Waltham Forest Council: Answers to FOI Request

Posted on 18 May 2012 by Caroline Day

Warning: the following communication from Waltham Forest Council contains circular arguments, contradictions and outright untruths. Not suitable for consumption by persons suffering from high blood pressure.

Freedom of Information Request: Leyton Marshes ODA Basketball

Thank you for your request for information received by the Council on 20th April 2012.  In your request, you asked the following questions which have been answered below as follows:

1. Please provide, in detail, the restoration plans to put the site back to its state before it was built on. Please include steps on how wildlife will be introduced back into the area. How will this area also be maintained to ensure its back to how it was after the building work has been taken down?

Answer: Condition 1 attached to the planning consent requires a “scheme of reinstatement works detailing the size, species, location, phasing and timing of replacement planting that shall be submitted to and approved by the local planning authority prior to its implementation, and thereafter fully implemented in accordance with the said details.” The Local Planning Authority has not yet received the scheme of reinstatement.

2. What other land in the area was considered for this building work, apart from Leyton Marshes?

Answer: This information is not held by the Council beyond that set out in the Report at sections 8.16 to 8.22. The Council understands you to have a copy of the Report; if not, it is available on the Council’s website.

3. Why hasn’t London Borough of Waltham Forest withdrawn planning permission when the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) broke the law by excavating 35cm deeper on Leyton Marsh than the planning conditions allow?

Answer: On 5th April 2012 an application with the following description was approved (ref:2012/0359):  Non-material amendment to planning permission 2011/1560 – Excavation of 2,100 of material (equivalent of a 30cm depth across the excavation area) across the suite to provide a stable sub-base, with an excavation depth ranging from 15cm -60cm.  

The Council makes no comment on the premise to this question.  

4. Please provide documentation showing that the Leyton Urban District Council Act 1904 “that the marsh would be kept as an open space” has been superseded.

 Answer: The Council assumes that this request seeks information as to repeal of the Act.  If this is not the case you are invited to clarify your request.  The Council holds no such documentation which is not otherwise publicly available.  The Council understands that (so far as relevant to the other requests) sections 138, 139, 142, 144, 145 and 150 of the Act remain in force.

5. RE: 2011/1560 Agenda item 41: “whilst there are grounds to withhold consent with regards to a number of these policies, the exceptional circumstance has been considered as a material consideration in a finely balanced decision.” What is the ‘exceptional circumstance’ that allowed planning permission of this site to go through?

Answer: The Report (from which this quote) is drawn sets out the factors and circumstances before the Planning Committee when it made its decision. (N.B. This is a grammatically nonsensical and circular answer)

6. How is the community benefiting from this?

Answer:  The factors, including community benefits, considered by the Committee in making its decision are set out in the report.(N.B. There are none).

7. Given the history of Leyton Marshes, particularly of it previously being used a rubble site after the Second World War, why wasn’t a thorough EIA inspection carried out on the area?

A: The Local Planning Authority received an application for an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) screening opinion on 26th October 2011, relating to development involving the construction of a temporary basketball training venue.  Based on the information submitted at the time it was decided that the development does not constitute EIA development. It was considered that issues regarding ecology and contaminated land could be dealt with at the planning application stage if necessary. 

8. What is the council’s response to asbestos being unearthed and an unexploded bomb being found on the land?

Answer: The Council takes this as being a request for details of the steps the Council has taken in response to the discovery of the asbestos and unexploded ordnance.  If this is not the case, you are invited to clarify the request.

Initial site testing, including the Ground Investigation Report by RSA Geotechnics Ltd (Jan 2012) had not indicated the presence of asbestos. A copy of this report is attached for your information.

In the sampling of two small soil stockpiles following deeper excavations, a total of 26 samples were taken. During this process numerous small fragments of asbestos cement sheet were noted. The stockpiles comprise predominantly granular soils with fragments of ash, clinker, rusted metal, brick, concrete and other inclusions.

