welcome back

since the security settings were changed some time ago the hope is that more people can gain access to this potted history written during the month of August.Since that time another trawl through the Echo revealed a strange tale.Dated 19thSeptember 2011 it concerned a police statement that they vow to keep the peace,Nothing strange about that - it is just that the man making the statement is the same officer who presided over a press conference earlier in the month at which reporters were told that thousands of anarchists had plans to hijack the eviction -at that time just six weeks away.Different messages coming from the same source.

job creation

A Council official  says that because of "underspend"they are creating a new post of Community Liaison Officer on a tempoary basis (1year) to work with Travellers at Dale Farm.
Sounds like the stable door closing after the horse has bolted.
"£28k for council job to help out Travellers" is the headline in the Echo, 1Sept 2013.  
Seems there is money left over from the £13 million tyhe government promised in 2011.

End of the line

Reporting on the 1st July 2011 the Echo covered the previous day's meeting of Basildon Council which dealt with  financial arrangements to assist the police, after which the eviction of Dale Farm could go ahead. The Labour and Libdem opposition were at pains to point out that plans should not go ahead until the Council had explored the offers made by Lord Avemore to find alternative sites on  government land.So far they had dismissed this idea out of hand..In the vote that followed the Conservatives won by 27 to 12.

 Tony Ball maintains that the Council have done their utmost to find a peaceful solution and have left no stone unturned and that is why they have pressed ahead with a forced eviction because they have been left with no alternatives.This is plainly untrue and was demonstrated,one year later,when Lord Avemore visited the site and said the eviction was a colossal waste of taxpayer's money because there had been other solutions which the Council had not bothered to explore-or dismissed out of hand.

Obviously some other solutions would have involved slowing up the process and may have taken some time to implement but think of all the money that would have been saved and all the distress to so many families that could have been avoided.

Tony Ball's argument is that the Council has been more and more dilligent in its effort to seek a solution whilst the residents have been more and more intransigent and difficult to deal with but the facts do not bear this out.

The opposition Councillors were talking sense but the Tory majority were always categorized as people in a hurry to get things done and not averse to taking shortcuts.At the High Court this is something that the judges remarked upon more than once.

The residents at Dale Farm have claimed all along that they would be willing to leave if a suitable alternative was offered to them and Lord Avemore has always said he was willing to  look around and find somewhere on government owned land that would prove to be suitable.

Why would this not prove attractive to Tony Ball?

My guess is that such a move would mean the Council
 might be forced to guarantee planning permissions as part of a deal: something they would find unpalatable.They were determined to get rid of this unwelcome minority and this would be made easier if they were branded as lawbreakers.

John Baron.(Tory) in the House at PMQs looked forward to the time when the greenfield land would be returned to the law-abiding majority.

Doing the Business

I am not a business person but I understand that large corporations like to keep tabs on their more expensive operations by means of cost benefit analysis beforehand and audits afterwards.They expect the CEO to come and explain in detail what has been accomplished and at what cost.The drawbacks and methods of improving performances in the future -financial gains and losses being uppermost in mind-before the BOARD has to report to the shareholders at the AGM .
Public bodies have similar systems of accountability - but what of the Police ? It used to be the case that the Chief Constable reported back to the Police Authority.Now that these have been scrapped a link with the general public has been severed.The plans to evict residents of Dale Farm were well under way in December 2010 see setting the Scene,elsewhere on this blog.
The information document published by Essex Police might be thought of as a preliminary report but even as such it is woefully inadequate.It would make most business people squirm with embarrassment because it does not explain what happened.
In an addition which was put out later and withdrawn from Utube it revealed that the police had entered the site at dawn.This was being economical with the truth as it did not say in what manner this was done (a raid by over 300 riot police).As you appreciate assistance given by other police forces has to be paid for  so a kind of chart is included to show how much involvement each county force played on and off during the preparations. (A list of injuries sustained and arrests made is a welcome feature)after that there are just a few minor talking points,for example comment upon messages received from the public which were 41 in favour and slightly less expressing concern.
Expressing concern in the police vocabulary is different from making a complaint.A complaint is a very special sort of thing and only two types are recognized.On this occasion there was one of each type and so there  were in total only two complaints registered against Essex Police.
Beyond this trivia there are lacunae aplenty:
Nothing about who was in charge,nothing about the chain of command,nothing about who made the decision to abandon the long standing tradition of being neutral in civil cases,nothing about arming some few officers with tazers,nothing about misuse of Tazers (on various videos officers can be seen waving these potentially lethal weapons in a threatening manner.
In many another operation one gets a warm commendation from a senior officer to say how well his men have performed the tasks given them but here - as at the eviction itself -senior officers are notable by their absence perhaps because it would not do to be photographed conducting an eviction whilst at the same time on their website saying that they do not perform evictions.
New York Times Headline................POLICE EVICT TRAVELLERS.

Excess Zeal

Some ideas encountered in the information document published five months after the Dale farm eviction hve their place in the annals of local history others are puzzling.

Objectives

1)to maintain the Queen's peace

2)to see that positive action is taken to prevent crime and minimize disorder

3)to enable the targetting of persistentoffenders and minimise disruption by

     by efficient gathering and dissemination of intelligence

Other Strategies include:

to.....To comply with our positive obligations under the Human Rights Act,1988 to facilitate peaceful assembly,freedom of expression and protect the rights of all involved in legitimate activity.

.........Where offenses are committed by any person or a group we will seek best evidence with a view to prosecuting those involved.

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An examination of people present at Dale Farm  on that day in October suggests that they could be classified in 3 groups-Residents,Human Shield protestors,and the International Press corps.This begs the question...

At which group was all the paramilitary activity directed ?

