Started at 5pm on Sunday, a group of around thirty people so far have occupied Queen Square in Bath in an Occupy protest. The location, announced via a Facebook event on Sunday evening, now has a number of tents pitched up.
All of the campaigners are intending to stay within the square and protest against the government until the 11th November at 11am. The static 11 day protest is one of many taking place across the country against the current democratic movements.
In regards to setting up camp in Queen Square, the leaders say: “This is a global, democratic movement which tries to encapsulate the feelings of the silent majority. These occupations are taking place in over 2100 cities around the world. Different occupations may have different ideas on how to best represent these views, so feel free to contribute and discuss.“
Initial reports coming in to NOW Bath yesterday told us that Avon and Somerset Police were in attendance at the scene but did leave after it was considered peaceful. A member of the public told us that as far as he could see there are ‘about two dozen people, six or seven tents‘.
The leaders of the camp have said that there are to be a larger number coming to camp, as many as two hundred are expected to attend.
Both Bath and North East Somerset Council and Avon and Somerset Police are said to be monitoring the situation.
On their Facebook event page, over 190 are classed as ‘attending’ and their information page has over 80 likes. In a message posted at 7:14pm on their page, they thanked members of the public for their donations of food.
“Thank you so much to people who donated food! So Sorry not enough of us thanked you in person, we were busy setting up camp. Please come back so we can do so!“
Messages of good luck have been posted on their wall by a number of people, the two Facebook pages can be found here: http://on.fb.me/occupybath and http://on.fb.me/occupybathinfo.
A spoof blog has also been created to go with the campaign; it can be found here: http://occupybath.blogspot.com/
This story is still developing and will change over the period of the next few days. Please check back regularly for updates as we get them.
3 Comments
Simon
Monday 31st October, 2011 at 14:19*Technical point*
At the general assembly last night, we peaked at 46 people.
Alan Key
Monday 31st October, 2011 at 00:32^ 40-odd people
Alan Key
Monday 31st October, 2011 at 00:30I popped along briefly this afternoon and reckon there were about at least people there, having what looked like a very civilised discussion. From what I could tell they hadn’t made a mess of the place and I didn’t see any kind of drunken or loutish behaviour. As a long-time resident and worker of Bath I do not have a problem with these people protesting at this spot, as long as they keep it clean and respect residents and passers by, and it’s good to see that so many people are concerned about what is going on in the world.