The climate change alarmist activist group Insulate Britain has once again blocked a major motorway outside of London on Wednesday, despite the government obtaining a High Court injunction meant to stop the disruptive and dangerous protests.
The Kent Police Force arrested 11 members of the radical Insulate Britain collective on suspicion of obstructing the highway, conspiracy to commit public nuisance, and criminal damage, after eco-loon activists glued themselves and blocked the Swanley Interchange on the M25 motorway at around half past seven in the morning.
The police finally freed up traffic at around 8:50 am but warned that delays would continue.
The protest is the seventh such action from the group, which brands itself as more strident than Extinction Rebellion (XR).
The government’s National Highways agency was granted injunctions last week stating that two year prison sentences could be handed out to activists blocking the M25 and A20 motorways, however, this has so far failed to act as a deterrent to Insulate Britain.
On Monday, 53 people were arrested for obstructing the M25 outside of Heathrow airport, however they were released without any prospect of facing prison time as the offence in of itself can only result in a fine. The activist group was able to sidestep the injunction because none of the 53 members were personally named in the order, thereby allowing them to skate free, The Times reported.
A spokesman for Insulate Britain said: “We are going nowhere. You can raid our savings. You can confiscate our property. You can deny us our liberty and put us behind bars.
“But shooting the messenger can never destroy the message that this country is going to hell unless you take emergency action to stop putting carbon into the air.”
Following the latest protest on Wednesday morning, Brexit leader Nigel Farage said that “there is no point arresting these people unless you are going to charge them as well.”
The chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales, John Apter warned that there is likely little that police can actually do to prevent motorway disruptions from the group, saying: “What more powers could you have? We’re using injunctions, they’re not afraid of breaching injunctions, that’s got a power of arrest, we can heavily fine them. We can’t just indefinitely lock people away so they can’t go onto the motorway.”
Apter said that as the UK is not a “police state” in which the protesters could be imprisoned indefinitely, more police powers would not solve the situation.
“The problem is you’re dealing with people who don’t care about the consequences and they have a passion about a cause, which I understand,” he said.
“The protesters have made their point and they do need to accept that they’ve lost the public’s support, they’ve lost the public’s sympathy and they’re also putting my colleagues, themselves and the public in danger and surely for most right-minded people, that’s enough to say, ‘We’ve made our point, we need to stop.’ Sadly, I don’t think they will.”
A Home Office source defended the use of injunctions, telling The Times that while it has not been effectively implemented as of yet, it has given the police the confidence to break up the disruptions quicker.
“It’s working, they’re moving them really quickly… Whether it’s the injunction or not, it’s given the police the confidence to be harder on them,” the source said.
On top of the disruption caused to normal people’s lives, the actions taken by Insulate Britain have already come with dire consequences. A seventy-four-year-old woman reportedly suffered serious injury after being stuck in traffic caused by Insulate Britain on her way to hospital after suffering a stroke.
The woman’s son, who was with her in the car at the time, said: “When we got to the hospital, the doctors had said if we were to have got to them within 90 minutes, her recovery would have been minimised. Because she had been left to endure a full-on stroke for six hours, it is severe. She has got complete paralysis now down her left side. She can’t speak.”
Follow Kurt Zindulka on Twitter here @KurtZindulka
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