13 samples were tested for, among other things, distributed asbestos fibres (to assess the feasibility of hand-picking of asbestos fragments to reduce the categorization of the material for disposal and re-use).

The result of the sampling and analysis is that the health risks to workers, engaged in working on and adjacent to the stockpiles, is negligible and that the risks to those off-site are too low as to be possible to calculate. The existing asbestos is expected to be managed according to the following broad process:

  Provisionally, to hand pick sufficient of the asbestos cement fragments and separately bag and dispose of it, such that the stockpile material becomes suitable for non-hazardous waste disposal or retention and re-use on site as appropriate. (N.B. No explanation of how the asbestos is identified).

  To tarpaulin sheet the stockpiles to be retained on site, in order to generally minimize any potential for neighbour nuisance through dust formation and wind-blown material arising. (N.B. Rubble piles were left without any covering for over 4 weeks).

  To dispose of some of the material off-site as appropriate. (N.B. Listen to Mark Sorrel on the recording of the meeting as he says that no material can be removed until tests on the soil have come back – work began on 1st March and results have still not been obtained on the contaminated soil on site).

  To instruct the project managers and site contractors to overcheck the works
method statement

  To re-use retained material, and to cover that material with topsoil and to
subsequently seed or turf that topsoil so that grass re-growth forms part of the
restoration works for the site. When the site is restored in accordance with the
Planning Permission, such that there is no visual change to the site, the site will be subject to final certification vis-à-vis the minor remediation discussed above.
In general, the marshes in this area remain relatively undisturbed so there will be a limited amount of exposure to the soil by users.

Unexploded ordnance has been found on development sites across London for many years and is an unfortunate fact of the city’s history. Procedures for such instances are well established and before work commenced the required surveys were undertaken and detected the presence of metal underground. As a result, a specialist consultant monitored the excavations and when the unexploded device was discovered, work on site was stopped and the device was disposed of in the prescribed manner under police supervision with no danger to local residents or users of the Marsh. (N.B. No marsh users or residents were evacuated when the workers were). A non-intrusive survey was undertaken prior to commencement of works, as is standard practice, and the report is attached for information.

9. What is the council’s response to the ODA breaking planning permission, and the law by digging further than they were permitted?

See the response to question 3 above. I trust that the above satisfies your enquiry.

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BAD ODA: Rotten Boroughs in Private Eye, May 15, 2012

Posted on 18 May 2012 by SLMAdmin

Thanks to Private Eye
 

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ODA Meeting: Why So Scared To Have Your Statements Be A Matter of Public Record?

Posted on 15 May 2012 by Caroline Day

FULL UNEDITED SOUND RECORDING OF THE MEETING

On Tuesday night there was a meeting of the ODA, LVRPA and local residents at a small nursery on Riverside Close, Hackney to discuss the ‘reinstatement works’ for the marsh.

To attend the meeting, residents were told they must submit their names, addresses and contact details to the ODA. However after most people had already done so, the ODA then said people could attend the session without doing so (they still tried to take peoples names on entry).

Shortly after the drop-in session began, Caroline tried to record the meeting with a sound recorder. She was told that she needed to give her name and could not record the meeting. However, residents and Save Leyton Marsh group put up a united front and demanded that anything that was said on an individual basis should be said to the whole group and be a matter of public record.

The ODA did not know how to respond. They took ten minutes to liaise privately and decide whether to be recorded. In the end, they came back into the meeting and said there would be a statements from the ODA spokespeople until 7.30pm and then the meeting would resume for individual discussions. The meeting unanimously refused saying everything that was said should be said publicly and with accountability so there should be an open public meeting for the whole session. Some of the ODA refused to give their names until Barry Buitekant and Ian Rathbone challenged this; they said they were councillors acting for the public and anyone acting in this capacity should provide their names.

The LVRPA refused to answer any questions after it was agreed the meeting could be recorded. Residents were absolutely outraged. What does this body have to hide?

