March for the Alternative - 26 March 2011 (essay)

March for the Alternative - 26 March 2011

On 26 March 2011, nine coaches laid on by my local trade union branch left for London for the TUC’s March for the Alternative. Nine coaches? I thought. From Leicester? Now I knew this demo was going to be big. Leicester is hardly a hotbed of political activism; it’s not a Manchester or a Bristol. But the large turnout for this protest proves how far-reaching and potentially devastating the ConDem government’s spending cuts are going to be. As people piled onto the coaches early that cold, cloudy Saturday morning, they may have been bleary-eyed, but their convictions for marching were clear: the political has got too personal, the cuts are threatening too many jobs, communities and livelihoods.

~

When my sister and I arrive in London the atmosphere is unexpectedly calm; the crowds on the tube no greater than usual for a Saturday morning. But as we leave Temple station, we’re immediately bombarded with people leafleting and petitioning in the name of a number of lefty causes. This is more like it. A steward instructs us to “move to the left” (literally, not politically, but that would still work). Streams of people have already taken over the streets of the capital, with various feeder marches underway. We step in with one of them as it approaches the assembly point, eventually hitching up with the hundreds of other people lining the stretch of the Embankment.

I wanted to take part in the March for the Alternative for a few reasons, the main one being this: Everyday working people and their families should not have to bear the brunt of a financial crisis we didn’t cause.  Something is seriously awry when the vital services provided by libraries, the NHS, children’s centres, and domestic violence refuges are being cut back and closed down whilst the top bods at the banks which caused the collapse of the economy continue to receive obscene bonuses and their reckless capitalism goes unchecked.  An alternative to sorting out our country’s finances is needed and it is possible.

A huge diversity of people, arriving from all across the country, was gathering along the Embankment, also keen to demonstrate their anger. An anger spreading broadly, around a multitude of issues:

Trade union branches sticking up for their local public services. Postal workers saying ‘no’ to the privatisation of the Royal Mail. Back-room NHS staff facing job cuts declaring, ‘our work saves lives too’. Mothers with children fighting for the future of their local children’s centres. Placards displaying anti-Tory ideology. Calls for a General Strike by the Socialist Workers Party. Concerns for climate change. ‘Cut war not welfare’. The spirit of the recent uprisings in the Middle East intermingling with our own desire for change: ‘Solidarity with the Egyptians’; ‘Turn Trafalgar Square into Tahrir Square’. ‘Hands off Libya’. Workers and students stand united. Lefty politicos well-versed in this sort of thing mixing with many more who are protesting for the first time. Teenagers with punk rock piercings and dyed-hair. Disabled people defending their access to welfare. Queers against the cuts, kids against the cuts. Bob Marley and Che Guevara printed on T-shirts. ‘Drop beats not bombs’ emblazoned on badges. Men and women; young and old; white, black, Asian, and Latin American.

We’re all here. United in our determination to call out a government that shows no commitment and no care towards those principles of equality, justice and fairness which ensure people’s right to emancipation and happiness. We’re all here because we want to change that.

~

A band of drummers accompanied by dancers get us in the mood for marching, their determined and infectious beat setting heads nodding and feet tapping. A couple of young mums start dancing and laughing, getting their kids in pushchairs to join in.

And then we’re off: slowly, but lively.

A girl no older than eight starts shouting into a loudspeaker: “Whose streets?” she cries, to which we reply: “Our streets!” She continues to stir us up: “Whose universities?’” “Our universities!” “Whose museums?”  “Our museums!” Then some righteous male voices take the lead: “They say cutback!” and we follow: “We say fight back”. “Cut, cut, cut back!” “Fight, fight, fight back!”  The atmosphere becomes more electric as we head towards the bridge. The intensity of our whistling, whooping, jeering and shouting increases, the drumming continues, coalescing to create a colourful cacophony of sound underneath the bridge. Our spirits lift as the noise gets louder.  Noise which communicates our discontent, but also propels our energy. Noise which recalls our ire, but also spurs on our optimism, our unity, our solidarity, brief but potent. An exciting few moments.

Big Ben then appears up ahead. We take in that postcard scene we’re all familiar with. It starts raining. Soggy sandwiches come out. I heart London. Rows upon rows of people are now marching, waving colourful banners and placards which scream a bunch of different, creative, inspired slogans. Some have been stitched onto massive embroidered pieces whilst others have been scrawled onto scrappy pieces of cardboard. ‘Defend Sheffield’s Libraries’ is the most endearing one; written on an A3 sheet of paper in coloured felt tip pen, it hints at the limited resources many libraries are being left to run on, but shows they’ll forge on nonetheless. Kids may be getting kettled in Oxford Street about now as they occupy Fortnum and Mason's but those Sheffield library assistants are spreading some of that kickass DIY punk rock spirit down this end of town too.

~

The rain clears and the magnitude and significance of what we’re doing starts to sink in. Speculation mounts as to how many people are here today: 100,000? 400,000? More like 500,000.

Me and my sister step out of the section we’re in to get a bit further ahead as we approach the Houses of Parliament. The crowd here is a little younger, with more students, and a brass band is blowing out some buoyant notes. A couple of women are chanting and dancing around a set of traffic lights.

This is a carnival but also an Uprising. An Uprising against a bunch of Oxbridge-educated career politicians, backed up by their mates in big business and Murdoch-owned media, who lead lives increasingly remote from those of the people they’re meant to represent. They’re not interested in preserving public services because they’ve never had to rely on them. Power, money, prestige – that’s all that matters to them.

