The original intended occupation site of Occupy London - Paternoster Square - adjacent to the stock exchange, has been occupied by Occupy London on Mayday since around 6.45pm

Details of the arrest of Bryn Phillips, his interview with the British Security Services, and the involvement of The City of London Corporation in his arrest.

It's been a very successful 3rd day at Occupy Finsbury Square

It was really inspiring this morning talking to people going to work all throughout the morning. Was amazed to see so many people coming up and saying they supported us. The info front tent does need more people to do shifts, but I'd really recommend people do the morning just to experience how much support there is. One problem though, is that this level of support we're getting from people just isn't coming across in a lot of the mainstream press reports about the occupations. We've also been giving out flyers with the statement printed on it to passers by.

One nice story was a chap in an armani suit being quite critical of us this morning, then another person going to work stopping and beginning to argue with him, and before we knew it there were like 10 people having their own debate about the issue right infront of the camp.

Media wise we had CNN, Bloomberg, Sky and AFP all down today doing pretty fair and positive pieces and interviews. All saying how well organised and peacefull this camp is.

We also talked to lots of investmant bankers today, some with negative views on us some with positive. Because of this we're organising a discussion in the yurt on saturday with some investment bankers and invite participation.

There are now over one hundred tents set up at Occupy Finsbury Square - so many in fact that we need to discuss plans for allocating new areas. Some tents are free for new arrivals to use - see shelter group to find out which.

There were visits today from Islington Borough Council, Parks and Green Spaces, Health and Safety, and London Fire Brigade, who all toured the occupation camp and had nothing but praise and positive feedback for how organised we are. We're getting wheelie bins delivered for recycling and general waste. As regards toilets it looks like we will come to an arrangement with the council - there's another meeting tomorrow and we hope that the situation will be resolved then.

One of the main things people were saying was, 'We know things have gone wrong but what's your solution?' and 'we agree with you but we need to know the alternatives'. So we're encouraging them to come here and discuss their views of the alternatives.

Tomorrow (tues) at 12.15pm we've invited people to come along and debate or critique the occupation's statment and on Wednesday there's a banker coming to run a sesson 'Confessions of a City Banker'. The Yurt if available for scheduling workshops and talks - contact the free university to propose a session.

Blackboards are bing sorted out to put up daily schedules and updates. There's a load of art materials that have been donated so there's plenty of stuff to make placcards and banners. Pallets are available for making walkways, esp given the forcast of rain we now have. A new group is also forming for workshops to teach useful community tools and skills, as well as a new process working group.

The Kitchen crew have been doing a great job, and say that they welcome help from people who have experience of cooking for large numbers. Each day a few people are needed to do the washing up after meals (rather than everyone washing their own dishes). Donations have been flowing in as well as people offering money too. Also some local businesses have been supportive and some restuarants have even offered to cook for the camp on some future dates to show their support.

Email: occupyfs _ at _ gmail.com
Twitter: @occupyfs

Wishlist: http://occupywiki.co.uk/Finsbury_Square/Wishlist

(notes taken from the General Assembly held this evening - mon 24th)

Few snaps from monday at occupyLSX showing some of the schedules.

Tent city univerwsity events listing:
http://tentcityuniversity.wordpress.com/events/

OccupyLSC Calendar (not updated much)
http://occupylsx.org/?page_id=176

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General Assembly report back and quick update:

Following a presentation of the letter from the Dean of the cathedral where he set out his reasons for taking the unprecedented step of closing the Cathedral, and the reading of the OccupyLSX press release initial response, the assembly had discussed in small groups the course of action. There were passionate contributions during the report backs with many questioning the official line from the Dean over health and safety.

Some said obviously that it would look bad with the cathedral closing, but that it was necessary to challenge this notion. There was overwhelming support for the camp to remain and to use the events planned over the weekend to highlight the issues behind the protest. There was consensus and a big cheer when they agreed to stay over the next days and try and resolve the situation.

The media team is preparing another press statement which includes supportive quotes from members of the clergy who were attending evensong.

The legal team noted that the camp is under no legal obligation to go, and that a series of legal steps would need to be gone through in order for an eviction process to be started.

The Faith working group has drafted a statement that faith groups can sign to support the occupation and an alternative sunday service will be held at 9am since the dean decides to close the cathedral to its normal service.

Various working groups have been meeting to discuss worst case scenarios and what to do in the case of a police eviction in order to ensure people are calm and that people have sufficient space to pack their things should they want to leave.

