Man-handling climate change protestors

[Leafyhouse]

Anyone else watch with horror as a climate change protestor was forcefully removed by Mark Field from the Mansion House speech? I mean, I'm no fan of political activism, 'direct action' and so on, but she wasn't presenting him with any direct threat, just shouting and being annoying. AIBU to think that his behaviour was totally unacceptable there?

Them being the people with the lawful right and responsibility

All people have a right and a responsibility to remove trespassers

It is not a clear cut punch a la John Prescott (who was never charged).

When the egg hit John Prescott, he thought he'd been punched, and punched his assailant in self-defence. That's why he wasn't charged.

I've seen bruising resulting from a thrown egg, and I was astonished at how bad it was. Bloody hurt at the time, I'm told.

All people have a right and a responsibility to remove trespassers

Not exactly - see what the secet barrister says about trespass etc.

FiddlesticksAkimbo the question of whether the force was "reasonable" depends on many factors, not just whether she received any injuries.

It's very difficult to judge without knowing the full circumstances (which I don't, not just from viewing that short clip) but on the face of it it looks pretty bad.

Hi beingnice,

I agree that we should not be jumping to conclusions and there might be more evidence.

But in abstract were a disruptive trespasser to be removed from private premises quickly, efficiently, without any injury and with a smile on her face then the CPS are unlikely to be opening a file!

BBC news are showing a much longer video which shows several woman disrupting the dinner being ejected from the room. It's clear that protesters are asked to leave, they don't.

At the same time, if you freeze frame as he's marching her out you could equally express the view that the protester is smirking and is well aware they've scored the best imaginable PR.

These folk are professional direct action protesters not the usual crusty student pressure group. They are well organised, they would have done their research and planning in order to get past security and they are PR savvy enough to maximise any potential confrontation to their advantage.

You do not have an automatic right and certainly no responsibility to forcibly remove trespassers.

There is a petition for him to be sacked.

actionsprout.io/BB238C

No sympathy for them. They shouldn’t have been there.

It's sickening that the actual murder of a female politician is being used to justify this.

@sashh

That’s it, sack the bastard. How dare he feel intimidated or threatened?

People like you make me sick.

LOL at him feeling threatened or intimidated. More like challenged and pissed off. These uppity wimmens need to be put in their place. . .

That fat prick got lucky.

I'd have fucking floored the cunt, and kicked him in the balls while he was down

Do you honestly think that only female MP's have threats made against them ?

If someone trespasses despite due warning the practical remedy is to ask them to leave. If they don'tyou are entitled touseno more than reasonableforceto eject thetrespasser

If you have ever been in the business of removing people from a room you will know that the actions here were reasonable.

I doubt very much this will meet any threshold for prosecution.

Fuck me I'm a radical feminist and even I can clearly see that he had a right to interceed.

@OhYouBadKitten Where did I - or anyone else - say "she enjoyed it really"? Answer - nowhere. I merely pointed out that you can't just say "if you use that freeze frame of Field it's he is angry" when you can just as easily say "if you use that freeze frame of the protester she is smirking".

The blocking of her and turning her round doesn’t bother me and could be argued was reasonable, however as soon as she had turned round he should have let go. The frog-marching her while gripping the back of the neck was totally wrong - especially for the distance covered.

I have to say, my instinct to being grabbed like that would have been to lash out. The fact that she 'allowed' it to happen is significant, because it proves beyond doubt that she was there peacefully. She did nothing to him.

She must have felt humiliated and it surely must have hurt.

Good job he didn’t throw a milkshake, hey...?

She is weighing up whether to press charges apparently.

It's so easy for everyone to say what they would do - like Donald would run into a school after a gunman.

but she wasn't presenting him with any direct threat

How do you know this other than hindsight.

Who knows what she was going to do at the time.

No one is actually a danger before they set a bomb off or draw a gun or a knife.

How were people to know that she wasn’t going to be a danger.

Seen a clip of this and someone defending her actions saying she was a woman.

Don’t women also murder people?

The lot of them were trespassing and lucky that this wasn’t the US.

Yeh she won't get anywhere

He was absolutely acting appropriately, he removed a threat quickly and effectively without injuring her. Nobody knew what her intentions were or what she had in her bag. If you invade a space full of MPs you should expect to be forcefully removed. The question that needs to be answered is what the hell were the security guards doing!

This may be of interest! (I can't link.)

Methods of Expulsion
Common law emphasizes that force is to be used only for the purpose of expelling the trespasser and no more. Words, no matter how offensive, do not justify a blow (Meade and Belt's Case (1823) CC Lew 184) nor if they are simply a nuisance (eg, “the law does not permit a man to break another's jaw merely because his chatter was interfering with a good drinking time” from Smilovici v. DPP of NSW 54 NSWLR 649 quoted with approval in Bullerton (1992) CA 163/92 unreported, Court of Appeal). Beating a trespasser during or after expulsion from the premises (Oakes v. Wood (1837) 2 M & W 791 is outside the scope of lawful force and constitutes assault or battery.

Common law held that a kick is unacceptable method of expelling a trespasser as held in Wyld's Case (1837) 2 Lew 214. It is possible to construe Wyld's case either as recognizing (i) simply that kicks should not be used to expel trespassers or (ii) excessive force in general should not be used for expelling a trespasser. However, with the rise of reasonable force as the modern test on the justified use of force it is at least possible in some cases that a kick might be justifiable in exceptional cases, though perhaps only where a person was attempting to resist expulsion and offering some serious personal violence.

At common law the right to use force in removing a non-violent trespasser does not justify any wounding (Moriarty v. Brooks, per Lord Lyndhurst CB at 626) or, in the case of self defence in a private dwelling, the use of a knife once the trespasser is beyond the threshold. (See Martin Mclean (1998) 2 Cr. App. R(S) 250 at 251.)

Those using force to expel trespassers must be circumspect only to use force for the process of ejectment and not to continue once the need for force is over. In a civil action, Bush v. Parker (1834) TR 73 it was held that the defendant was entitled to use force to remove the plaintiff from a field but not to drag him through a pond.

I wonder if Jo Cox politely asked her murderer to leave her alone and to consider more appropriate action. Or if Anna Soubry should perhaps have opened an important face to face dialogue with the nasty twat who had a go at her.
If the security people didn't tackle the situation, what else was anyone supposed to do.
In hindsight it looks dreadful but elected representatives have been physically attacked and even murdered in this country and in others.