 Surely,judging by the court cases that followed most transgressions involved people obstructing the Bailiffs and most of these were made by people who set up Camp Constant for that very purpose in August -saying they would accept the consequences in order to highlight the cruel nature of the actions being taken by the Council against the Irish Travellers (a recognized ethnic minority) They were trying to show that other solutions might have been adopted other than the maximum display of force.

Force was not proportionate and was used against protestors  whom the police-under the Human Rights act - are pledged to assist.

Anarchy:the Stats

Essex police

....."of those arrested 35were for obstructing Bailiffs,two remain on police bail and six people have been cautioned,the remaining 26 have been reported for the offences which will be prosecuted by Basildon Borough Council.

The remaining ten people were charged with offenses including

2 counts of violent disorder

5 counts of Public Order offense

1count of racially aggravated Public Order offense

1 count of failing to remove a face covering ***

1 count of assault by beating

1 count of causing bodily harm by wanton or furious driving

1 count of resisting an officer

1 count of using behaviour likely to cause harassment,alarm or distress.

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***This was the first case to come to court and resulted in an humiliating defeat  for the police when the defendant produced two videos exonerating her.

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Elsewhere the local papers reported that three protestors had pleaded guilty to urinating on police stationed below the gantry and another local man pleaded guilty to throwing a piece of concrete which fell short of police lines. The cases came to court in an haphazard fashion and one person charged with a serious offense had 4/5 postponements before being acquitted.(The others were given community service orders )

 At first glance these results might seem similar to any found in any country town an an average Friday or Saturday night when the pubs and clubs release their revelers and most police forces have learned how to cope with these contingencies without calling upon riot squads.What ails the Essex Police ?

A partial answer may be found in the September press conference chaired by Chief Supt.Tim Stokes who estimated that several thousand undesirables whom he called anarchists were preparing to hijack the eviction.

The team assembled in Basildon to investigate all matters concerning Dale Farm concentrated on the social media which is notoriously unsafe and unreliable and indeed during the run up to the big event Facebook,for example,was almost unusable there was so much interference from persons for whom "monitoring" seemed to involve removing messages and posting Spam in their place.Other police forces have dedicated teams of officers who go round schools telling pupils how to use the new media responsibly and how to be wary and not trust the small screen - where you can seldom be sure of the identity of the person trying to get in touch with you.

Raj Chada the solicitor representing the lady with a face covering told the Judge that the police were hounding his clients as if anxious to boost their reputation in law enforcement

There you have it  they had put on a big expensive operation supposedly to deal with a massive threat of violent disorder from a large group of determined rebels which never materialised.They were dealing in fantasy policing - not rooted in the gathering of evidence-and not conducted in a measured,proportionate set of responses. They were OTT     Over the top  by a country mile.

Dale Farm -the Artistic heritage.

Now we are free to speculate so nothing we discuss with the same gravity we have used so far....

As I understand it a play has already been performed in a college or school in the region and been well received.A documentary film made for the BBC by Panorama has been shown(although the troubled Corporation seems reluctant to give it a second viewing).Could Hollywood be interested ?Are there any epic  features ?Certainly we cannot boast a Monument Valley as a backdrop to the action although we do have our very own crusader for law and order-the Leader of the Council.Is it a story of confrontation like the O.K.Coral ? Who are the baddies and who are the goodies ?

If the account given by the Essex police in their September 2011 press conference is credible there lay waiting,all tooled up with stockpiles of dangerous substances,an army of two thousand fierce anarchists who were prepared to use any amount of force.

Yes, there is a story after all:

sending 300 of our finest to raid the place and face numerical odds of 4 to 1 that is something like the "Charge of the Light Brigade" It might appeal to the Hollywood producer.Did our Guys raise a flag when the job was done as they did in the war in the Pacific?

A frisson of excitement was caused when I was reading in the police information document details of injuries sustained by officers at Dale Farm.The first was when an officer was pulling down a fence and something sharp pierced his glove.The second was when an officer stumbled over a newly demolished wall and damaged a knee.

Now...there we have it ...WOUNDED KNEE...makes a good title. There is a snag because the officers although clad with body armour and equipped with shields and visors would not be protected from dangerous chemicals said to be stockpiled on the site, also.... according to he police document only seven officers had Tazers provided for their personal protection though why this was so was never explained.Of the 18 or so injuries reported only one was selected and issued as a police press release (I read it in the Belfast Telegraph although it probably went round the world) It concerned a man who was weilding a big piece of wood with huge nails protuding who is said to have attacked a female officer.Another observation:none of the protestors found on the site seemed to be wearing clothes which would protect them from handling dangerous chemicals and nobody it seems gave dangerous chemicals a thought when the Council contractors dug up the plots in the illegal part of the site.

At present nothing monumental emerges from this story other than the miscalculation of the threat and danger proposed by the protestors who had claimed from the outset that they would resist in a peaceful manner when the Bailiffs came to remove the families.They had explained they would act as human shields and the residents welcomed this kind of support as something they had never experienced before from settled people."We stood because Ye stood" is how one resident put it but there came a time when the pressure got to the old and frail members of the community and further resistance outside the courts became problematical.

Some film might be made of the make belief and the fantastical which Essex policemen have shown some aptitude for in their gamesmanship.A recent report put them at the bottom of the list in dealing with domestic violence and the judicial review blamed them for confusing intelligence (unverified stories)with evidence.

Military men will tell you that raw data must be sifted and carefully analyzed before any decisive action is undertaken.Otherwise one falls victim to counter intelligence and commits fatal blunders.So far this means in the case of Essex police merely that they have lost credibility and their reputation for neutrality in civil cases has been compromised.

One year on.

On the occasion of the first anniversary of the eviction.....

Much of the media local and national took only a passing interest and Aljazeera simply put out film they had taken in 2011.They did have a helicopter but this did not altogether prove helpful since a police helicopter hovered immediately in the line of vision.Their man on the ground did get to ask the police spokesperson why they had used so much force and got the stock answer "We have Intelligence."