There was a lengthy discussion with Mark Sorrell, who claimed that the group has harrassed him, evidencing the postings on Facebook which had been added by Mark Walsh who had later identified himself as a PC and had added a series of fake aliases to the site in order to get information.

Residents were not satisfied with the inadequate answers given to a series of questions related to both reinstatement and to the way the facility gained planning permission and was constructed.

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Beating the Bounds

Posted on 13 May 2012 by Caroline Day

[slideshow]

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Beating the Bounds 2012

Posted on 11 May 2012 by Charlie Charman

Beating the Bounds 2012
Walks around the Lea Valley Marshes

Sunday 13th May 2012

Once each year, sometimes on a legally designated or customary date, people still
walk around local areas of land to re-establish rights of common or mark significant
boundaries, such as of a Parish, Manor or an area of Common Land or public open
space. This often takes place during Rogationtide, in springtime, when prayers were
once offered asking for the fertility of the land. Willow sticks decorated with flowers
and ribbons are traditionally carried and important boundary markers hit with them.
Younger children are turned upside-down to have their heads bumped three times at
significant points ‘to imprint the location on their minds!’ – boys might also be hung
over bridges, and girls were “pricked” with pins. This year Rogation Sunday falls on
the 13th May and there are three Beating the Bounds walks to choose from!

Beating the Bounds of St. Saviour’s and St. Barnabas Parish in the Parish of Walthamstow. This is an Anglican procession setting off from St. Saviour’s Church in Markhouse Road, E17 at approximately 10.45am after Mass. It is a religious occasion and those participating might wish to attend Sunday Mass at 9.00am beforehand. The walk will end at approximately 3.45pm. Quite a long walk, not suitable for wheelchair users.

Beating the Bounds of Leyton Marshes in the Parish of Leyton.
This perambulation will follow the route of the Community Procession, revived about
17 years ago, around the former Lammas Lands of Leyton Marshes. Meet from 1.30pm at the Lee Valley Ice Centre car-park on Lea Bridge Road beside the bridge. Setting off at 2.00pm. About 4 miles, not suitable for wheelchair users, ending at the Hare & Hounds pub, Lea Bridge Road, approximately 4.30pm.

Beating the Bounds of Walthamstow Marshes.
This walk is organised by the New Lammas Lands Defence Committee and will be led by John Gilbert of the Walthamstow Historical Association. Meet from 1.30pm at the Lee Valley Ice Centre car-park on Lea Bridge Road. A 2½ mile walk suitable for all.

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Save Leyton Marsh Group: Our Response to the Olympic Delivery Authority

Posted on 10 May 2012 by Caroline Day

Our Response to ODA letter of 30th April (signed by Chief Executive Dennis Hone)  sent to local residents:

