It all starts pretty early: 7am, meet at the Offmarket Social centre for 4 of us to go and visit pickets with some cake and a thermos of hot chocolate as anarchist propaganda!
We start with the picket at the BSIX college on the Clapton round about. Not many people there yet, we help them to put some banners up and offer some of our delicious cakes.
Some of us go round the back with few strikers to check the back entrance and the potential scabs. After that we’re informed that there might be a big banner drop at some point next to the town hall, so we start walking towards there. On the way, the picket at the Clapton Girls school had started. Pretty crowded. A lot of them appreciate very much the support (and the cake!). We keep strolling south, and to join the picket at the Department of Work and Pensions, joining the PCS strikers. The promised banner drop becomes a simple unfurling in front of the building. Banner is nice and big though!
Pickets are getting bigger and bigger, as well as the group walking from one to the other! We then arrive at the very big picket in front of the learning trust/hackney library/hackney museum. We meet comrades from the North London Solidarity Federation there and we have finally unfurled our black anarchist flag! Fashionably late as the good anarchists we are…
The picket is big and lively. Some chants and pictures. Few workers not from the striking unions decided not to cross the picket line and are well cheered by the crowd.
A group of about 30 decides to walk to the Hackney Community College where the Hackney march will leave to meet the main march of the day in London. The small march itself is pretty un-eventful and looks more like a bunch of friends drifting in the city, walking through very small estate streets. We pass by a school in Haggerston allegedly on strike but I personally failed to see any picket there. Ironically enough, the “march” that was just a loose group of people chatting to each other suddenly become a structured (big banner unfurled at the front and a compact group behind it) and lively (some chants) only 100 meters before arriving at the Hackney Community College, maybe to pretend we behaved like that all the way! Even more people are there, on strike or as supporters. And even more cakes!
That’s pretty much when I left, but I personally very much enjoyed the morning, there was a good energy, people were enthusiastic and seemed pleased to see some support. Anarchists in Hackney had a nice and meaningful presence. Let’s work to have some more of that!
Over to another member of HAG who attended the rest of the day (and uses past tense after me using present tense, but I’m sure you’ll get used to it!)
Once the picket outside Hackney Community College started to thin out a couple of HAG members went off to grab some breakfast and the remaining members jumped on a bus to Lincoln’s Inn Fields to join the march. After a while of being held up the march started to move off slowly and the group I was with met up with other HAG members at the Freedom books stall. We decided to cut through Covent Garden as we’d had a call from other HAG members that where on the Strand near Charring Cross. So there we were with our enormous black flag marching through a world famous commercial shopping landmark and I’d like to say all eyes were on us, you could cut the atmosphere with a knife and we made a real impact. But no, not one eyebrow was raised! That was of course until we ran into two Her Majesty’s (not so) finest old bill and had our first Section 60 encounter of the day, one of our group was searched for weapons, one had a ‘debate’ with one of the bill and after finding none, (but still calling for back up!) gave it up and let us on our way.
When we reached the Strand we saw the North London SolFed banner coming towards us so joined them while looking for other HAG members. Just outside Charring Cross station there was a sit down protest in progress in solidarity with some teenagers that had been arrested, to be honest there wasn’t much to be done there so after a few minutes of yelling “let them go, let them go” most people realised sod all was going to happen we started to move off and down Whitehall after meeting up those we were looking for.
When we reached Parliament Square I ran into some friends of mine which was nice but there was none of the scenes from last year in that very square to be seen so we moved along to near where the boring union speakers were safely indoors preaching to the already converted and hung around with some other Anarchists we met there, sat on the green outside Q.E II Hall and chatted with friends for a while then about 3pm what I thought we had been waiting for was about to start. There was a large group of people marching towards Parliament Sq so we joined. One of our members got the crowd going with a chant of “who’s streets” getting “our streets” as a reply back, but it turned out they weren’t as the march snaked through Parliament Sq and back up Whitehall. About halfway up we could see we were heading straight into a kettle and as nothing had happened that we thought was going to happen we figured a kettle just wasn’t worth the hassle and ducked down a side street making our way back to Trafalgar Sq. There we met South London SolFed and while standing there giving water to those making it if the kettle/kicking the police were handing out in Whitehall we met the biggest cock of an Inspector that has probably walked the streets of the west end. He and some of plod came along and confiscated our black flag under Section 60 claiming it could incite violence! Then hiding behind a row of his squad when I started demanding a receipt. Around 5pm I left thoroughly deflated.
Later that evening while reviewing the day and thinking back again now I think we really missed a trick then. We scored several ‘goals’ on M26 but J30 for me at least turned into a real let down so far as the march went, possibly it was a letdown after the great morning we had on the pickets and our mini march in Hackney or maybe it was because the old bill were really on top of obvious looking Anarchists and many I think were either nicked or bottled in when saw the reception they were getting in Lincoln’s Inn. But either way in football terminology it was a draw, first half to us, second half to them.
Can’t wait for the next match.
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