Accompanying the pictures were some perceptive comments.They said that this operation had all the hallmarks of a government inspired and funded attempt to bolster the work of a local authority who were keen to rid themselves of an unwanted minority.Such activities were happening all over Europe.It was not new to them. 

Five months later in the police Information Document this was confirmed and the writers described how they had gone about persuading HMG to release considerable funds despite the usual restraints imposed by overall austerity measures.(even  the Bobbies were not immune to cuts and there was talk of station houses closing and- as far as I know-the stables being closed and the mounted police being disbanded.)

Helping the Leader of Basildon Council pursue his vendetta had become a Tory priority and he himself appeared alongside the ruined Dale Farm site to talk to camera.One question he faced was  put in an awkward fashion How could he as a leader of a cash-strapped Council afford to continue with such expensive adventures ? Clearly the reporter was unaware of the big money by which the government bankrolled both the police and the Council.He may also been deluded by the Council Leader's  air of invincibility in his crusade against the "Outsiders" who had come to live in Crays Hill.

Setting the scene

Basildon Recorder noted (1Dec2010) that Dale Farm eviction could take six weeks to complete and on the 10March 2011 returned with more detail in a story:"Counting the cost of evicting Crays hill Travellers"

     

It will be an operation of unprecedented scale  risk  and complexity and is beyond the normal business of any Council.

Indications are that there will be a significant presence of other protestors some of whom(they go on to explain) have no connection with the site or even the Travellers.

This has prompted Essex Police to estimate costs of about £12m to police the operation.

One  may compare this spectacular build up with the tawdry conclusion on the day of the eviction(19October2011) recorded verbatim in the Billericay Gazette.

"Basildon Council press conference;full transcript"

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In part the Council confirms that it receives its intelligence from Essex Police but can not resist the temptation to pass some of this on when it states:

"Intelligence received indicated that protestors had stockpiled various items with the intent of using these against the Bailiffs and the Police...

                        the Police will give you more details on this at their briefing...."

comment....

As we all know the Police Spokesperson,giving nothing away on the day, spent his time successfully warding off questions from dozens of reporters and you can see him doing this on video clips recorded by BBC News/London.

Even the Information Document issued by the police  five months later has nothing to say on these matters.

The Council Leader is quoted,giving himself,the Council,and the Police a pat on the back and telling us how they have all behaved professionally and that the protestors (previously referred to as anarchists in police press conferences)were in fact initiators of the violence even though most of them were still in their sleeping bags at 7am when the riot squad tore down fences and demolished walls to gain entry to the site.

P.M.Q.s

John Baron.MP for Basildon and Billericay

Will the Prime Minister join me in sending a clear message to the Travellers at the illegal Dale Farm site:we all hope that they will move off peacefully in order to avoid a forced eviction,but,be in no doubt that the Government fully supports Basildon Council and Essex Police in reclaiming the greenbelt land on behalf of the law-abiding majority.

The Prime Minister in response said:

that he wholeheartedly supports Basildon Council and the Essex Police and made the point that this was an issue of FAIRNESS in ensuring that the law was enforced.

                                                                                    Echo 7Sept 2011

Approximately one week later  Johbn  Baron was making headlines again

Basildon MP Mr.B is shown the rooms set aside for planning the eviction in the Council HQ......they are described as Gold and Silver cells.Then he moves over to the scene of the confrontation at or near Dale Farm where he talks with Bailiffs and other officials.There is no indication that he got any nearer than the holding centre ( a mini village built close to the enemy lines ) from where,as an old soldier, he could survey the battlefield.There is no indication that he went anywhere near the Main gate where plenty of people,including not a few undercover reporters from the Sun and the Mail gained entry without difficulty

Echo/16 Sept.2011:  headline ....Basildon MP visits Dale Farm ahead of  eviction.

**********************************************************

Convergence

Three news items occur in a period close to the end of August and the beginning of September 2011

1) a visit from  the Brentwood Gazette published on the 31August.

2) A police Press conference about Hijacking the eviction.

3)A press conference at Dale farm (PA news agency)

**********************************************************************

Number 3....dated 2nd Sept.

Travellers and supporters fighting eviction from the U.K.'s largest illegal site in Essex have refuted claims that they have been infiltrated by trouble-making anarchists.

Speaking at a press conference the two groups presented a united front and said that they were committed to non violent resistance.

It followed reports (see 2)that up to 2,000 protestors (?)are set to descend on the site to clash with bailiffs and police.

comment:

I wonder where they got that idea from?

In the same report  Resident Kathleen McCarthy said:

"These supporters are welcome here

           and we remain determined to stay "

*****************************************************  

Number 1)

The human shield supporters who introduced themselves  back in April also featured in an Echo report dated 27/8/2011 under the headline...."Camp Constant takes root as Dale Farm eviction date looms.

******************************************************

Number2)

The detective who presided over the press conference early in September  also appears later in the month (19th) under the headline "Police vow to keep the peace."

*****************************************************

Commentary/These news items seem to indicate that there was a feverish atmosphere and lots of rumours were being circulated which is why the folk in Dale Farm came to call a press conference to help clear the air.It does seem that most of the rumours originated in the extraordinary press conference  (no.2)called by Essex Police early in the month which led to headlines about hijacking the forthcoming eviction. 

If there had been any truth in these claims one would have expected that a roll call of people arrested at the time would have been substantial but most were charged with obstructing  Bailiffs -something they professed that they were going to do for months and accept the consequences in order to demonstrate to the general public that this whole operation was a cruel and shameful exercise of power.

The perceived punishment protestors faced were being given Police Cautions.If they did not accept this they would have to go to court and be prosecuted by Basildon Council.Most rejected the cautions and opted to face court procedures where the police would have to prove any case made against them.  