An Open Letter to the ODA

  • You wrote to residents to address concerns that have been “expressed about these works in recent weeks”. These concerns have been expressed from the very beginning; in fact since some residents and councillors first became aware of the plans back in December. Councillor Ian Rathbone raised 11 questions at that time to which he has only just received a reply. Why has it taken you so long to address fundamental questions relating to the development, especially as you were prepared to lodge hugely punitive injunctions against people before answering their basic questions about the development?
    Furthermore the multitude of issues of concern, including those raised by Cllr Rathbone, were spelled out in the 115 letters of objection to the ODA’s planning application, and of which the ODA will have been fully aware.
  • Why did you send this letter and a previous letter out to far more residents than the original ‘consultation’ letter which was sent to a mere 250 residents?
  • Your agreement with LOCOG was that you would have finished work on the development by 7th June and yet in your letter you say work is due to be “completed by early July”. Have you re-negiotated your agreement? What other aspects of your stated objectives can we expect to change?
  • In response to statements and actions by Save Leyton Marsh Group, you claimed repeatedly in the media that the site would be “restored to its original condition by 15th October”. We knew this would be impossible since Leyton Marsh is a habitat and took years to establish itself as such. However, you now insist “reinstatement works” will “begin to restore Leyton Marsh to its original condition”. So it appears you have stopped asserting Leyton Marsh can be restored to its original condition. Please provide us with details of these reinstatement works that should have been published as part of the planning conditions back in February.
  • You claim that the “vast majority of the land” remains open to the public. Is this based on the wholly inaccurate map included as part of your letter which labels Walthamstow Marshes as ‘playing fields’ and does not provide a to-scale depiction of the basketball facility? This map is frankly an insult to local people, many of whom live directly opposite the facility and others who walk the marsh everyday and know exactly the extent to which the land has been confiscated from them for your private use and desecrated.
  • You refer to “recent unlawful disruptive action” to stop work, yet the actions taken by local residents and their supporters were of a peaceful and lawful nature. It was only through the imposition of a costly injunction that you were able to criminalise previously lawful protest on Sandy Lane. Whilst claiming you have “no issue with peaceful and lawful protest”, all information about our campaign, that the judge gave permission to be attached to the fences, has been ripped down and bailiffs have been covering their identity to film residents, including local Green Party candidates that came to visit Leyton Marsh.
  • You state that you “regret” that you “had to involve the courts and police”. In fact, you never at any stage attempted an alternative approach. On not one occasion did your Authority attempt to engage our group in dialogue and when in an attempt at mediation, Waltham Forest police arranged for a group of us to meet and talk to you, you refused to enter into any dialogue with us. Your use of extremely costly injunctions has been at tax payers’ expense and has not reflected the democratic will of the people. It has been a blatant attempt to intimidate people into giving up peaceful protest in order for you to build an unnecessary and unpopular facility which will not benefit local people at all.
  • You declare that your concern has always been “the safety of the public, our staff and contractors”. We have seen very little evidence of this. The Ground Investigation Report done on behalf of the contractors in January stated that lead and potential asbestos were present in the ground; you have since acknowledged presence of the latter, yet none of your (non-unionised) workers were aware of such hazards when we spoke to them nor have ever worn the protective clothing recommended in the report. Piles of dangerous rubble have been sitting on site for weeks. If you had adhered to the planning conditions set out in the planning permission granted by Waltham Forest, there would only have been a “15cm skim of topsoil”and no such mounds of rubble would exist. Mark Sorrell also assured residents directly that there would only be this shallow skim of topsoil when he met with them, at their behest, back in January. Yet you have dug far far deeper than claimed in the planning application. Consent was given on the basis that no environmental impact assessment or full site survey was necessary due to the shallowness of the excavations. Yet the ground investigation report conducted before the Council meeting, as we have documented, stated the intention to go up to 50cm to lay concrete foundations on our marsh.
  • It is wholly dishonest to claim of the rubble stockpile that ‘the delay in removing material from site was due to the unlawful activities of protestors’.  It was excavated without planning approval weeks before protests started and should not have been there at all. When approval (an unlawful use of a Non-material Amendment) was granted on 5 April, work on site started again almost immediately. Yet the stockpile remains there over a month later, and as your letter admits, the statutory bodies have not yet approved any plan for its disposal.
  • Your assertions about the lack of alternative venues are simply a case of too little said too late. Many training venues for London 2012 do not meet the 30 min travel time ‘requirement’ of the IOC. Paralympic athletes have no need to be close to the Olympic Park since they are performing in Greenwich – as local residents we can assure you that this does not take 30mins or less to travel to. Why were the original sites outlined in the Bid documents rejected? Once again, you have had months and can only provide inadequate answers.
  • You say you will give details of the reinstatement plan that you are only now “finalising with the LVRPA” (this should have already been published as part of the planning conditions) as part of a ‘drop-in’ session at Riverside Close Nursery on 15th May from 6.30pm – 8.30pm. None of us in the group have ever been invited to a ‘drop-in session’ where you have to provide your name, address and contact details in advance (and are then sent the location, published here, in secret). We wonder why you think you need this information and what exactly you will intend to do with people’s private details.

