The Socialist 26 July 2017

Barts health strike: Low pay, no way!

Right wing attempts to use single market against Corbyn

Barts health strike: Low pay, no way!

Birmingham bin workers stand firm

Bron Afon workers strike against £3,000 pay cut

Court victory for PCS and all trade unions

Tesco's 10% pay increase accompanied by cuts and job losses

Mears workers escalate action to all-out strike

Workers' campaign underway to stop ward closure

Workplace news in brief

Building workers' struggle and the forces of international socialism

Abolish tuition fees and student debt!

Education cuts: Tories buckling under public pressure

BBC yawning pay gaps revealed

Homelessness and evictions soar under the Tories

Them & Us

Russia 1917: how art helped make the revolution

Young people...fight for a future, fight for socialist policies

Grenfell survivors tell Tories: "Step down and resign"

Vigil for Grenfell

Tenants' meeting reveals huge anger

Corbyn visits Southampton on marginal seat tour

Huddersfield A&E closure referred to Jeremy Hunt

From Militant to the Socialist Party - what you thought

Socialist sales at Salford station

Street cleaners support the Birmingham bin strike

'Freedom riders' lobby against violent policing

Council meeting abandoned after undercover policing protest

Education cuts forced back in Hackney

Southampton councillors faced with angry anti-cuts campaigners

Plans to bring A-levels back to Knowsley abandoned

PO Box 1398, Enfield EN1 9GT

020 8988 8777

[email protected]

Link to this page: https://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/957/25877

Search the site	Printable version

Home | The Socialist 26 July 2017 | Join the Socialist Party

Subscribe | Donate | Audio | PDF | ebook

Council meeting abandoned after undercover policing protest

A banner outside the meeting photo COPs campaign (Click to enlarge)

Carl Harper, Peterborough Socialist Party

The mayor of Peterborough postponed a council meeting due to protests in the public gallery against Tory councillor Andy Coles.

Coles, the former deputy county police and crime commissioner, resigned from the role following a Channel 4 investigation into the activities of undercover police officers in the 1990s who infiltrated a group of animal rights activists. The programme claimed he had a relationship with a young activist while working as an undercover officer.

The protests, organised by the Campaign Opposing Police Surveillance (COPS), began outside Peterborough Town Hall before carrying on inside. They are demanding that Coles resign as a councillor.

The mayor warned the protesters, before ordering the public gallery to be emptied. This led to a 30 minute stand-off, with police acting as mediators and passing on messages between senior councillors and the protesters.

The protesters stood firm, refusing to take down a banner from the gallery until Coles left the meeting. Faced with this exercising of democratic rights, the mayor cowardly postponed the meeting.

This has forced the Tory council leader to agree to meet representatives of the COPS group.

In this issue

What we think

Right wing attempts to use single market against Corbyn