What do you think about the Dale Farm evictions?

I had largely not been following the case, so it was only today that I registered that the Travellers were being eviceted from a property that they legally owned, which seemed a bit much.

some quite grim pictures here: http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/gallery/2011/10/19/dale-farm-eviction/?via=rel

or indeed here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/gallery/2011/oct/19/dale-farm-evictions-in-pictures#/?picture=380646260&index=0

The whole thing seems fucked.

what are they being evicted for? planning violations?

Don't understand why riot police were brought in to do the "job" of the bailiffs. Seems like an egregious misuse of taxpayers' money.

they own the land?

The bailiffs don't, the Dale Farm residents own the land, it's a question of contravention of planning laws. Why the police should be called in to sort out what's a civil dispute, I don't know (nb. in case you hadn;t already guessed, I'm not a lawyer)

no, i was surprised to hear the residents owned the land, is all.

If eg council employees or bailiffs or whoever are under threat while carrying out their work maybe it's normal for police support? Not sure, really

yeah I'm sure some kind of risk assessment was done. The situation is extremely convoluted, but one would like to think that UK law and politics would be able to cope with this kind of thing. Wishful thinking maybe.

the police were there cos it was obvious the professional protester dickheads were up for a fight w/bailiffs, gonna relive the glory days of the M11 link road

What do you think about the Dale Farm evictions? [Started by The New Dirty Vicar in October 2011, last updated 17 seconds ago by Once Were Moderators (DG) on I Love Everything] 8 new answers
Lindsay Lohan: "Hot, Ready, and Legal!" [Started by Gear! (Gear!) in July 2004, last updated 36 seconds ago by surm on I Love Everything] 21 new answers

xp

Q. then becomes why the police are deemed appropriate method of forcing people out of their homes, regardless of wranglings over planning permissions, abilities of bailiffs, rights and wrongs of "professional protester dickheads" &c.

I think I'm wrong about the ownership of the land BTW- anyone know?

the police cleared the barricades for the bailiffs to do their bailiff things

the residents do own the land but never got permission to build on it

thanks. Interesting tension re. the professional protesters defending people building on green belt, something they'd otherwise be implacably anti.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-15303177

this is a sadder, less aggro version wherein the council seem to my untrained eye to be being cocks, but it doesn't feature Levellers fans so i doubt it'll make the national news

Where does this 'professional protestor'/'rentamob' thing come from anyway? Always gets trotted out as some sort of smear.

i think it's because they're generally awful ppl? I dunno

just goin on personal experience of the mob from shell-to-sea here tho, tbf

Don't know if it's what they're trying to imply, but I always get a whiff of 'protest funded by secret marxist millions' batshit-ism when people use those phrases.

nah, jobless unwashed funded by taxpayers is the usual context, surely?

Yeah, that would makes sense. Send in the army. Or bring back conscription. Or both!

conscription in order to boost the ranks of the army in order to send it everywhere

Keynesian militarism

thanks. Interesting tension re. the professional protesters defending people building on green belt, something they'd otherwise be implacably anti.

It's slightly more complicated than that. The green belt for instance was not exactly pristine when they bought it.
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/55482000/gif/_55482320_dale_farm_historical_624.gif
In other photos I've seen the scrapyard covered an even bigger area. And I'm not at all sure about what the council is going to do with the land once they have evicted everyone.

Meanwhile that chap who built a minicastle under a haystack and got a load of (positive) press because he was 'sticking it to the man' (or those fuddy duddy planning officers) has gone very quiet.

This is another photo claimed to be the scrapyard before the travellers bought it.
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6089/6108999094_c4809933f3.jpg