At least five supporters of the climate activist group Just Stop Oil have landed in jail for climbing gantries over the M25 in an attempt to cause gridlock on the motorway.
According to reports, George Simonson and Theresa Higginson were sentenced to two years each, Paul Bell was sentenced to 22 months, and Gaie Delap and Paul Sousek were sentenced to 20 months for their part in the protests in November 2022.
A sixth defendant, Daniel Johnson, was given a 21-month sentence suspended for two years and ordered to complete 200 hours of community service. All six had pleaded guilty to causing a public nuisance for their part in the four days of disruption on the M25 when supporters of Just Stop Oil had climbed multiple gantries over the M25, which encircles London.
Reports show that they sought to cause maximum disruption in an effort to force the government into a ban on new fossil fuel exploration in the North Sea – a demand that has become policy under the new Labour administration.
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Before the sentencing, Sousek said: “‘No New Oil’ was the demand from Just Stop Oil right from the start. Now most political parties agree and it has become government policy. How come we are being jailed for pushing for, what is now, government policy? Kafka couldn’t make it up!”
Delap said: “I’ve had to read the evidence of people who were stuck in our traffic, it hurts me. I’m sorry I had to do this. But we really have no other option. They didn’t listen to the scientists, they didn’t listen to their constituents, so we had to cause disruption in order to communicate the seriousness of humanity’s predicament.”
The jailings come weeks after five Just Stop Oil activists were handed record sentences for peaceful protesters after a jury found them guilty of planning the direct actions, which caused thousands of hours of delays to drivers and hundreds of thousands of pounds of costs to the economy and the police.
Roger Hallam, a founder of the group, was handed a five-year sentence, while four others were handed four-year sentences by a judge who told them they had “crossed the line from concerned campaigner to fanatic”.
On Wednesday, two others – including one awaiting sentence for throwing tomato soup on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers in the National Gallery – were remanded to prison for taking part in protests at Heathrow airport in a call for an international treaty to phase out fossil fuels altogether.
Story was adapted from the Guardian.
