The Occupy London camp at St Paul’s Cathedral has lost its legal fight to remain in place. Once the injunction was ordered, bailiffs and officers from the City of London Police (a separate police force directed by the Corporation of the City of London, whose council is elected by the companies in the financial district, with more votes going to larger companies) gave the camp five minutes to vacate.
Judging from the liveblog maintained by The Guardian, it sounds like the procedure was remarkably orderly, with the police and the camp both taking steps to minimize conflict with one another.
Catherine Brogan, a poet and high-profile member of the Occupy movement, said it made sense for the authorities to come on a Monday night.
“There was talk of prayer rings and of other people coming down to support us when this happened, but many of our supporters are elderly or obviously live in areas other than the centre of London, so this would have caught them by surprise,” she said.
“This has always been a peaceful process, and it has never looked like turning into anything other than that,” she added. “There’s definitely no Molotov cocktails stashed, it is very timid. I just hope the police respect that, and don’t react in the way I’ve seen them reacting at other times, at other protests.”
Activists from the camp say they will take their case to the European court of human rights, but judges denied them a stay of eviction, and it is understood that the City of London Corporation, which brought the case against the protest camp, has has now acted to remove up to 100 tents from the grounds of the cathedral.
Occupy London: police and bailiffs move in to evict St Paul’s protesters