Tomorrow (Sat) sees the 'meet the movement' outreach day and the one week anniversary of OccupyLSX.

There's also a march tomorrow on Saturday, leaving OccupyLSX at 2.30pm, destination is a surprise! the activities and march tomorrow has been endorsed by the Unite trade union.

The tent city university lectures tomorow during the 'meet the movement' outreach day, will be a teach out - walking to the location at 2pm.

Recycling and waste management on site is going well, with the council remaking that the recycling they're been collecting is upping their figures for recycling in the area. Volunteers were requested for the weekend when there will be a lot of visitors who maybe aren't used to the recycling system, to ensure that collected waste is sorted into the right types.

The tranquility 'night watch' mediation team will be on duty 10pm-8am to address issues of noise and disturbance.

The main topics for discussion tonight at the assembly were then:

- a call to action?

- concrete proposalsof what to do next

- why we are staying

Pics from OccupyLSX on Friday 21st including the emergency assembly to discuss the letter from the Dean where he took the extraordinary step to close the cathedral - when was the last time this happened? Wasn't it open throughout the blitz in world war 2?!

www.occupylsx.org

Some updates from OccupyLSX (see also Indymedia feature + occupylondon wire)

In general the occupation has grown very well with something like way over 300 tents now. NB The space is getting pretty crowded now, so please contact the Shelter working group if you want to bring a tent - some tents are free - pls don't just set up a tent now anywhere you like.

There's an outreach event planned for 11am Saturday - "Meet the movement" type thing. The media re invited to come along and meet the different working groups, visit the kitchen, have a tour of the site etc This is the proposal presented to the General Assembly, and formulated by several working groups in discussion this morning and at the lunchtime assembly.

The afternoon General Assemly on sat is planned to be at midday (scheduled wedding pending) and to be a Public Assembly, starting with updates from news from the occupy movement, from the uk and the world - from the international movement.

Then the idea is to have personal testimonies from activists involved in setting up the OccupyLSX camp and the working groups. 

We're also inviting testimonies from social justice movements outside occupation to show solidarity and the links, with people from or involved in:

- Occupy halfterm - a group from cambs planning an occupation during school half term

- A banker who has been sleeping here

- Electricians involved in dispute and strikes and action like the recent Blackfriars blockade

- Disablbed people's alliance against cuts (who are marching on saturday) and involved with atos office occupations

- Dalefarm - after the evictions

- Single mothers self defence campaigning 

- Tottenham defene campaign 

- Jodie McIntyre

- Queer resistance

- Women of colour

- Student occupations

- Polly Toynbee 

The tent city university group is holding daily lecturesd and discussion - this Saturday there's a panel on systemic change and pragmatic ways to bring about change. If you have ideas for workshops email tentcityuniversity@gmail.com

The last two days has seen people from OccupyLSX linking up with the electricians who blockaded Blackfriars station site and protesting at mining company BHP Billitons annual general meeting.

There's been some hassle from the police in terms of health and safety regarding fuel for generators and kitchens and people have expressed concern over police Forward Intelligence Teams photographing and filming people in meetings.

In terms of communication there are plans to schedule specific coverage for the video livestream and to ensure that the main minutes from working groups and assemblies are published quickly.

Interview extracts from wednesday: So what's happening next?

There's some specific things we've got planned.

We've begun a daily lecture series chaired by university lecturers, authors and activists.

Tomorrow we are marching to protest a meeting of large mining company executives in solidarity with the victims who have been displaced by large-scale mining projects in South America.

On Saturday we've planned a rally called "Occupy London, Occupy World" to invite members of the public and community groups to speak out about their lives under austerity. It will also be an opportunity to stand in solidarity with all the occupations around the world and share experiences and new insights.

We're thinking more and more about our strategy. We feel like we're reaching out to the British people - to let them know that their experiences are mutual, that we are the majority, and that there are alternatives - but we're being pragmatic about how we might hold "the system" to account and to meet people's needs.

From reading about other social movements we know that organized people are the only way to create and safeguard our freedoms. The suffragettes and the civil rights movement showed how people don't get the things they need simply by asking the government nicely. Pressure has to be applied and we are a part of a new struggle to create a more civilised society.

I think we should take the following strategy very seriously. For our demands to be met, we have to make the costs to the government of not implementing humane and social policies so high that they are forced to concede. This is the only way we will tackle the power of the multinational corporations.

