| |
|
From The Guardian:
quote:Anti-globalisation protesters are planning a huge demonstration to disrupt the first day of the Labour party conference.
Thousand of protestors intend to bring the seafront of Brighton to a halt with an "extravanganza" of street theatre and a march past the conference centre.
Organisers, who include the anti-capitalism group, Globalise Resistance, which took a trainload of protesters to Genoa last month, also say they intend to take part in "multiple actions" around Brighton throughout the day.
The demo is planned for the first Sunday of the conference on September 30, when by tradition hundreds of delegates get the chance to question the party leader, Tony Blair, in the conference hall.
Protesters will be meet by a wall of police and army reinforcements. Since the Brighton bomb of 1984, the conference hall and Grand Hotel have been surrounded by a ring of steel.
The SAS's sister service, the special boat service, patrols the waterfront during the week-long event, and police helicopters hover over the city centre permanently.
Passes for the event must be applied for months in advance, and all hotel reservations are checked by the secret services. Snipers are stationed on all rooftops.
The Globalise Resistance organiser, Guy Taylor, expects thousands of anti-globalisation protesters to converge on Brighton for the one-day protest event - aided by radical activists from the city itself. Mr Taylor said: "We want to give Blair a colourful inventive and spectacular welcome to the south coast.
"It will be an anti-capitalist extravaganza in Brighton to oppose the neo-liberalism of Tony Blair and the New Labour project at the start of their annual 'conference' at the end of September.
"I use the term 'conference' with hesitation, as it is admitted and widely accepted that any debate or decisions taken at the conference are totally ignored by the upper echelons of the Labour party."
Activists, including members of the Green party and Socialist Alliance members, are meeting in London this week to discuss tactics. They are also holding a "counter-conference" in London to discuss anti-capitalist ideas, with speakers George Monbiot and Tony Benn.
They will be joined in Brighton by various other lobby groups. The Countryside Alliance has already pledged to organise a pro-hunting rally, and petrol protesters are also expected to make an appearance.
Pensioners, who last year humiliated the leadership at the conference with a march and a vote in the hall to restore the link between pensions and earnings which Tony Blair lost, are not expected to be a force this year, since they recceived a rise in pensions in the Budget.
Snipers and the SAS's seaside branch notwithstanding, anyone else think this might be worth attending? |
|
|