The atmosphere is celebratory, imbued with a joyous freedom. We’re sending a riposte to the stiffness and propriety of Parliament. This is the essence of protest but also of life itself: breaking out of the boxes and questioning the pre-determined values others impose on us; engaging with something bigger than ourselves to feel more Alive within ourselves.

~

The crowd spreads out as we continue along Whitehall. We’ve taken over London, democracy in action, in the heart of the capital city. A tinny stereo blasts out some John Lennon. The red and yellow flags of the Communist Party appear, billowing brightly in the breeze, and spreading a wave of optimism amongst the marchers.

Red and yellow then give way to purple and green as we join in with the women’s bloc at Trafalgar Square. Suffrage sentiment.  The energy and chanting becomes more melodic: “Sister can you hear me? Women have the power!” The banners have more bite: ‘Rich men’s axe always falls on women’s backs’.

Men need to be named as the instigators and continuing perpetuators of this economic and social crisis. George Osborne laced his budget speech earlier in the week with macho imperialist tropes: “A Britain carried aloft by the march of the makers”; “putting fuel into the tank of Britain’s economy.” And planes fly phallic over Libya.

On Piccadilly, ‘Save our Arts’ has been spelt out on pieces of individually-lettered card and hung along a lamppost. Another placard pleads: ‘Don’t break our arts’. This city we’re marching through today is steeped in a rich and brilliant his-and her- story of literature, philosophy and culture. Etched on its buildings, making up its museums, lining the shelves of its libraries. And yet the ConDem government doesn’t seem to care for the future cultural life of this country, cutting the budgets of arts organisations and education. I want an alternative to this, too.  

Remnants of the ‘anarchist’ action that took place along here just a short while before are visible. Smashed glass and pink paint are splayed on the pavement outside The Ritz. Graffiti’s been daubed on a few buildings. Starbucks has been smashed. A flag warns:  ‘London’s burning’. A tinge of volatile anger still hangs in the air.

The capitalist behemoths should come under attack. For spreading superficiality and breeding apathy. So should their CEO's. For evading their taxes.  For feeding off their greed, just like the bankers, whilst the customers their corporations rip off, encourage into debt and attempt to placate, struggle to make ends meet.

We pass the Hard Rock café: ‘still rockin’? Then finally, three and a half hours after setting out, we arrive through the gates of Hyde Park, finishing off with a final bout of chanting. A bunch of younger protesters looking set to stage an overnight occupation surround a banner they’ve draped across a statue which demands: ‘Listen to the people’s rage’. A tree has been decorated with pieces of laminated paper which display some cryptic messages: ‘is your reality my reality?’

The rally rounds off with a call to arms to continue the fight once we get back home. I’m drunk on revolutionary spirit, the cold gusty air whipping through the park invigorates and clarifies, and another boost comes when the lively protest beats of some ska music strikes up in the background.

Then the daylight starts to dim. The huge crowd begins to disperse and my sister and I make our way home. Abandoned placards pile up at the edges of the park whilst others have been propped up outside the banks along Grosvenor Place. Police helicopters circle ominously over Oxford Street.

~

By the time we get back on the coach, it has gone dark. We leave London via the route we marched. Just a few hours before these streets were packed with people, loud and colourful; now they’re cleared empty, and dark. Plenty of police are still gathered in Westminster though with bonfires beginning to burn in Trafalgar Square.  But I simmer down. The headiness of the day gives way to quieter contemplation; the possibility of effecting change felt whilst united in solidarity with hundreds of other people now goes back to the individual to figure out. We drive past the famous sights of London all lit up, history, haunting. Where does today’s march sit amongst all this? Were we heard? What difference did we make? What difference can we make?

~

In the wake of the march there’s been some debate in the lefty blogosphere about the relative efficacy of the main march and the more disruptive direct action that took place on Piccadilly, Oxford Street and Trafalgar Square. I believe resistance should necessarily take many forms. There’s value in peaceful protest and more antagonistic actions. One of them shouldn’t be deemed better than the other. Therefore, I can only agree with this when it argues that this is an insult to those of us who didn’t start burning bonfires in Trafalgar Square but instead stuck to marching from A to B.

Politicians aren’t the only ones who often show their disconnection from the realities of people’s lives – us lefties can be guilty of it too. We can sometimes forget who our revolutionary fervour is supposed to support, who should lie at the heart of our theories, and who cannot be left out if we want our activism to achieve anything - that being everyday working people and their families. From what I saw on You Tube of the actions that took place on Oxford Street and Trafalgar Square, they all seemed to culminate in a confused chaotic atmosphere with a load of mainly young middle-class men exchanging fisticuffs with the police.  What’s so radical about that? Are we suggesting that in order for her participation in the day to have meant anything a single mum with her two-year old in tow should have got involved with that instead of heading to Hyde Park?

The main march didn’t involve “shuffling in an orderly queue from one march point to the other”, but was a lively and vocal display of resistance; respectful, optimistic, inclusive, safe, and fun… a microcosm of what a revolution should be. To dismiss this is to dismiss not only the nature of the march, but the people who marched; the people who piled back onto their coaches that Saturday evening with jobs to go to on Monday morning, as nurses, arts outreach officers and playscheme workers, the work they do being just as radical and affecting, and probably more so, than firework-throwing and window-smashing.

It's these people's jobs the ConDem government want to cut. So this is where the resistance needs to be focused. This is who the resistance needs to include.

By Michelle Wright
Spring 2011