Hannah:

The first thing to say is that he next move depends on what we as a collective occupation decide to do. and where we decide to take the occupation, where we decide to go next. we don't have a pre-prepared plan, because we are building the direct democracy which allows us to take decisions collectively. I personally would agree with you that it would be great to keep dynamic and doing new things which reflects the newness and the excitement of what we're doing here. There have been loads and loads of ideas about what to do next. At the General Assembly last night about 300 people broke into small groups and shared ideas about things that we could do. These include: direct action, further connections with other grassroots groups and political struggles, e.g. this morning we connected up with the electricians who are currently striking over conditions, this hasn't been reported much in the media and we hope to use the momentum we do have now to make the connection with more working people who are suffering under the current system.

We'd love to hear your ideas, also would like to point out that although it's really great having media coverage, so others of the 99% can hear about what we're doing, we are not thinking primarily about if the papers want to cover us, but want to concentrate on working together collectively to build processes for ways of making the world better.

Postal correspondance or donated kit can be sent to:
Occupy London St Pauls Cathedral, The Chapterhouse, St Pauls Churchyard, LONDON, EC4M 8AD, United Kingdom

Wikis and wishlists:
http://occupylsx.org/?page_id=192
http://olsx.wikia.com/wiki/Wishlist
https://occupywiki.co.uk/London/Wishlist
https://occupywiki.co.uk/London/Tech

General Calendar
http://occupylsx.org/?page_id=176

Live video stream (sometimes live otherwise looped content)
http://livestream.com/occupylsx

Ideas / Manifesto bank (3,363 votes on 102 ideas from 236 people)
http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=f76a0&t=f76a0.40

Flickr Pics
http://www.flickr.com/groups/1769303@N20/
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=occupylsx
http://www.flickr.com/groups/15o/

Youtube channels
http://www.youtube.com/user/occupylsx
http://www.youtube.com/user/occupylondon

A ournalist from the Evening Standard has requested that a Christian linked with the occupation sends a letter to the editor. I thought all letters to the editors were spontaneous, but there you go. They request the type of person they want to send the letter, the theme and a word count. Next we'll hear they fake them.
Anyway, even though it was at an impossible deadline, I managed to produce about 180 words. Which I am publishing now in case the letters of my letter suffer any alteration - or vanishing - on their way to publication.
The request was "on how the protest should respond to concerns from the St Paul's authorities" (that they may have to close because of the occupation on its land). Wrong question. However, given the deadline pressure, I didn't want to scorn this journalist with a "wrong question. Please try again later", so here it is:

I think it would be those in power an in possession of property, in this case land and buildings, who "should respond".
It is a shame that the Cathedral is put in a position where it will be necessary to decide whether to close or not by those who could allow the occupiers to enter the building they intended to stay in, in the first place. The occupation is not against this or any other church. Indeed, both occupiers, christian and anarchists are most concerned with social and economic justice, equality and dignity of life. It is the powerful that are destroying all those that those are against, symbolised by the Stock Exchange. Those with the necessary power to make the Stock Exchange, or whichever other building or land that the occupation's assembly would deem appropriate, should the necessary steps so that the occupation can move and thus the carers of the Cathedral do not feel the pressure to need to close.

Good luck and all best wishes in your attempts to get this letter published. Sincerely.

#OccupyLSX - Day Three Report + 53 QuikPix

Dateline: The London Occupation, West Courtyard, St Paul's Cathedral, London, UK, Mon 17 Oct 2011, 17:00-18:30 - Since even the mainstream media have been full of reports all weekend about the global ubiquity and huge scale of the #OccupyTogether uprisings, I really didn't need much of a push to carry me back to the site of Saturday's successful #OccupyLondon General Assembly (see '#OccupyLSX - Day One Report + 75 QuikPix'). So when the call came in for some serious speech amplification, I charged up, labelled up, and delivered my 70Wrms street sound system to the newly erected Media/Tech hub in their Big Blue Tunnel, the better to facilitate communication and consensus decision-making during General Assemblies (which role it fulfilled so well on during Saturday's Occupation creation events). From an amorphous and homogenous sea of citizens two days ago, the London Occupation has transformed itself into a well-structured intentional community encampment, as you can see for yourself in the following photographs.

WITH “GOD” ON OUR SIDE

As a militant atheist (and part-time worshipper of the One True Trinity of the Aten, Ceiling Cat, and the Flying Spaghetti Monster ;-), I fully failed to anticipate how fortuitously world-changing events can gain the benefit of having God on our side. Since the panicked revocation of public access to the pubic space of Paternoster Square, where resides the much loathed London Stock Exchange (target of the London Occupation), we citizens choose instead to hold our General Assembly next door, on the steps of St Paul's Cathedral. One of twelve the working groups our people's assembly decided to create was tasked with liaison with the folk of the Cathedral, and boy has that paid off big time: on Sunday morning, the Canon Chancellor of St Paul's Cathedral, Dr Giles Fraser, spoke to the citizens of the London Occupation.

