5 protesters jail for M25 protest
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Good, hopefully act as a deterrent.
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I shouldnât really gloat at someone elseâs misfortune, but the thought of overprivileged and overly arrogant Tarquin and Jemima dropping the soap in the communal showers gives me a warm fuzzy feeling.
Definitely comes under the title of âeff about and find outâ.
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Itâs a non-violence conviction, after a week in âthe big houseâ theyâll be shunted off to some Cat D âopenâ prison I expect.
I vehemently disagree with their beliefs and actions. But I am concerned about the declining ability to protest and the increasing punishment for failing to fall in line with the State.
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4 and 5 years for non-violent protest?
Seems excessive to me too.
What would have happened to the truck drivers who blockaded fuel depots years ago?
What about strikers in the future?
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Calculating the points at which reasonable protest stray into the realms of breaching national security and even terrorism is the hard thing to assess. Some of these clowns are just anarchists with mental health issues who donât give a stuff for the knock-on effect of deliberately induced chaos.
If a handful of Russian spies dressed up as Extinction protesters and strategically blocked pinch-points at the Dartford Crossing, the M25/M1 junction and a few other places to gridlock the South East theyâd be done for terrorism. Iâm surprised this lot werenât done for treason.
Examples like the oil terminal blockades are clouded by infiltration by malign agencies who pose a deliberate threat to national security. Itâs a network of fine lines.
Yes, Iâve been having similar thoughts. Iâm opposed to JSOâs actions, p-issing off other people is not âraising awarenessâ in my book, and their main guy made things worse for himself with the contempt of court actions of his followers, but Iâm quite attached to my own personal freedoms and donât want to see those undermined by Draconian measures.
Got what they deserved, treat their court appearances like it was a circus. No judge will tolerate that.
So, if that is the case, charge and punish them for Contempt.
That is not what happened here.
Agree with their message or not, it is heavy sentences for peaceful protest.
So what about the personal freedoms of the thousands of people stopped going about their daily lives by the actions of these half dozen idiots.
We will probably never find out how many appointments were missed, events cancelled etc.
Judges go by sentence guidelines. P155 the Judge off and donât expect the sentence to be at the lower end of the guidelines.
Like I said, Iâm opposed to what theyâve been doing, my concern is for the knock on effects for the rest of us because the legal system is sanctioning significant sentences for non-violent protests. As Franglais pointed out, truck drivers involved in their own protests are now more likely to receive significant jail terms, if it was some of us getting a dose of porridge, TN and the various FB driver groups would be alight with rage.
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I think the sentencing is ridiculous, people get next to nothing for animal cruelty. Most definitely less for knife crime, less for stabbing someone. The punishment does not fit the offence.
i dont see how anyones civil liberties have been infringed. the lorry blockades were properly organized with the police notified and didnt impinge on anyone elses civil liberties. These jso crowd dont care about anyone else just think they have a god given right to do what they want
Thatâs just a total lack of objectivity: We have no right to âblockadeâ roads, so âplanningâ has no more validity than if someone burgled your house in a wall planned way. JSO twonks causing havoc on roads or HGV drivers doing it, makes no difference to someone just trying to go about their own business.
it wasnt a blockade it was an organised demonstration along a organised route
jso just turn up and cause mayhem
It was a rolling roadblock, and a pointless one, inconveniencing other members of the public wasnât going to do anything other that make Joe Public have an even worse attitude to HGV drivers than they already have, it certainly wasnât going to have an impact on fuel prices.
And if there was a worthwhile reason to have any kind of demonstration by HGV drivers it would be to do with pay and conditions, but you donât see that happening, do you?
an organised rolling roadblock that was well advertised. if people havent the intelligence to avoid a designated area or allow extra time if they have to pass though it then there is no helping them.
it did achieve its aim it brought petrol prices down from over a pound to around 80 pence at least in the area i was in. again if joe public dont like it then lets see how they like it when they cant get their carrots for their sunday roast or they have tripled in price. most people realise if they have something its because a lorry brought it and if they dont its because a lorry took it away.
i agree better conditions and wages are needed in some respects however it is a well known fact that in logistics you work longer hours than your standard 37.5 if you dont want to work 12 hour shifts save your money for the license and do somthing else
This is sheer arrogance on the part of the organisers. Not everyone will be aware in time to avoid this self-entitlement to anarchy. I remember shipping in from North Africa with hanging garments in an artic years ago, only to find myself embroiled in a rolling roadblock right up the length of the country that I had no intention of being involved in. Even worse, I was delivering to the industrial park just beyond the Ellsmere Port plant. Iâm a great believer in collective bargining, but how DARE they force me into industrial action without my consent!
EDIT to add: non-consensual collective bargaining is a vestige of the old '60s âloony leftâ. We have to turn our backs on such inanity.