The Barnet 500 on the march

(above is Barnet resident)

I was proud to be able to take part in the first Barnet community march outside the borders of Barnet.

500 residents/trade unionists/from Barnet congregated outside the Savoy Hotel yesterday morning (site of Peasants Revolt 1381).

As we snaked through the capital, chants of “no to easy council no to easycouncil” provoked some bemused reactions. It was all good fun and the 500 all seemed to be inspired by marching with so many others. The banners and home made placards were fantastic as were some of the chanting.

It took us 5 and half hours to march from Embankment to  Hyde Park! I was exhausted when I reached Hyde Park (a note for me,we must find lighter banner poles for our banner).

It is disappointing to see the media focusing on the violence that took place last night. On the whole, it was a peaceful march,I never saw any violence, n fact it was almost a carnival atmosphere.

We will never know how many were there but it must have been close to a million. Feeder marches kept joining the main march, but even if we say it was as low as 500,000, the media by focussing on the behaviour of 0.04% let themselves down again.

The real story is the open attack on our public services and the resolve of communities everywhere to stand up to defend them.