Main article image: ‘Protester removal technicians’ prepare to forcibly evict the HS2 camp (image: Guy Smallman)
Before dawn on 27 January 2021 Euston Square Gardens was stormed by a gang of angry bailiffs. The park had been occupied by a group of peaceful protesters aiming to protect 200-year-old trees on one of London’s most polluted roads from being knocked down to build a temporary taxi rank so Euston Station could be extended to accommodate the High Speed 2 (HS2) rail link: a massive loss of precious habitat and heritage for no permanent gain. TREVOR RHYS reports.
At least two private companies are currently conducting evictions for HS2: the National Eviction Team (NET), which claims to deploy ‘protestor and traveller removal experts’ and the Eviction Response Team (ERT), whose ‘professionally qualified teams … use a variety of techniques in order to manage and remove protestors respectfully’. The 27 January eviction was executed by NET with no court order and no regard for the health and safety of activists, but with the full support of the Metropolitan Police. One of the activists evicted described how the bailiffs ‘grabbed me by the hair to pull me outside. They then proceeded to drag me through the mud and out of my home of the previous four months.’
The Euston camp
The Stop HS2 camp at Euston was set up in August 2020. It was the latest in a series of protest camps created to oppose the construction of HS2 by means of direct action. HS2 is on track to be the most environmentally destructive construction project of the modern era, catastrophically damaging ancient woodlands from London to Birmingham, with plans of extending to Scotland.
The camp integrated into the park at Euston very well. The kitchen tent acted as a drop-in centre where anyone could stop by for a hot drink during the day. Spare food was shared out. At night people with nowhere to go could stay in a spare tent. The camp, as well as being a protest site, became a safe sanctuary for quite a few people on the streets. They helped with the day to day running of things. The high number of passers-by gave the camp a lot of attention. Not all of it wanted; many had a genuine interest, but a significant number seemed to be either secret police or working for HS2. The ones I met were almost comical. They approached with a jovial swagger, very clean-cut appearances, nice shoes, and pristine North Face jackets. They would casually discuss protests without saying anything solid on the subject. Rather than asking about HS2 they’d enquire about how many people were in the camp, defences, etc. When straight answers weren’t forthcoming they’d state that they weren’t police officers and swap to asking about drugs on camp – as they used to be ravers back in the day!
Protester removal technicians at Highbury (Photo: Guy Smallman)
In the run-up to the day of the eviction, activists prepared their resistance. They had built tree houses and a tower made of pallets, and had dug over 100 metres of tunnel under the park. The ground crew slowed the NET down enough to allow activists to mobilise towards their defensive positions. However, this didn’t stop over-zealous bailiffs from grabbing them out of the trees as they were climbing.
Tree camps
FRFI spoke to Thor, who had set up camp in a tree:
‘At first the bailiffs were quite friendly, but I could see through it; they obviously do that because they want everyone to get out of the tree without any sort of resistance. They were very friendly to the people who got in the cherry picker because they were told if they got in without a fight they wouldn’t get arrested. The bailiffs loved those guys; they were very friendly to them. They were alright with us when they started, but M and I were in a lock on and they spent an hour or so cutting us out. And it was getting dark by this point, so they said “Look, you can come down with us now, you’ve done your bit you’ve slowed us down, but you should really just come down with us now, because then you won’t get arrested. And you know it’s going to be cold tonight. It’s going to rain a lot. We don’t want to put you in that position. It wouldn’t be very nice for you”. So I said, “Fair enough, but I think I’m actually going to stay here”.
‘And then they suddenly started pulling all of our stuff away. They pulled away my sleeping bag from underneath me. They took away our food. They took away our water and then essentially left us on this platform with nothing. They had previously cut our safety line so they set up a new one. They took everything off us and gave us a very thin foil blanket which essentially did nothing. They left at about five o’clock and at about six o’clock it started raining and it didn’t stop until six in the morning. When they came back the next day and started cutting us out, we’d been in the heavy rain for 12 hours, which was pretty unbearable. I think it took about an hour for them to cut the rest of our arms out. So we came down and we got arrested under the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act, for “obstructing a workman with his tools”. The case is currently under investigation. They didn’t try any Covid nonsense with us, but they did with other people in the tree opposite.’