Through our campaigning, we will continue to hold your dishonest, undemocratic and unelected quango responsible for its gross actions on Leyton Marsh.

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The Four People Who Voted to Ruin Leyton Marsh Once Again Demonstrate Disregard for Democracy

Posted on 9 May 2012 by Caroline Day

On Tuesday 8th May, Waltham Forest Planning Committee, who voted against a groundswell of public opinion to grant planning permission for the temporary basketball facility on Leyton Marsh, passed London and Quadrant’s unpopular plans for the former Walthamstow Dog Track.

This site of Walthamstow Stadium will now be turned into a high-density, architecturally- insensitive housing development which, with only 20% of social
housing, which is not even close to meeting the council’s own guidelines for developments to have 50% of social housing. Tensions ran high, with nearly 20 speakers eloquently putting their cases against the development, and angrily responding to the dismissive way in which the Labour councillors ignored the issues they raised and once again voted along party lines (4-3) to grant consent.

Members of Save Leyton Marsh who attended the meeting described it as “yet another insult to local democracy” and “another travesty of justice”. Member Claire Weiss, who has lived in the borough for many years described the scene at the meeting as “one of pure theatre” in which “”the script had been well rehearsed and the outcome predetermined” (to anyone who has attended any court cases relating to Leyton Marsh, this has a familiar ring).

Opposition to the London & Quadrant planning application is cross-party and has mass popular support. There were no reasoned responses, or even begrudging respect, from the four councillors to the read-out messages and/or quotations of clear opposition to the proposals from Stella Creasey MP, Iain Duncan Smith MP and the Mayor of London and two other main mayoral candidates.

Waltham Forest Council has set itself outside this groundswell of public, well-informed opinion. Instead, it wants to see five-storey tower blocks squeezed into the Stow site, uncharacteristic for the suburban area, lacking in facilities such as doctors surgeries, dentists, shops, and yet offering bizarre tokens that include the prospect of residents running around a re-designed mini-track in the place of the greyhounds. What an irony.

The Chair having been shamed (on this one procedural point only) to consider a deferment – on grounds that the report from English Heritage was incomplete due to last-minute alteration to the proposals – predictably the Gang of Four hands duly went up again to forestall this.

We can learn a lot from the long experience of Save Our Stow. Their determination and wide-ranging support was admirable.

In addition to the overriding factors of (a) ignoring the strength of local opinion, and (b) the planning applicants’ railroading methods tolerated by the Council officers and committee, a number of key issues common to both Save Our Stow and SLM arguments are emerging, namely:

  • loss of recreational amenity
  • loss of well-known and loved borough asset
  • incorrect interpretation as a purely local issue
  • harm to local community
  • damage to bio-diversity (the River Ching a tributary of the Lea runs across the Stow site and the original proposal to de-culvert it has been lost, thanks apparently to Environment Agency indifference)
  • environmental flooding hazard (the Stow is geographically on the same flood plain as Leyton Marsh).

Save Leyton Marsh have already filed our first judicial review of the decision to grant planning permission for the monstrosity on our marsh.

We hope that this unpopular decision will also be reviewed and look forward to working with other local groups to represent our community and hold the Gang of Four responsible for their poor decisions which are adversely affecting people in the area.

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Leyton Marsh: Spot the deliberate mistake

Posted on 7 May 2012 by Caroline Day

Millfields Park Blog Spot have an excellent front page blog on the insulting letter sent by the ODA to residents regarding Leyton Marsh.

The blog has many pointers for responding to the misleading information provided in the ODA letter sent to residents on 30th April.

Take a look at their page!

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Individuals now guilty of pre-crime: granting of first Olympic ASBO

Posted on 4 May 2012 by Caroline Day

Does the Olympics by definition constitute a collective good?

