Extinction Rebellion holds a mass protest in central London

By Annabel Sinclair

Londoners brace themselves for further disruption this week as Extinction Rebellion plan protests calling for an end to the fossil fuel economy.

The environmental activist group, which encourages its supporters to cause disruption through non-violent civil disobedience, has scheduled protests in the heart of London every day until this coming Sunday [subs: 17 April].

It has told its allies to book the week off work and meet in Hyde Park every morning before marching into central London and creating “the most roadblocks we ever have.”

However, the Metropolitan Police warned yesterday that it is “ready to consider using police powers should the protests result in serious disruption or involve anyone committing criminal offences.”

Activist Tom Hetherington, 71, from Lambeth, south London, will be attending the protests this week as he is concerned about future life on Earth. “My 28-year-old son came to me and said that he wasn’t going to have children as he didn’t think there was much of a future for them,” he said. “Fossil fuels are not only stealing our global future, but it’s stealing my future.”

The planned protests follow last Sunday’s [subs: April 10] mass sit-down on Lambeth and Vauxhall bridges when 38 arrests were made, and the police had to physically remove the last of the activists.

Members of the group sat in the middle of the road and waved multi-coloured flags reading ‘I am here because Boris won’t act’ and ‘Life on Earth is dying.’

Extinction Rebellion spokesperson, Dani Esposito, 54, said: “We have one big demand and that is to put an end to fossil fuels. That means no new fossil fuel investments, no new licences [for oil and gas drilling], and no new fossil fuel subsidiaries.

“We have a small chance of securing a liveable future. The tipping points are coming, and we will lose the capacity to undo all the devastation coming our way.”

The new protests come after the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report was released on April 4, which warned that if we keep burning fossil fuels at our current rates, we will exceed 3 °C of global warming by 2030.

Hetherington said he had been protesting with Extinction Rebellion for several years. “I have absolutely no confidence that politicians are going to save the planet and that’s why I’m protesting, to demand an end to fossil fuels now.”