Oxford builders get harassment warning

Several weeks ago at the weekly SPEAK demo against the animal lab on South Parks Road in Oxford, a car of four builders drove past. The were rude and abusive to those carrying out the demo. A couple of protestors challenged them and passed the vehicles details onto the police. After some pressure it emerged this week that all four men had been tracked down.

It turns out that they worked just around the corner for building firm Sir Robert McAlpine, contractors for the new biochemistry building just off South Parks Road. All four (though they all had problems' remembering who the driver was) recieved harassment warnings for their behaviour.

However, they were not the only University employeed people to come a cropper due to their own stupidity. The “Desigated Protest Area” is where the protestors are told they are allowed to stand once a week if they wish to protest in front of the laboratories. These protests have taken place every Thursday, between 1 and 5 pm for the last two years, so it is impossible for anyone who uses the area regularly to not know about their existance.

Now there are two cycle paths down South Parks Road toward St Cross Street / Marston cycle path, one on the road, and one on the footpath. The latter cuts through the protest area, but there is nothing the protestors can do about it as they have been told to stand there at the request of an injunction taken out by Oxford University itself.

On a regular basis cyclists deliberately ride at speed and in a dangerous manner through the protestors, despite their being saver alternatives. Thursday gone was no exception. One member of university staff went out of this way to pick the spot that would endanger the protestors as much as possible despite there being plenty of space elsewhere. Only it was he who came undone. Hitting the soft gravel at a speed he must have known was too fast, he flipped over his bike and ended up on the ground.

When asked aby one protestor how stupid he felt now for trying to injure protestors he swore back violently, though he declined to repeat the comments to the police that came to stand over him. In the end he wobbled off foolishly.

Yet again, the true nature of the University is exposed....