Early Day Motion regarding the right to protest

Posted: 14th January 2025

Today John McDonnell MP has tabled an Early Day Motion in Parliament calling on the Metropolitan Police to drop the repressive restrictions imposed on our National Demonstration for Palestine this Saturday 18 January. We need as many people as possible to pressure their MPs to sign it – will you email yours today?

In a grave violation of our right to protest, the Metropolitan Police has confirmed its intention to prevent our planned protest at the BBC on Saturday 18 January by imposing an exclusion order banning Palestine solidarity protestors from entering the area surrounding the BBC throughout the day.  

Nearly 200 MPs, trade union and civil society leaders and groups including Amnesty International UK and Liberty, lawyers, journalists and prominent cultural figures have signed our statement demanding the police drop these repressive restrictions. They have now been joined by over 800 members of the Jewish community.  

Alongside this, 13 Holocaust survivors and survivor descendants have rejected the police’s excuse that the attempt to ban our protest is to prevent potential disruption to a nearby synagogue, which is not even on the route of the march. As the Metropolitan Police have been compelled to acknowledge, there has never been any threat to a synagogue arising from any of our marches.  

It is entirely unacceptable for the Metropolitan Police to use public order powers to shield the BBC from democratic scrutiny. Write to your MP today and demand they support our right to protest by signing EDM 633 and urging the police to drop their objections.

We will not be silenced. We are calling on all those who demand an end to Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people, and who believe in the democratic right to protest, to join us in London at 12noon on Saturday 18 January.  

We will assemble in Whitehall, which will allow us to form up in massive numbers, and we will march in an orderly fashion towards the BBC. We will continue to call on the Metropolitan Police to drop these repressive restrictions and accept our right to demonstrate at the BBC. We will march – write to your MP today and join us in London on Saturday.

In solidarity,
Celie
PSC Campaigns Officer