In the wake of many delays the Judiciary declared that these cases be dropped.It was not in the Public Interest to continue clogging up the courts.

the Tradition we inherit

As we know we do not enjoy the benefits of a written constitution but we do have viable notions we have accumulated over the centuries upon which we could establish the new era of government of the people by the people.To begin with we have Magna Carta:

 "No free man shall be seized or imprisoned or stripped of his rights or possessions or outlawed or exiled or deprived of his standing in any other way.

Nor will we proceed with force against him or send others to do so except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the land"

It is true that this was drawn up when the King and Barons were looking for a cessation of hostilities and in days when King's could claim a divine right to rule, sponsored by the Church but times have changed and there are not many kingdoms left   and the influence of the Church has waned.It does however outline the privileges we should all enjoy as by right simply because we are citizens which in Common Law tradition also makes the point that everyman is entitled to be regarded as an upright and worthy citizen - unless the contrary has been proved in a court of law.

Contrast this positive outlook with the modern day   business of looking for scapegoats and branding people with labels to indicate that they are beyond the pale or setting the dogs upon them ( a modern version of this is to conduct a campaign in the deplorable British Media to denigrate whole sections of the populace).

Then we have civic leaders bringing down the whole weight of the State's security apparatus upon transgressors -  in the form of paramilitary policing - something invented in the Thatcher era to quell the rebellion of the Miners but here in Essex used against men women and children who have committed no crimes.

The UN charter of Children's rights declares that all children need a stable home environment first and foremost and education and other benefits depend on this being in place.The Dale Farm community gave children a good environment and they had a good school nearby.They still have the school but the stability of their home environment has been  almost destroyed by the activities of Civic Leaders and the police relying as they do on the application of force.

COUNCIL OF EUROPE.

Post war several countries dismayed at the devastation and upheaval formed the Council of Europe and GB was a founder member where Churchill stated that Jaw,Jaw was better than War,War.It was the common denominator  in a manner of speaking that the acceptance of the Human Rights ideals would form a basis of agreement upon which to build a new future.At first there were ten countries but today there are 47.

It falls upon the Human Rights Commissioner to keep an eye on standards and warn individual States if they are falling below acceptable standards.In 2011 he had reason to complain to Eric Pickles,the Minister,in the following fashion:

"I call upon you to ensure that an end be put to violations of the right to adequate housing of Travellers in Basildon and that local  authorities are made aware of the U.K.'s obligations to respect the right to adequate housing for Gypsies and Travellers"

An exchange of letters can be found on the Council of Europ's huge website.

Mr.Pickles uses the argument he still employs today.He points out that HMG provides money with which local authorities can build sites -which is true but beside the point because what has been lacking so far is the WILLINGNESS to grant planning permission to certain classes of citizens - notably those aspiring to a mobile lifestyle-the nomadic way of life is one that is -according to the United Nations-perfectly legitimate.

You may despise it but you may not discriminate against it.

Here we meet with one of the core considerations which the Council of Europe always puts before its member States at regular intervals by a sort of audit.In what manner do you deal with minorities in your territory ?Do you have a strategy ?Does this strategy encourage inclusion or does it on the contrary encourage discrimination ?   

The architect of the Velvet Revolution,Vaclav Havel,had a measure of how much a nation had achieved maturity :he said  you can tell this by how well it treats the minorities.

Lots of countries fall below the highest standards and in this case it is our own politicians  who have put England on the Naughty Step....inhabited as usual by France,Spain and Italy who have all  engaged in hounding Roma or Sinti communities or sending them  back to Hungary by the trainload.

When Basildon Council first voted to set aside cash to conduct an eviction the opposition  pointed out that they had not examined the offers made by the Homes and Community Agency who had declared a willingness to try and find government land with which to rehouse the residents of Dale Farm.That should have been considered and not overlooked. 

Richard Hewitt (Lab)M.E.P. was at pains to point out that in the European Parliament he had consistently voted against measures taken against the Roma in Europe and he could not endorse similar methods used in his own country against Irish Travellers.

