Let’s have an end to kettling

Published: 2 December, 2010

• THIS kettling method of police control really must stop. 

It was begun by Margaret Thatcher in a demonstration in Oxford Circus when American tourists, who had nothing to do with the demonstration, were detained much to their distress. It was the continued policy by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown who have had absolutely no respect for international law. In two recent examples of kettling, violence was used by the police against the public who have a democratic right to protest.

In one case we were present at a demonstra­tion against the Israeli Embassy about the bombing of Gaza. We saw many frightened young Muslim women trying to escape.

David Cameron and Nick Clegg have allowed police to use the same tactics over a demonstration by young schoolchildren and students over tuition fees at university. The children have been kettled tonight on a dark freezing day in central London. They are frightened and cold. As far as we are concerned this is a perfectly legitimate protest against astronomic fees for university, which we and the politicians involved enjoyed free in our youth. Now we have a cruel new system of charging for university and plunging young people into deep debt so that they cannot afford a  house or marriage until middle age.

Quite what Cameron and Clegg now think will go on in the minds of these young people who have been subject to police kettling, we have no idea.  

Everyone should have a right to walk away from a demonstration if they so wish.

Nicholas and Sara Wood South Hill Park Gardens, NW3