Bristol allotment protest camp: possession is nine tenths of the law! – Second Possession Order granted

This after­noon Judge Deny­er QC ruled in favour of Bris­tol City Council‘s appli­ca­tion for an imme­di­ate Pos­ses­sion Order for land at Sta­ple­ton allot­ments cur­rent­ly occu­pied by Ris­ing

This after­noon Judge Deny­er QC ruled in favour of Bris­tol City Council‘s appli­ca­tion for an imme­di­ate Pos­ses­sion Order for land at Sta­ple­ton allot­ments cur­rent­ly occu­pied by Ris­ing Up.  Five mem­bers of the Ris­ing Up col­lec­tive stood in court to defend their right to tem­porar­i­ly be on land, with­out legal rep­re­sen­ta­tion,  due to a lack of legal aid.

The QC dis­missed the argu­ments of human rights, the neces­si­ty to pro­tect the land from destruc­tion and poten­tial­ly dan­ger­ous and unlaw­ful devel­op­ment.  The Ris­ing Up spokes­peo­ple cit­ed leg­is­la­tion, case law, pub­lic and polit­i­cal sup­port as well evi­dence of poten­tial breach­es in plan­ning and pro­ce­dure and the need for time to mount a legal case. These were all dis­missed in a dis­tinct demon­stra­tion of how prop­er­ty rights take prece­dent over human rights and the rights of nature.

Food secu­ri­ty, the rights to protest, the rights to home and fam­i­ly life and to sub­sist in a sus­tain­able way have once against come into direct con­flict with cap­i­tal­ism and short ter­mism. The coun­cil have failed to hear, acknowl­edge and explore the con­cerns of many, and have pri­ori­tised the eco­nom­ic gains of a few pri­vate com­pa­nies – under the guise of a “sus­tain­able” pub­lic trans­port sys­tem.

Ris­ing Up Spokesper­son Dan­ny Bal­la states: “Today was a clear indi­ca­tion that the sys­tem is bro­ken and reflects why we are cur­rent­ly fac­ing many seri­ous envi­ron­men­tal and social crises. In the court­room we wit­nessed a fail­ure of the judi­cial sys­tem to facil­i­tate the rights of peo­ple to chal­lenge con­tentious and poten­tial­ly unlaw­ful deci­sions.  Judge Deny­er even stat­ed how the avenues “to judi­cial­ly review local plan­ning author­i­ties “are a some­what illu­so­ry right” due to costs involved.

We are once again forced into a posi­tion of eth­i­cal­ly and moral­ly sound, yet unlaw­ful behav­iour by con­tin­u­ing to defend this land. This plan­ning and legal process has been a clear fab­ri­ca­tion of any real space for alter­na­tive and sus­tain­able think­ing.  Rid­ing roughshod over the wants of needs of local peo­ple, nature and the future gen­er­a­tions of Bris­tol.”

Today, jus­tice has been obscured by the law, but our deter­mi­na­tion to resist has risen.  Bris­tol is Ris­ing up!