ALL CHANGE AT THE TOP

SHAREHOLDERS OR STAKEHOLDERS

BECAUSE THE PUBLIC HAVE CONCERNS ABOUT PUBLIC SPENDING THE LOCAL NEWSPAPERS TAKE AN INTEREST IN THESE MATTERS AND LIKE TO KNOW WHERE THE MONEY IS GOING.A POLICE FORCE MIGHT BE FINANCED BY THE HOME OFFICE BUT WHERE THEIR ACTIVITIES MIGHT BENEFIT PEOPLE IN THE BOROUGH THEY CAN ASK THE POLICE AUTHORITY TO HELP OUT.THEY IN TURN CAN ASK THE FULL COUNCIL TO INCREASE THE COUNCIL TAX. A BIG EVENT LIKE THE OLYMPICS OR AN IMPORTANT EVICTION CAN THUS BE CATERED FOR.
IN BUSINESS TERMS THE PUBLIC EXPECT A FULL REPORT AT THE AGM FROM THE OFFICERS IN CHARGE -WHAT WENT WELL AND WHAT WENT WRONG WITH PLANS TO RECTIFY ANY SHORTCOMINGS.
************************************************
In recent times the Police Authority has been scrapped and in its place the government have put Police Commissioners who along with the police chiefs are to plan the future police activities.In Essex there has been a further complication in that the Chief  of Police has stepped down and a new man has been appointed.Gone is Chief Constable Jim Barker McCardle and in comes an experienced officer from the MET.
***********************************************
We can not fairly hold the new men on the block responsible for what has gone on in Essex in the past but do you see the dilemma ?a full account of the Dale Farm eviction would eventually have gone to the  Police Authority and through them to the general public who are now left in the dark about the effectiveness of measures sanctioned by Tony Ball and J.B.McCardle.
***********************************************
MANY MILLIONS OF POUNDS HAVE BEEN SPENT - AND ACCORDING TO LORD AVEMORE -  WASTED  - ON THE FORCED EVICTION IN OCTOBER 2011.
COULD THINGS HAVE BEEN DONE DIFFERENTLY ? THAT IS A LEGITIMATE QUESTION.
IN ORDER TO JUDGE THESE MATTERS WE NEED MUCH MORE RELIABLE INFORMATION BUT ALL WE HAVE AT THE MOMENT IS THE "information"document"PUBLISHED ON THE POLICE WEBSITE IN MARCH 2011....A VERY UNPROFESSIONAL LOOKING AND SKIMPY PIECE OF WORK.
*********************************************
THERE WAS A FOLLOW UP OF SORTS IN THE SHAPE OF A VIDEO+TEXT WHICH APPEARED BRIEFLY ON UTUBE BUT WAS WITHDRAWN.THE TEXT INVOLVED THE POLICE SPOKESMAN,SUPT. TREVOR ROE,WHO FACED THE PRESS ON THE DAY OF THE EVICTION AND WAS FEATURED IN THE BBC/LONDON COVERAGE WHERE HE DID A STERLING JOB OF FENDING OFF DOZENS OF QUESTIONS FROM NUMEROUS REPORTERS.NOTHING SEEMED TO PHASE HIM.HERE HE OUTLINES POLICE THINKING.
"where we have intelligence that there is likely to be violence
we need to protect the members of the public including
Bailiffs,Police Officers,Travellers and Protestors from injury.
We also need to provide access for all emergency services
should they need to enter or exit the site.
 ACCORDING TO THIS THE INVASION AT DAWN BY 300 RIOT POLICE WAS TO PROTECT EVERYBODY THERE FROM HARM
Only one group was not mentioned - the international Press Corps who were present in large numbers.
THE QUESTION ARISES - WHERE WAS THE HARM COMING FROM....?
****************************************************
A clue may be found in the Press conference held in the early days of September 2011 in which Chief Supt.Tim Stokes presided and revealed to the reporters that a plot had been uncovered in which thousands of anarchists wsere planning to hijack the forthcoming eviction.
The thought occurs that perhaps the anarchists had second thoughts when they realized that the detective was on to their dastardly plan and decided to abandon all thoughts of unlawful activites at the last minute - before the riot squad could be demobilized -say my Irish friends.
(perhaps we might examine that information document a bit more closely,given time ?)

CHARACTERS IN SEARCH OF A PLOT

SOME PEOPLE AND ACTIVITIES WHICH CAUGHT M ATTENTION...but not in any particular order.
gabby logan..
working for bbc radio did a splendid outside broadcast from DF.she was very friendly and put people at ease.
vanessa redgrave...
put her head above the parapet by visiting the residents to encourage them as well as supporting them and got sniped at by the popular press.
"Ellie"
A protester featured on the bbc london news who conducted an interview by cell phone with a reporter on the ground whilst the whole area was in turmoil caused by 300plus riot police.
Supt.Trevor Roe
the official spokesperson during the eviction
Trevor did a sterling job warding off scores of questions from dozens of reporters and giving nothing away a bit like the last batsman in for England stonewalling for Queen and country.It might not be pretty but it was immensely impressive as far as rearguard actions go and he even diverted talk about the use of Tazers which technically are not supposed to be used in pubic order operations.
 JULIAN STURDY
THIS REPORTER GAVE WITNESS TO THE INVASION OF 300 PLUS RIOT POLICE.HE USUALLY WORKS FOR LOOK EAST BUT WAS FEATURED ALSO IN BBC LONDON COVERAGE.HE TOLD OF THE LONG PERIOD WHICH FOLLOWED WITH NO SIGN OF THE BAILIFFS.
LEN GRIDLEY
ONE COULD WRITE A BOOK ABOUT "our Len" as the local journos call him because he is never out of the limelight he is a fantasist of the serial kind,a self publicist always coming up with some scheme or other
and threatening to take his concerns to the doors of the Prime Minister,he wanted to sue Tony Ball for not removing the travellers and again for not clearing up the mess left by the Council contractors and he was once taken away from Dale Farm after trying to start a fire whilst brandishing a firearm.He left in a police car and later police said that they were reviewing his firearms license (?) I expect to hear more because the media treat him as a witness of note simply because he lives next door.
RAY BOCKING
The former owner of the six acre site who ten years ago sold his land as a brownfield site to a group of Travellers  because nobody else was willing to acquire land that might be contaminated from more than 14 years of industrial use....see Essex Chronicle 8Sept 2011 Why I sold the land to the Travellers.also Basildon Recorder 20/5/2008.
He also visited the residents and told them the Council were not telling the truth about the 6 acre site being greenfield.
NICOLA WATSON
Is a photographer working for the Brentwood Gazette  whose pictures tell the truth about life inside Camp Constant,31August,2011. and make nonsense of the story put out by the police a few days later that the camp had been taken over by thousands of anarchists.
ELLEN YIANNI
the activist who blew the police case out of the water with her own video evidence. 
JONATHON OPPENHEIM
The celebrated Cambridge scientist stayed in the background but assisted the Travellers in their many encounters in the Law Courts because he considered them as neighbours.
There should be others and we might mention them later.

THE FOURTH ESTATE

We are able to talk about regional newspapers because they are numerous and were featured in the inquiry chaired by Lord Justice Leveson about the ethics and practises of the media.One got the impression that they are under pressure because there has been a fall in small ads which was previously the principal source of income and the way round this has been to combine  into groups where many titles are published and edited from a central hub.-of which -in Essex -there are a couple.

Considering the evidence they gave to the inquiry one might expect that individual papers would continue to display conservative attitudes which means that they would be reluctant to offer items which might upset the authorities or the advertisers.Under financial pressure this trend might perhaps continue ?

