the ground must think to themselves they were being thrown to the mob. Officers in riot gear being told not to react as a protester graffitied them. Vans being told to drive in to get destroyed one after the other. Horses and dogs brought in pointlessly, agitating the crowd, that clearly looks good in the media in the days after the event, but if you were one of the officers, you must be left confused as to why you were forced to be so impotent when all you and your heavily armed gang of mates are trained to do is to batter people in a situation like this.

Perhaps if you are a senior officer and had watched the Met being shafted by the Home Secretary the previous week, perhaps this week you teach her a lesson and show her what happens when she doesn't support you. Perhaps the politics of the protester is the only black and white issue on the streets this day, the politics of the police is far more opaque.

Future Politicians

And should we worry for the future? Won't our future politicians will sort this out? Not if the quality of politician being selected is like this one who wants to resolve issues using terrorism, I think the police should be even more worried, the protesters in Bristol were nothing in comparison to this potential future leader inciting violence which without doubt will put the police in harms way!

In Conclusion!

I respect the police, yes, I would vote to fund them more so that they can actually investigate crime. Yes, I want them to turn up if my property is under attack. But that does not mean that the choice is them being effective and us living in a police state versus them being ineffective with them only dealing with “covid crimes!“ That is not the choice here.

If there is a lesson to be learnt from this it's that the freedom to organise and protest in the UK must be protected. It should not be legislated against any further, no matter how small the changes appear, they should be taken off the table.

Covid restrictions on outdoor protests can now be ended, NOT EXTENDED!

Protests should be encouraged and the role of the police should be to facilitate that protest and keep the protesting crowd safe. There will be disruption to others, everyone understand that and at times, we may curse the XR protesters blocking the street, but these events are important, and they can continue peacefully if done properly as they have done before lockdown.

But given that we are in a time when people are dying, and given that our civil liberties have been removed, and given that in using their powers during lockdown the police and our politicians have shown that they are the last people who should be given the say over the legality of protesting, whether that's the Sarah Everard vigils, or the Bristol protests, we should not be handing over more powers to them at this point in time, or ever.

Credits, video clips taken from longer videos found here:

Politics Joe YouTube

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Bristol.Live Facebook

UK NIP YouTube

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