In the last few days, some news outlets have reported ‘riot police’ manning cordons in the area of Grenfell Tower:
However, neighbours of Grenfell Tower have told the SKWAWKBOX that armed police from the Metropolitan Police’s SCO-19 (formerly SO19) Specialist Firearms Command have been patrolling the estate.
The police in the image above, described as ‘riot police’ by a reporter, are wearing the dark blue caps typical of SCO19 armed officers. Although this is not absolutely definitive, the caps are certainly closely-associated with London’s armed police:
One young resident of the area alleges that an armed officer thrust the barrel of his weapon into his throat when the young man became frustrated at not being allowed to pass and go about his business.
The Metropolitan Police press office initially told the SKWAWKBOX that no armed police were in the area, but when the incident with the young man was related the spokesman asked for details of the time and location of the incident, rather than insisting there were no armed officers.
Residents are, in any event, adamant that armed police have been seen in significant numbers on the estate since the fire and say that this is making them feel regarded more like suspects or criminals than victims.
One man near the site of the fire, whom the SKWAWKBOX spoke to on Saturday, told this blog:
There were minute’s silences widely held for the victims of the terror attacks in Manchester and London. Apart from the Queen, there’s been none for us. Everything here on the ground has been done by volunteers and we still haven’t seen anyone from the government around to co-ordinate things, in spite of what Theresa May promised.
The local bobbies here have been brilliant and have treated everyone like human beings, but these armed officers don’t seem to know how to handle people at all.
The council’s been useless, we’ve been left to fend for ourselves and now we’ve got armed police patrolling us – after a fire, not a terrorist incident. The people here are the victims, but it doesn’t feel like we’re being treated that way. Why? What have we done? We didn’t start the fire.
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Reblogged this on michaelsnaith.
Reblogged this on SUBSTRATUMS.
If Theresa May is to win back support, she needs to provoke the situation and have violent incidents placed at the door of protestors and families. The MSM will step up and do the rest. This could be the next battle played out as people continue to search for answers.
https://twitter.com/RichSuchet/status/875825015400345600
Quite correct.
richard suchet giving us the murdoch variation of events: ‘Masked scumbags, not interested in protesting’.
Ever thought some of them could’ve been directly affected, suchet/murdoch? Think they’ve no right to be rather pissed off, even if they aren’t? It was a minor kerfuffle – NOT an all-out riot ffs.. To call them ‘scumbags’ sums up pretty much what suchet/murdoch thinks of those what refuse to conform to his agenda.
I’ll bet his cousin Rory – on Russia Today news – would’ve given us a more accurate version had he been there.
And it wouldn’t surprise me if there’ll be police plants stirring it up. We’ve already seen the underhand tactics used by them to infiltrate other protest groups, so it’s not out of the question.
No stoop too low for Murdoch-allied shitpeddlers, as demonstrated by Hillsborough, and Suchet blunders into autobiographic metaphor with “masked scumbags, not interested in protesting”.
Saw the live Sky coverage of protests in/outside KCBC building. Sky said protesters were going after “council staff” … looked like they were going after a councillor they recognised … dirbags never miss a trick to shape a pro-establishment narrative.
Tories revelled in smashing the print unions, now they’ve got Murdoch in every orifice. It’s a microcosm.
The Tory jackboot now visible in all its glory. Now we find that Maybot has used the fire to help her fiddle to delay the Queen’s Speech so she can cling onto power for two years. A few years ago constabularies across the UK were issued some 5,000 semi-automatic rifles. Now why was that?
Because austerity meant they couldn’t afford fully-automatic? 😛
The police being used as the ‘miitary wing of the tory party’ under Thatcher (with the mining communities) was just the beginning. We’re a step away from mass civil unrest and revolution. Bring it on!
Our precious freedom of speech legislation has gone down the sewer, under this fascist government. They have cancelled our membership of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, granted to us by Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the existing government, in 1948.
Under that umbrella, “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
We took this for a cast-iron right, never dreaming that it could be removed from us.
Our system of voting for governments, under the Constituency boundary system has been gerrymandered by successive Tory gov’ts, ensuring that the boundaries are set to include a majority of tory voters. We need a change of system that is a true representation of the political orientation of all voters. However, neither the tory or labour party supports the system of proportional representation.
Are you sure that our freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers has been removed from us?
That freedom of expression certainly seems to thrive here.
Perhaps you could reference our abrogation of the UDHR?
I should have been clearer. It’s the part of Universal Declaration of Human Rights with regard to our rights to safe housing. The rest of it remains in place but Cameron was working on it and you can bet that Maybot will continue with that.
It certainly has in the private rented sector. So why not in the social housing sector, Graham?
Again perhaps you could reference our abrogation of Article 25
Reblogged this on Earth Changing Extremities and commented:
This is looking more like martial law
Indeed.
May’s failure to get a bigger majority (We all know how that turned out) coupled with her apparent failure to form a coalition, and her cancelling of the 2018 queen’s speech leaves me thinking/fearing her current course of action is designed to lead to martial law that will give her the dictatorship she’d happily accept under a facade of “not really wanting it to happen.”
Democracy, MY ARSE. I really do believe the Grenfell crime could well be her Reichstag… The last refuge of the ersatz-fascist corporatocracy.
Reblogged this on elizapdushku's World.
As faithfully reported by our national papers, without criticism and misunderstood by people:
” There will be no Queen’s Speech next year to give MPs more time to deal with Brexit laws, the government says. ”
Just to remind people this is NOT the forthcoming Queens speech.
We do not currently have a government that can legitimately make such as statement. It is nothing more than a statement by the Tories of their intent.
In order to take power their must be a vote taken on this year queens speech, it is the vote of the house that decides whether the Tories can proceed in a working form, or something else happens.
If it were the forthcoming queens speech being cancelled and Mrs May tried to ‘take’ power (not keep because at the moment we have no elected government), that would be a coup. People should and would take to the streets.
What is being done here is the same old Tory line of, Brexit is so important, you must blindly trust us and not scrutinise us for two years. It is the same attitude and approach that caused the courts to intervene when she tried to elbow out any scrutiny by parliament, who after all are elected to represent us.
Despite, her approach being rounded on in the election, she and her cronies have learnt nothing, and are still trying to rule the roost.
They are not armed police they are public order trained officers. Compare the uniform to that of the officers shielding the firefighters and you’ll see they are the same flame retardant overalls. The baseball cap has been issued to these officers in the last few years as it can be folded and bunged into a pocket where as the normal flag cap can’t.
*flat not flag