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I came to examine the files of one group and put in a search for "Dale Farm" which may have yielded a total of 140 pages each containing  10 items.One identifies the stories by the headlines quoted..The first observation I made was that the majority of them were marked as having no comment.This seemed to me to indicate that the publishers did not have an open relationship with the readers and this might be thought of as a subtle form of censorship.To offset this impression some papers posted comments in a column alongside the articles which you could scroll down and it was there during the build up to the BIG EVICTION that one came across vituperation and hate mail.Eventually many readers,after trying to argue for reasonableness to prevail,gave up and started to report the troublemakers to the police,who I understand, responded in a responsible manner. 

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JANUARY 2012

THE FIRST CASE TO COME TO THE MAGISTRATE'S COURT AT SOUTHEND ON SEA CONCERNED A YOUNG LADY WHO WAS ALLEGED TO HAVE COVERED HER FACE AT THE TME OF HER.ARREST.THE CASE COLLAPSED AND SHE WAS TOLD THERE WAS NO CASE TO ANSWER WHEN SHE PRODUCED TWO VIDEOS OF HERSELF AT THE SCENE.The BBC gave a little more information,saying she had supporters in the gallery who raised a cheer and local gossip was that the official witnesses gave contradictory accounts of what had happened .

 ALL THIS WAS A DISASTEROUS START FOR THE POLICE CAMPAIGN.THE LOCAL"ECHO" GAVE OUT THE BARE BONES OF THE STORY,SAYING THAT THE CASE HAD BEEN DISMISSED.........HOWEVER THEY PROMISED THAT THE FULL STORY WOULD BE PUBLISHED ON THE FOLLOWING DAY. THE FULL REPORT NEVER APPEARED AND EVEN THE WHOLE OF THE DAY'S ARCHIVE COULD NOT BE TRACED.

COULD THIS BE BECAUSE SOMEONE WANTED TO PREVENT THE POLICE FROM BEING  EMBARRASSED 

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OCTOBER 2012

A PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE VISITED THE FORMER HOME OF THE TRAVELLERS AND REPORTED THAT LIVING CONDITIONS ON THE SDE OF THE ROAD WERE ABOMINABLE-MOREOVER LORD AVEMORE (WHO HAD OFFERED TO FIND LAND WITH WHICH TO HOUSE THE TRAVELLERS PRIOR TO THE EVICTION) SAID THAT THE EVICTION ITSELF WAS A COLOSSAL WASTE OF TAXPAYER'S MONEY.

THIS SENSATIONAL NEWS WAS TOO HOT FOR THE EDITORS TO HANDLE BUT THEY COULD NOT AVOID IT ALTOGETHER - - -SO THEY BURIED IT IN THE MIDDLE OF ANOTHER STORY,DENYING IT OF HEADLINE STATUS,AND THE OTHER STORY WAS PUT OUT AS NEWS BUT WAS BY THEN OLD HAT INDEED.......THAT THE COUNCIL WERE PLANNING A SECOND EVICTION.

"COUNCIL POISED FOR NEW EVICTION AT DALE FARM" RAN THE BANNER.

On this occasion a search based on the headline might not have yielded the full story.

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Another twist came when I mentioned to friends that a certain item had been published on a certain date but they were unable to locate it,Quite by chance I came across the article in a remote part of the archives and all the evidence was that it had been printed in 2012 but it was filed away in January 2007.

Was this a mistake or are things moved so as not to catch the attention of the casual reader ?

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I must here mention my credentials - I only have experience of the time before computerization when printing wa done by lynotype and everything was measured by column inches,I had work experience when I was a student in a weekly religious newspaper.There the editorial staff numbered 1.+typist+student.

During the week in a piecemeal fashion copy was transferred to the printers who seemed to have a similar arrangement with the advertising dept.Towards the deadline time the Editor would go to the printers and negotiate the layout....perhaps they would find themselves a bit short -with space to fill ?,,,,the message would come back to me can you produce this week's Horoscope...or can you do a short editorial in the manner of the Soar away Sun about the hot weather ? NO PROBLEM = SCORCHIO !

In such a manner is history recorded.

Basildon:The Thatcherite town.

Close to the Thames container port of Tilbury the Borough of Basildon enjoys good links with the capital,It was the last of the "new Towns" built after the war and perhaps in some need of modernization.The official website stresses that the authorities are aware of its potential,it has favourable property values compared to the metropolis and it is,they claim,a good place to live and work.They have links with overseas markets and officers have been on business trips to Scandinavia and even China to promote trade.

While they are keen to promote change they still suffer from the recent history as a place which benefited most from the policies of Mrs.Thatcher and the BBC sometimes compares their reputation with other towns in England still suffering from the decline of heavy industries and the onset of mass unemployment.

In 2010 the Council set out elaborate plans to conduct a forced eviction of Irish Travellers from a site  in Crays Hill part of which did not have planning permission.This stirred up plenty of opposition and among the protestors were leaders of the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches ,various Rabbis,the representative of the UN.Amnesty International et alia. 

Most significantly the body which looks after government land,The Homes and Community Agency, said that they were willing to look around for land upon which sites could be established to rehouse the Travellers.This did not please the Council because they were in a hurry and impatient.It would have taken some time to implement and might involve the Council having to agree to granting planning permission -something they had resolutely resisted hitherto.

The United Nation's position on forced evictions is clear:They are cruel and unnecessary.Member States are urged to avoid them at a local and national level.If they do occur the people affected should be found alternative accomodation and they should be given compensation for the trauma of losing their homes.

 The council ignored all opposition and discussed what alternative plans could be made if their request for help from HMG for £13m was rurned down.

