Tens of thousands of people on Saturday marched through central London to protest against the far right, weeks ahead of local elections and six months after Britain saw one of its largest far-right demonstrations.
Organized by hundreds of civic groups, including trade unions, anti-racism campaigners and Muslim representative bodies, Saturday’s Together Alliance event was billed as the biggest in UK history to counter right-wing extremism. A separate pro-Palestinian march had also converged with the main rally.
While organizers claimed 500,000 had turned out in total, the police gave a figure of about 50,000.
Photo: AFP
Protesters carrying placards with slogans such as “no to racism” and “you cannot divide us” marched from near Marble Arch to Whitehall near the British parliament for a planned rally featuring various speakers.
They included left-wing politicians such as Zack Polanski, leader of the increasingly popular Green Party, singer Billy Bragg and members of English reggae band UB40.
“Days like this are here to send a message... We are unstoppable,” Polanski told the event, which appeared to have attracted people of all ages from across Britain.
Student Emily Roth said there was “a global toxic climate and the UK is not fighting it.”
“The government is obsessed with immigration, but that’s not our biggest problem,” the 23-year-old said as she walked the route.
The London police, which had promised a “significant policing presence” to ensure various protests passed off safely and lawfully, later said officers had made 25 arrests.
It said 18 of those followed an alleged protest near the Together Alliance rally in support of Palestine Action, an activist group banned under anti-terror law.
The London force announced earlier this week it would resume such arrests after pausing them in the wake of the High Court last month upholding a challenge against the government ban.
The Together Alliance march followed a rally organized in September last year by far-right activist Tommy Robinson that drew up to 150,000 people, many of whom draped themselves in English and British flags. That event was marred on its fringes by what police called “unacceptable violence” which saw clashes with officers that left several of them seriously injured.
Robinson is planning a follow-up rally in mid-May.
Saturday’s march also came less than six weeks before voters head to the polls for elections to the Scottish parliament, the devolved assembly in Wales and local councils in London as well as some other parts of England.
Anti-immigration figurehead Nigel Farage’s hard-right Reform UK party, which has been leading in national polls for more than a year, is predicted to perform well across the contests.
Robert Gadwick, 48, who had traveled from Bath in western England for Saturday’s march, said he was “worried” about Reform’s rise.
“We’ve been there with Brexit — it’s all the same lies, and yet some people decide to believe it,” he said. “We need to speak the truth... Voting for Reform is a vote for more chaos and more uncertainty, and we certainly don’t need more chaos.”
Retiree Rose Batterfield, of central England, echoed the sentiment, saying the “current political climate” concerned her.
“I don’t really recognize Labour anymore,” she said of the country’s center-left ruling party which has been criticized for shifting to the right. “The idea that you can implement far-right ideas in order to stop the far right is nonsense.”
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