Even if it does, in pursuit of this collective good should the human rights of individuals be compromised or even suspended? It appears that the authorities believe so. The first ever Olympic ASBO was granted yesterday, severely restricting the freedom of speech and movement of Simon Moore, who has been a prominent member of the Save Leyton Marsh campaign.

At Westminster Court this first Olympic ASBO was issued in the form of an interim ASBO.

Previous to the hearing, Simon Moore believed he was already the subject of an interim ASBO; in fact up until the hearing yesterday he had only received the summons (one of the problems of not being able to access thousands of pounds of legal help is that it is difficult to decipher legalese and therefore even know what charges you face).

The police prosecution set out their skeleton case for the granting of the full ASBO at which a full hearing will follow on 14th June. The legal grounds to apply any ASBO are two stage; whether a person has acted in an ‘anti-social’ manner, in a manner likely to cause distress, harassment or alarm to other persons and secondly whether an ASBO is needed to ‘protect other persons in advance from the assailant’.

Simon has never harmed another person and his previous convictions are all for peaceful protest. Despite this, the prosecution chose by way of an example the case of a person known to have carried weapons who was likely to cause harm and injury to another person.

The test for an interim ASBO had no legal guidance excepting whether or not it was ‘just’.

Simon constructed his own self-defence founded, in somewhat Socratic style, through questioning those present about their concept of justice. He appealed to the inner sense of justice that each individual held, rather than what was defined in a law book, since “justice was sometimes something beyond words”.

Simon declared that he was not ashamed of the previous two convictions which would be explicitly considered in the test for the granting of the ASBO. These convictions, he stated, were obtained whilst doing something that the law deemed criminal. On 18th November 2011, Simon took part in a protest ‘in a prohibited area’; Simon argued that no human being should have to receive prior permission to demonstrate as this in itself is a right. Therefore he was willing to break what he viewed as a unjust law.

He made a passionate defence of his actions on Leyton Marsh (where the prosecution falsely claimed that he did not have the right to be), declaring that “the organisations of the state were not engaged in doing what was right and just” and that it was “the moral duty of human beings to act for what was right”. He pointed out that the ASBO criminalises protest and the freedom of movement and that for the maintenance of a democratic society “we need individuals to take responsibility and individual action. In the delivery of the Olympics in east London, the needs and the rights of the community have been ignored and even worse trampled upon.”

As the basis for the imposition of an ASBO is harm and potential future harm to the public, Simon asked the Magistrates whether they believed he would endanger the public. As a peaceful protestor he had been engaged in attempts to protect the rights of others and had set out never to harm anyone in any way.

Furthermore, Simon said that he had no intention of disrupting the Jubilee or Olympics since his involvement with Save Leyton Marsh was due to the nature of the ‘development’ of the marsh not that it was an Olympic training venue. However, even if he was intending to disrupt the Olympics, the ASBO would still constitute that he had committed a ‘pre-crime’; an idea contrary to democracy.

He summed up by asking: “What is justice? That is the question at the root of this issue. In the legal dictionary, as was pointed out at the beginning of proceedings, there is no definition since it is a word that defies a simple answer”

The Magistrates took very little time to consider this profound question. In somewhat circular fashion, the chief magistrate declared that what was just was what was best for the collective good and this collective good was defined solely by what was legal.

Despite the consideration made of Simon’s sincere declaration that he’d no intention of harming anyone, the interim ASBO was imposed on the basis that his past convictions have caused ‘distress’ and ‘alarm’ and could therefore do so in future (cries from the public gallery pointed out that he hadn’t caused either to our community). These concepts of distress and alarm were of course never defined.

The Magistrates concluded the hearing by warning Simon that any breach of an interim ASBO would be met with ‘the full force of the law’. This means that if Simon goes within 100 yards of an Olympic/ Paralympic venue/ training venue or athletes dwelling, he will be arrested. If he enters land without the prior consent of the owner carrying sleeping equipment or a tent, he can be arrested and imprisoned.