The leader of the Council,Tony Ball, enjoys an unusual position of  privilege because in October 2009 the Council agreed that only he could speak on matter relating to Dale Farm.Other Councillors must keep stum because there was a danger that somebody might in an unguarded moment say something that attracted the attention of the Equalities Commission.There was some murmurings in the Council chamber because two members had to deal with related matters in their particular wards.Inwhich case they were instructed to run the message through him.In this fashion Tony Ball became the new  TV personality and attracted,so he tells us,much hate mail.

Under his leadership the Council pursued a vigorous campaign of developement which involved the sale of huge parcels of land to retail giants Morrisons which involved the closure of the municipal baths in Pitsea in Olympic year.Other open areas where generations of children had played in safety were threatened by the Council's ambitions to excell in the cutthroat world of real estate.

At the same time,having acqured financial backing from Eric Pickles they went ahead with their plans to remove the Travellers.

At that time on their website they still featured an item which looking towards a time when the conflict was over they could charge the Travellers with the cost of their own eviction and in the event of non-payment seize the land in compensation.

After the eviction Tony Ball,still breathing fire said he was determined to pursue through civil courts those protestors found guilty of obstructing the Bailiffs and to this end hired a solicitor to do his bidding at £90 an hour.In the end the Judiciary decided that this was not in the public interest. On the first anniversary of the eviction the Sun noticed that the site which had been pulverized by Council operatives was still in a bad shape and spoke to the Great Leader who originally had said the uprooting of the land had been a temporary measure to stop Travellers coming back,now -in an unguarded moment perhaps (He had hired a top PR man from Westminster,Cormac Smith, in 2011) he said that the Council could not clear up the mess because the land did not belong to them.

In another interview he was given a leading question the like of which even John Wayne  would have appreciated:

"You have been 10 years on this case,Mr.Ball and spent millions how long do you think you can continue ?"

Our hero drew himself up to his full height:"As long as it takes ."he declared.  

Note the admission

The land that his contractors had ruined belonged to the residents,before,during and after the eviction.

They had destroyed somebody else's land.

They only had permission to remove dwellings that did not have planning permission.

They exceeded their powers and in the process did criminal damage which resulted in the creation of a real health hazard.

One of the contractors said that the bungs or mounds of spoil piled eight foot high were of a kind he had never encountered before.They seemed to be designed to make the site uninhabitable.

On film somewhere is shown a person who is legally entitled to stay having her caravan removed,the hardstanding cleared and the caravan put back where it was but now in an area less safe from the effects of contamination.

Mostly however the deeds done on the site were hidden from view and when the Labour MEP,Richard Hewitt visited the site he was forcibly removed by security men who dragged him unceremoniously away with his heels scraping the tarmac. Let that be a lesson to you,Sir.

THE 6 ACRES IN QUESTION

IN JUNE 2012 -the Billericay Gazette visited again the site formerly occupied by the Travellers and found it in a sorry condition which prompted the observation that it had been -as was well known-partly used as a scrapyard but that was not so well known was its other use as an unregulated landfill site and rubbish tip.
 http://www.thisistotalessex.co.uk/Toxic-waste-fears-linger-Dale-Farm/story-16366264-detail/story.html#axzz2bTsZ91PH
The independent video journalist Jason Parkinson filmed the former owner ,Ray Bocking, while he was visiting the site to talk to the residents and the media and he rounded on the the Council saying their version was untrue;he could recall that the land had been used for more than a decade for industrial purposes.Jason tells us that none of the National sources of news reported this evidence except the Guardian.They were not interested.Mr Bcking also told of the times when he was under contract to the Council to pick up abandoned vehicles and bring them back to Dale Farm.
In another interview he said that this piece of land had a poor reputation among locals who knew to what uses it had been put and thought of it as contaminated.Nobody would buy it off him-not even the Council until the Travellers came along.
He told another newspaper that he thought it was an ideal site for Travellers,it was shielded by trees and they had the skills to tidy it up and make it habitable.They deserved a place to live.

THE HIGH COURT

It is well known that the Council and the Travellers in Basildon  have a long history of challenging each other in the courts culminating in 2011 with a judication favouring the Council.It is beyond my scope to examine all these events but some statements were given publicity in the local media and became common knowledge=for example when a lawyer told the court they would be sending the wrong message to people throughout the country if they let the Travellers stay.

In the latter days Judges remarked on the impatience displayed by the Council almost as if they were anxious to punish their opponents in a vindictive fashion.One compared them to Shylock in the Mercant of Venice insisting upon his pound of flesh.

When judge Antony Edwards Stuart sought to make a final decision he postponed it for a while because he considered that the proposed measures might go further than the terms of the enforcement notice (according to the BBC) and he indicated that the families must be notified individually about the precise nature of the enforcement action taken against them  so that they can respond.Over all he was advocating a calm approach and that the Council should clear the site preferably plot by plot rather than going in with bulldozers and sweeping all before them.He gave permission to clear dwellings from 49 of the 54 sites and warned that certain structures had legal protection and ought not to be damaged.

This posed a problem for the Council and seemed to involve a lengthy process adding to their sense of impatience.

The nature of the Judge's remarks caused a stir among reporters and you may see this in the Brentwood Gazette 7/10/2011 when some commentators thought this would scupper the Council's plan to return the land to greenfield status.

On the day of the eviction,Kathleen McCarthy briefly appeared in Jason Parkinson's film saying the residents were shocked and alarmed at the dawn raid.She had been told that later that day the Bailiffs were going to arrive accompanied by police and begin the clearance of some plots -she had been witness to many evictions but never experienced anything like this dawn invasion- she was very frightened by it

One wonders what the Judge who ordered a calm and considered approach would make of it but it was not the Council or their contractors who had taken the initiative.It was the police.They may have felt that they are not tied down by instructions meant for the Bailiffs.