Tunnels
Since Wednesday 27 January a group of activists have been in the tunnels under the park. Tunnelling is a slow and laborious process, first digging five metres down, then tunnelling out slowly using small tools to chip away at the rock and dirt in a tiny confined space, and shoring up the tunnel with wood as you go along. The idea of tunnelling as an activist strategy is that under Health and Safety legislation no heavy machinery should be used within 100m of a tunnel that is occupied because of the high risk of collapse due to the vibrations. However at Euston, Health and Safety protocol has not been followed. Cherry pickers were immediately driven into the park, and once activists were removed from trees they were immediately felled. This reckless activity resulted in part of the tunnel networks collapsing. Activists witnessed NET pumping water into the tunnels; on Stop HS2’s Instagram there is video footage of bailiffs at the entrance of the tunnel trying to kick down the pallets that were used to shore up the tunnel walls. Bailiffs made it into one tunnel where an activist was locked on, and spent nearly 24 hours trying to cut him out, only for him to escape back into the tunnel network. Those in the tunnels have been denied food and water but at time of writing, mid-February 2021, they are holding strong below the park.
HS2 – the high speed railway
HS2 phase one is planned to be a new high-speed rail link which will shave a whole 20 minutes off the current time it takes to travel from London to Birmingham! Full plans for phase two will link Birmingham to cities in northern England and eventually Scotland. The journey from Birmingham to London can already be done in a shorter time than it takes to travel from one side of London to the other, an hour and 31 minutes. All this at an estimated cost to each taxpayer of £4k, with its projected users typically earning £60k per year, (median annual UK income according to ONS is £30,100). It is projected that this will lead to higher rents in Birmingham, intensified gentrification, and the pushing of people on low income out of the city centre; 888 homes and 985 buildings are to be demolished. Many residents and businesses have already been evicted without compensation, and required to sign non-disclosure agreements in order to be given any chance of remuneration.
Ecocide and state repression in the city
Estimated to cost over £230bn, according to independent experts, the HS2 project has been ‘green washed’ as the most sustainable high speed rail link ever built. Yet HS2 acknowledges that it will take 120 years to become carbon neutral assuming a high level of usage. HS2 claims that it will only marginally affect 62 ancient woodlands, as it will leave 85% of them intact and only 0.39 square km of ancient woodland between London and Crewe will be lost. However, the Woodlands Trust argues it will adversely affect 34 ancient woodlands. And once these unique ecosystems are damaged or lost no amount of tree planting can ever restore them; they will be lost forever. A report by the Wildlife Trust in January 2020 states that HS2 will have an impact on 700 local wildlife sites, 33 sites of special scientific interest and five wildlife refuges of international importance. HS2 will be catastrophic for what remains of biodiversity in the English countryside.
Protest camps and policing
Since 2017 Thames Valley Police has mainly been dealing with protesters as most camps have been in their jurisdiction, including Harvil Road, Wendover and Denham camps amongst the longest standing ones. The Thames Valley force uses its special organised crime unit ‘Stronghold’, to intimidate protesters on remote country lanes. I witnessed this myself while travelling with Thor near Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire on 20 November 2020. Our minibus was stopped by the police and we were all bundled off the van. Thor was dived on, beaten and then arrested for obstructing the highway. ‘They arrested me for wilful obstruction of a highway, even though I was barely in the road’, he says. ‘And the only reason I was ‘obstructing’ the highway was because three of them were laid on top of me!’
A video of this arrest can be seen on the Metro website. Two officers can be seen kneeling on Thor who is face down, while another punches him in the back.
Previously Thor has sustained broken fingers and significant bruising on his back as a result of being pushed against a razor wire fence by police. In late 2020, a group of activists who were recognised by the NET in a car park were set upon, had their car keys thrown away and were badly beaten, one sustaining a broken jaw. Female activists report it is commonplace for bailiffs and police to sexually assault them during arrests. Thames Valley Police also seems to have a lot of off road police cars and pick-up trucks, which many protesters believe are funded through ‘donations’ to the force from HS2. In September 2020 a Freedom of Information request to Thames Valley Police, enquiring about service agreements with HS2 Ltd was rejected on the grounds that retrieving the data would ‘exceed the appropriate 18 hour time and £450 cost limit.’
The Stop HS2 campaign is asking supporters to complain to HS2 and to report the NET, HS2, and the Metropolitan Police to the Health and Safety Executive, for lack of health and safety assessments in regard to evictions, and for harming and endangering activists who are exercising their democratic right to protest. Contact details can be found at:
www.hse.gov.uk/contact/concerns.htm
www.gov.uk/government/organisations/high-speed-two-limited
For more information about the campaign, go to www.hs2rebellion.earth/why-stop-hs2/
or follow @HS2rebellion on Instagram
