Press Releases & Updates 2005

Protesters sub outside the Scottish Parliament

At 10 a.m. on Thursday morning the submarine approached the Parliament building and, as it crossed the Canongate, the peace activists on the inside, from Trident Ploughshares and the Theatre of War group, locked on to each other, using tubing and climbing clips. The 25 foot model straddled the busy thoroughfare, allowing only emergency vehicles and other essential traffic to pass.

The 15 people inside came from far and wide across the UK and included Trident Ploughshares pledger Rosie Kane, who is also an MSP. As soon as the news reached the inside of the building MSPs and researchers from three parties came out to give the campaigners their support, making impromptu speeches and chatting with the submariners at the portholes. MSP Carolyn Leckie was expelled from the debating chamber after refusing to give up a placard which explained that Rosie Kane was absent because she had discovered weapons of mass destruction. A parliamentary motion of support for the protesters was tabled.

Throughout the day activists on the outside of the model kept those inside informed of developments and handed in coffee, chips and pizza, as well as shortbread from inside the Parliament. The number of supporters gathered round the sub grew as the day went on and the news spread

For nearly eleven hours the police were content to take a low profile and indeed told the activists that they were not causing an obstruction, although they indicated that if the sub stayed in place it would become a problem. After a final warning at 9 p.m. the police moved the supporters away from the model, with the exception of two activists acting as legal observers. The police then began the task of disentangling the activists from the framework of the model. Due to equipment failure - the batteries ran out on their cutting machines - and an obvious lack of experience, it took them a total of three and a quarter hours to remove very simple lock-ons.

The first activist to be cut out was Brian Quail from Glasgow who suffered severe pain as his wrists were cruelly clamped behind his back by so-called quick cuffs. Following angry protests the officers moderated their use of the cuffs on the other nine who were arrested. There was also surprise and anger as police called a fire brigade unit to help with the cutting-out task. After Rosie Kane loudly and insistently pointed out to the firemen that they were breaching their own rules by helping police in an operation which did not involve risk to human life, they desisted, but not before one fireman had attempted to cut crudely through a lock-on tube with a hacksaw, at huge risk to the arm of one of those locked on.

The activists were taken to St Leonards police station where they were charged with obstructing the traffic. Rosie Kane and Emma Bateman, though they were the last pair arrested, were released at 7 a.m. It was 10 a.m. before the next pair, Angie Zelter and Adam Conway were let out, and the release of the others, Jane Tallents, Jane Smith, Sarah Whiteside, Brain Quail, Peter Lux and Janet Fenton was done in stages that ended at 12.30 p.m. The campaigners, and most notably Rosie herself, were incensed that they police had shown still more political bias by singling her out for early release so as to avoid media attention.

A spokesperson for the group said:

It was a very special moment when the police took the Trident submarine apart bit by bit. This was what we hoped would happen, that they would symbolically achieve what people all over the world are crying out for, the honest and open disarmament of Britain’s hideous arsenal of death.

The opposition to Britain’s nuclear weapons is particularly strong in Scotland and a Scottish Parliament with the courage to take a stand against Trident could make a real contribution to global nuclear disarmament. Specifically it can apply pressure to the Westminster Executive to live up to its commitments under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and play a positive role at the Review Conference of that Treaty in May this year.

The NPT is not only about stopping new countries from getting nuclear weapons, it is also about the nuclear weapon states getting rid of theirs. At the moment Britain is completely refusing to comply with the Treaty.

The model submarine previously blockaded Downing Street for 5 hours on 11th October last year.

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