The families were not notified of the police invasion and the whole event was an insult to the Judiciary and an injustice to the families.Those walls and fences got knocked down anyhow.

PRODUCTION ORDERS

The invasion of dale farm began at 7am.There was very little light at first apart from a searchlight provided by a police helicopter and NUJ filmmaker Jason Parkinson could at first hardly record anything on the video.Where the searchlight was operating seemed extra bright and the other places seemed unusually dark in comparison.These were not ideal conditions for the police to gather evidence of a quality suitable to be of use in court.As a result when the initial struggles were over the police asked Jason to surrender his unpublished footage.
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Here begins a new episode:Jason refused and the police went to a judge who gave permission for the police to collect all the material he and other broadcasters had acquired.
At this the NUJ,BBC,ITN,Sky news etc got together and  took the case to a higher court.
On the day of the hearing there was a brief exchange between the journalists and ACPO on the bbc Today programme in which ACPO claimed that the police do not take such steps lightly but only after much consideration.However they would agree to the judgement of the higher court.
The presiding Judge said that the earlier judgement had been faulty in that such production orders  should only be granted when police produced sufficient evidence but the Essex boys had come with no evidence to the first hearing and what is more they had brought no evidence to the higher court -their cupboard was bare and they were just fishing for evidence which they ought to have obtained by their own methods.
A free press  ought not to be coerced by the servants of he State the judges pointed out.
According to the NUJ this was an historic victory because it shows the police trying to act beyond their powers  and the case will act as a landmark by which further disputes might be settled.It was a setback for the forces of law and order - not that all constabularies have learned the lesson:Jason was in dispute with the greater Manchester police and had to wait ten months before they recognized that he had the legal rights established by this landmark case from Dale Farm.

local and regional news

hello:Objective is to examine recent events in Essex from a local point of view.This involves local TV,newspapers and police sources -dismissing for the most part the National titles.
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FOCUS IS ON CRAYS HILL WHERE A FORCED EVICTION TOOK PLACE IN OCTOBER 2011 but the activities before and after that throw light upon the event demonstrating,in my opinion,collusion between politicians and the police and the press which was highlighted in the Leveson inquiry at a national level
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THE PRESS devoted most space to the two day storming of the site and neglected the full scale swamping of the environs of Basildon by 700 officers which showed another aspect of policing which seemed to have been designed to stop Travellers from settling anywhere in the Borough.
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More lines of enquiry are now suggested.What is the history of the assistance given by protestors who set up camp alongside the residents.What relationship did they have with the local papers.They introduced themselves publicly on April 13th 2011 and stimulated headlines such as "Human shields will confront the Bailiffs." On the 31st August the Brentwood Gazette paid a visit to the Camp Constant site and published a report with many fine pictures which showed that they were operating in an orderly fashion but were worried about what might happen when the eviction took place.
A few days later in a press conference the detective in charge of investigations painted a totally different picture - the site was awash with anarchists who were threatening to hijack the forthcoming eviction and were advocating violence (Southend on sea ECHO/5th Sept.2011).
The press and police clashed in June 2011
An editor reflects on the fact that the constabulary had just been backed by HMG to the tune of nine and a half million pounds and wondered what a police eviction might look like so he commissioned Alex Leys to produce a picture.This brought a furious response from the Chief Constable who on the website declared that the editor was out of order and was promoting alarm because the police do not conduct evictions they merely attend them as bystanders ready to maintain the Queen's peace.Evictions are civil matters.
(see Billericay Gazette.9/6/2011)
The Local Tory MP and the leader of  Basildon Council were also upset according to the Chief.
The police website also boasts an FAQs page about Dale Farm which again firmly confirms the doctrine of police neutrality in civil cases.
Something extraordinary must have ocurred which made the Essex Force
give up their longstanding and much cherished reputation for neutrality at the drop of a hat.
In March 2012 the police published an INFORMATION DOCUMENT which the media took little notice of other than gathering official statistics about offences committed and arrests made.Later they added a video (soon withdrawn) but there were lots of matters unexplained.What was the chain of command?  who gave the orders to use riot squad tactics? In the Strategy document they make two claims -one that they uphold the rights of people to make protests and yet the invasion was against protestors specifically.They also claim that the purpose of police intervention is to limit disorder.
In my book the policing method to reduce the chance of disorder is to go softly,softly at the start;then summon up more assistance if needed and finally,as a last resort,call upon the heavy squad.
At Dale Farm this order was reversed. Why? On the day of the eviction a spokesperson told Aljazeera that they used so much muscle because they had "intelligence"and the only clue we have about that we can glean from the press conference of September 2011 in which Ch.Supt.Tim Stokes presided over the revelations......which his men had concocted.......of a secret army of anarchists emerging from the Essex marshes to threaten the rule of law.This tale was embellished by stories of stockpiles of weapons and noxious substances said to be buried on site. (Echoes of Iraqi nukes) Was any trace of these uncovered in Baghdad.Was any trace discovered in Crays Hill? Did they even look for them?
Another point can be made in the terminology used since the London Summer  Riots were still fresh in people's mind and the blame had been put on anarchists by the popular press even though most offenders had "form"and were minor street troublemakers easily rounded up.Even so Anarchist was a likely label you could put on various undesirables - it had been used in Victorian and Edwardian literature.(ref.Conan Doyle ).Understod by the Plod.
There is another strand left to study:The role of the Council and its leader.....
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The entire Basildon Council campaign was centred upon the six acre site being a greenfield site but a strong case can be made that it was in industrial use for decades.The previous owner used part of it as a scrapyard and he claims the Council used the other section as an unregulated landfill site and Council tip.This can be confirmed by Billericay Gazette 14/6/2012 and by the independent NUJ video j0urnalist,Jason Parkinson,who interviewed the former owner whilst he was visiting the residents in 2011.

localised history

the