Nine University of York students arrested while protesting at Faslane nuclear base
Nine University of York students were arrested after successfully blockading Faslane Naval Base as part of the ongoing Faslane 365 campaign against government plans to renew the Trident nuclear missile system.
The students, as well as three other York residents, were arrested on March 19 after chaining themselves together and lying on the roads in front of the North and South gates of the base. Grouped into fours, the protesters chained their arms together inside of multi-layered tubes of carpet, drainpipe and chicken wire, designed to slow down attempts by police to cut the chains.
Both groups successfully deployed out of the van and onto their positions on the road, a stage many protesters don’t reach without being arrested by waiting police. Ric Lander, one of the students arrested, said, “All on my mind was that five seconds of getting out of the van and onto the ground. I’d heard of so many groups that didn’t manage, that got arrested as soon as they got out. I just hoped and prayed that didn’t happen. I kept thinking about those five seconds.”
The human barricades stopped traffic going into the base for about 45 minutes at the North gate and over an hour at the South. The groups were surrounded by lines of police while they waited for cutting equipment to arrive. Lander said “there was a really good feeling of camaraderie between everyone” as they lay surrounded by police.
Camilla Wimberley, another York student arrested, described how the police covered the protesters with sheets designed to protect them as they used a “rotary blade saw” to cut through to the chains. Describing one protester who had covered his tubing with tar, she said, “Apparently, one policeman got quite annoyed because he got tar on himself and had to go get gloves which delayed the whole thing.”
When the chains were finally cut, the students were arrested and removed from the area of the base. The males were taken to Dumbarton police station, while the females were taken to Grennoch. The students were all released after a few hours.
Speaking of his incarceration, Lander said, “It does sort of break your spirit to be in a room which smells a little bit of sick with absolutely no idea how long for. Thinking I was going to be in there for 24 hours was very hard. I was trying to mentally prepare myself for being there all night.” He added that “the police were really good, really sympathetic and friendly.”
The decision was taken not to prosecute any of the students. Andrew Miller, Procurator Fiscal for Dumbarton, said, “Having reviewed the evidence in this instance, the decision was taken not to take criminal proceedings.”
Upon receiving the news that the government was not seeking to prosecute, Lander said, “One of the objectives of the Faslane 365 campaign is to try and clog up the courts in order to cost them time and money and I would have been quite glad to be part of that objective, because I think it’s worthwhile. But from a personal point of view, it’s a relief.”
When asked about the decision to take direct action by protesting outside, Lander said, “Part of the injustice of the Trident issue is that the debate in Parliament is one-sided. The public seems on two sides, but the government seem so dead-set on what they’re going to do.” Wimberley described the Trident nuclear system as “a colossal waste of money.”
The Faslane 365 website describes the campaign as “an audacious civil resistance initiative to apply critical public pressure for the disarmament of Britain’s nuclear weapons.” As of March 2007, there have been 576 arrests at the base but just 22 prosecutions.
The protest took place four days after a vote in the House of Commons in which a bill was passed to renew the Trident nuclear system. The Government faced a rebellion by 95 Labour backbenchers, including some 16 former Cabinet ministers.