For simply visiting Leyton Marsh, his home for nearly six weeks, Simon could be arrested and imprisoned for up to five years.

So I leave you with a variation on the question Simon put: Is this justice?

And this supplementary question: In the face of criminalisation of peaceful behaviour previously legal and enacted in order to defend our rights and environment, how do we now uphold our own sense of justice?

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Imprisoned for telling the truth?

Posted on 1 May 2012 by Caroline Day

On Thursday 26th April Mike Wells, a citizen journalist who writes for the Games Monitor website, was filming unsafe working practices on Leyton Marsh at the chaotically managed Olympic construction site.

As a result of his attempt to film and draw attention to the unsafe practices of an excavator working close to pedestrians on Sandy Lane (the pathway running adjacent to Leyton Marsh), Mike was assaulted first by the driver who did not want the activities filmed and  was then brutally restrained by a number of bailiffs resulting in injuries to his ribs and forehead.

Several Shergroup employees dragged him 200m to Lea Valley Ice Centre car park under duress. Several shocked members of the public tried unsuccessfully to intervene and prevent further injury to Mike who had a gash on his forehead and was clearly in pain.

His assailants refused to show ID or explain their actions but appeared very agitated and were ordering people to keep away. One of them was recording the scene and bystanders on video.

Police arrived and immediately arrested Mike, who was driven away in handcuffs after being treated for some time in an ambulance.

It was very difficult to get information about where Mike was being held. Eventually we discovered that he was at Stoke Newington Police station, from where he was transferred to Leyton Custody Centre (a facility specially built for the Olympics).

There was an emergency Saturday court hearing at Bow Magistrate Court on Saturday, and this is where Mike’s case becomes even more troubling. Despite being assaulted and injured, the CPS requested that Mike be denied bail. They claimed that the members of the public that witnessed the incident were protestors, taking part in a ‘highly organised event’ in which protestors were menacing security staff by taking images of them. They claimed that  members of the public were ‘professional’ and had set out to intimidate staff and security. Mike is a professional. Mike, like all of us, should have the right to document the destruction, contamination and unsafe working practices on our marsh without being accused of criminal activity.

It was claimed that Mike ‘jumped into the excavator’ (a completely unfounded accusation) and in the next breath that he ‘published events about the Olympics’ as if Mike were involved in propagating incitement to violent protest. Mike is completely dedicated to covering the truth about the Olympics and its effect on communities; he has never incited or carried out any violent protest on Leyton Marsh and in fact has been the victim of violence from the bailiffs there. Despite what Mike has suffered in pursuit of covering the truth, he was denied bail on the basis he was of ‘no fixed abode’. Mike lives on the Lea in a narrowboat. This is exploiting the strict use of the term in a disingenuous way to justify denying bail.

What is even more shocking is that the Magistrate mistakenly claimed that Mike should not have been on Sandy Lane as this is an area ‘covered by the injunction’. The injunction prohibits blocking construction vehicles and staff; it does not prohibit walking or filming on Sandy Lane, until recently a tranquil public footpath that the ODA claims is open to full public access. On the completely erroneous basis that Mike had broken the injunction, Mike was remanded in custody in Thameside prison for seven days.

He was allowed very little access to the outside world and visits from his friends were denied.

What further punishment will Mike face for speaking the truth?

What threats may we face for speaking the truth about Mike? That remains to be seen. However, for entirely peaceful actions people trying to save our marsh have faced litigation threats, two High Court Injunctions, prison sentences, an eviction, threat of a further possession order and one individual has been slapped with an ASBO which could result in a 5 year prison sentence. The signs are not good.

UPDATE: Mike Wells was given conditional bail today at Bow Magistrates Court. Like Connor Murray’s bail and Simon’s ASBO, this prohibits Mike from going within 100m of the Olympic Park/ athletes village/ any Olympic or Paralympic training venue which effectively makes his job reporting on the Olympics for Games Monitor impossible.

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