Pro Palestinian marches apparently costing police 20 million pounds.

[Jupitersstorm]

Should these be allowed to continue due to the cost of policing? I am all for peaceful and safe protests - it's enshrined in our culture and law - but why are these supposedly peaceful protests costing so much to police? There is now a funding gap - couldn't this tax payers' money be better used elsewhere?

Lots of litter and placards to clear up each time too.

"Pro-Palestine protests cost police '£20million' as thousands more take to London streets on ninth weekend in a row - and plans for them to continue into the New Year"

"Additional pressure on the Met is having a detrimental effect on the welfare of its officers, Mr Khan warned.
'The Met has cancelled nearly 4,000 rest days and for each public order event, the same officers are being deployed,' he said.
'Many officers have worked every weekend since October 7 and sickness rates are rising, a trend which is likely to continue.'
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12846831/Pro-Palestine-protests-cost-police-20million.html

"couldn't this tax payers' money be better used elsewhere"

off course it could but then do the public to realise how much things like this cost etc.

how did you come to that conclusion ?

When I was in the MET they used to draft in resources from all across London.... leaving the suburbs short of staff and open to more crimes committed

They also, on occasion,used to cancel any leave we had booked

i do wish the public were more educated on factors such as these, trouble is it could be debated and analyses that media is more intrigued with criticism rather than helping explain and educate the public on the breakdown of the costs of aspects such as protests etc.

They will be soon, don't worry. People have had enough of them as they can't control the anti- Semites in their ranks. How do you think people feel when they've worked hard all week and want to go up to London on a Saturday and enjoy the festive streets and have to put up with hordes of screaming, jostling people.

How do you think people feel when their government is yet again giving a free pass to a genocidal regime and contributing to the torturous deaths of thousands of children and civilians? I am glad that while our governments hearts and minds are dead, the publics honor and humanity is alive.

See - respectfully, I think most people don't feel the way you do. I think they can see that Hamas needs to be dealt with once and for all. Certainly that's what the Daily Mail comments seem to be saying.

Daily mail is the absolute worst batshit place to go for news or comments. It represents the worst of British society.

Also, most people on the marches want Israel to end the ceasefire and to find a peaceful way forward. Israel is the occupying and brutal force of Palestinians both in the West Bank and Gaza, the former which has nothing to do with Hamas. Protestors are calling for freedom for Palestinians to live happily and freely with all human and civil rights in their own country.

This one here.
It’s good to see that there are people who still care about others and don’t support israels genocide on Palestinians.
It’s important to see that not everyone is filled with hate. Getting the US and israel to stop this madness and slaughtering civilians day in and day out is the most important thing right now, but so is showing that there are still people with some humanity left.
I mean how would we live once Palestine is free, knowing what heartless people are around us?

The Daily Mail?? Seriously?!! 🙄

There's 30,000 Met police

There are marches or protests most days in London, how much is spent policing football matches and before and after.

'The Met has cancelled nearly 4,000 rest days and for each public order event, the same officers are being deployed,' he said.

This is the ludicrous part, their evidently aren't enough officers trained in this area to cover. That said pretty sure the article stems from Khan asking for more money. All police forces have had finances stripped, they all need investment- not sure I'm on board with London once again being prioritised when where I am even serious crimes aren't being taken on because of resource.

Calm yourself OP. , it’s not anti Semitic to march against the killing of 20000 civillians , displacement and starvation of almost 2 millions, it’s called Having a conscious , it’s humanity , the majority of marchers have this this in common. Regardless of their faiths , Beliefs and opinions .
It will end when Israeli government stops the killing in Gaza and illegal settlements in West Bank .

In which case less than 15% of the force have had a single rest day cancelled to deal with it?

Daily mail is the absolute worst batshit place to go for news or comments. It represents the worst of British society.

Also, most people on the marches want Israel to end the ceasefire and to find a peaceful way forward. Israel is the occupying and brutal force of Palestinians both in the West Bank and Gaza, the former which has nothing to do with Hamas

This

Well the OP has emerged from cover with their later comments and revealed that they just want the marches stopped/never to have happened full stop. Though it was pretty clear from the off with the "supposedly peaceful protests" that it was a loaded ever so umble question with an agenda.As in "shut up citizens about Palestine"
As for:
1: quoting the Daily Mail as an authority on social peace - words fail me.
2: the line that central London is unsafe for folks wanting to do their Christmassy things, clearly rot, barring a general terrorist attack. The marches have definite routes and are so easily avoided that many many people as they go about their business will be totally unaware that they are even happening.
Mnet is full of these sorts of threads at the moment - some folks are clearly putting a lot of work into them.
Of course the marches should be allowed - yes it costs in policing for of course any large gathering has to be policed as has been pointed out upthread.
The marches are essentially peaceful, remarkably so for such large gatherings.

The right to peaceful protest is a cornerstone of democracy.

We used to draft in all the special constables to cover the football, trooping if the colour etc. not so sure for these marches

It says its the same people tasked to it. Yes it's bad management/lack of suitably trained resource and not a reason to scale back the right to protest, but I'd be pretty fed up.

Well the OP has emerged from cover with their later comments and revealed that they just want the marches stopped/never to have happened full stop
by using none other than the farcical Daily mail tactic of pointing out how much these marches cost the government/ tax payers,
like the Government are so careful with money all the time . 🙄

@queenofarles the same Daily Mail that helped to sell us Brexit and all the other shit things that it's done over the years. LOL.

Stop believing that the Daily Mail is gospel.

There are protests for all manner of different things going on in London every single day, and most of them generate zero media coverage and you'd never know they'd happened unless you happened to be in that area of London.

I once attended a large protest that marched down Whitehall, literally received zero media coverage at all. Unless you happened to be there, you wouldn't know it had happened.

And tons and tons of smaller protests that (somewhat understandably) don't get media coverage because they are so small and because there's so many of them.

They all have to be policed, which costs money, because the government can't just arbitrarily say what protests are allowed and what protests are banned. And people would just protest anyway, which would require a larger police presence than an approved protest.

I agree with the right to protest.

If you think the cost of peaceful protests is bad, just wait until you hear about the cost of elections… maybe we should just suspend democracy until the books are balanced. That sounds like a good idea. 🙄