Forty people, aged from 22 to 58, will be behind bars on Christmas Day for planning or taking part in a variety of protests relating to the climate crisis or the war in Gaza. Several of them are facing years in prison after courts handed down the most severe sentences on record for direct action protests.
Nineteen people are in prison – 10 of them on remand – after taking part in climate protests with the campaign group Just Stop Oil. They range from five people who received multi-year sentences after being found guilty of conspiring to cause gridlock on the M25, to two young people jailed for more than 18 months for throwing tomato soup over Van Gogh’s Sunflowers painting in the National Gallery in London.
Cressida Gethin, 22, who is in prison for conspiring to cause gridlock on London’s orbital motorway, told the jury during her trial: “Earth’s life-support systems are breaking down due to human activities … I stand by my actions as the most effective option available to me.”
Michel Forst, the UN rapporteur on environmental defenders, has described the situation in the UK as “terrifying”, saying protesters are being forced to navigate a draconian new legal environment that includes significant limits on the right to protest.
Earlier this month a report found that the UK is a world leader when it comes to jailing environmental protesters, with police arresting people at nearly three times the global average rate.
Over the past few years a raft of new legislation has been introduced that severely curtails the right to protest.
Direct action climate protests are not always popular with the British public. In October, a YouGov poll found that almost three-quarters of people thought the jail sentences given to the National Gallery protesters were either “about right” (37%) or “not harsh enough” (36%).