“People have a right to protest and it's been very good natured. Church went down well this morning. There were no problems. We had no problems getting people in. People were very helpful. I haven’t seen any trouble. I understood there might have been some, but I haven’t seen any trouble. The police were trying to protect the building for us, which was very good of them. Earlier this morning I asked them if they’d leave, because I didn’t feel that it needed that sort of protection. We'll see how it goes. We're taking one day at a time, and it's really good to see it's all worked out well for us today.”

~ Dr Giles Fraser, Canon Chancellor of St Paul's Cathedral

VOX POPULI

“The reverend came out this morning and asked the police to leave the steps of the cathedral, and said he didn't mind protesters being here, that he supported the democratic right to protest. He said there was no issue and that people were treating the site respectfully, and he was happy for it to carry on. He was asked if the services would still be carrying on and he said yes, they would carry on as if there was no problem happening. The response from protesters was very positive - everybody likes to feel that the community around us are helping out.”

~ Ben Doran, 21, music student from the Midlands

“I’m here today because I can’t see why you wouldn’t be, and I feel that this is one of the few moments in history where it’s not a protest, it’s an actual movement that’s taken root. We’re trying to challenge this myth that there are not enough resources to go around.”

~ Lorena Fentes, 27, charity worker, hailing from Vancouver, Canada

“We want as many occupations as possible, to spread the message that we can make a change. We’re peaceful and very organised.”

~ Tarek Von Bergmann, 36, German chef, Swindon

“I’m sick of talking about the state of the country, so I thought I’d do something about it.”

~ John Dean, 21, chef, Milton Keynes

“I was made redundant two months ago. I’ve come to show my anger at the Government about bank bailouts and not helping the people.”

~ Tristan Woodwards, 28, ex-IT support worker, Basingstoke, Hampshire

“Inflation is growing, prices are going up, but my income is not only frozen but going down. There’s a minority causing these problems for the majority.”

~ Virginia Lopez Calvo, 30, women’s rights worker, from Hackney, East London

“I lost my job in April because of the cuts. But now I’ve got the best view in England from my tent. I could stay here for ever.”

~ Carl Buckland, 51, social worker, Hastings, East Sussex

GRATITUDE DUE, FOR FRIENDLY FESTIVAL ATMOSPHERE

We're very grateful to Dr Giles Fraser and the folk of the Cathedral for their amicable pro-democracy intervention. By dismissing the intimidatory police presence as unnecessary, they’ve help to ensure that the atmosphere of the London Occupation is dramatically improved, now resembling that of joyful free festival of music, poetry, revolutionary ideas, and world-changing direct democracy. Now that we're no longer hemmed in by a gang of armed-&-armoured thugs in uniform, in the pay of the 1% plutocrats, interfering with our fundamental human right to Freedom of Assembly, we 99% citizens of the Occupation and our visitors can move around freely, free from the obstructive intimidation of the rozzers.

Do please come on down to the London Occupation, for just an hour, or a day, or a week, or as long as it takes. You can discover for yourself how powerful it feels to begin giving up illusions in bourgeois representative democracy, while starting to exercise your political power DIRECTLY, in concert with other citizens of the Occupation. Once we've re-discovered how to govern ourselves - through the direct democracy of our General Assemblies - we'll be able to withdraw our consent from the corrupt and corrupting Parliament, by which the 1% capitalist plutocrats lord it over us, and enjoy the spectacle of the Palace of Westminster collapsing like a house of cards in a direct democracy earthquake.

Before visiting or joining the London Occupation, please take a look at its collective needs and wants, and see if there are practical and material ways in which you could deliver your support too:

• Donations webpage at Occupy London

» http://occupylsx.org/?page_id=192

LINKS

• Occupy London

» Website - http://occupylondon.org.uk

» Facebook - http://facebook.com/occupylondon

» Twitter - http://twitter.com/occupylsx

• Hashtag - #occupylsx

• Occupy Together

» Website - http://www.occupytogether.org

• Hashtag - #occupytogether

• United for #globalchange

» Website - http://15october.net

• Hashtag - #occupytogether

• Occupy London, Global Day of Action #15Oct - further coverage

» Indymedia London Aggregate Article - http://london.indymedia.org/articles/10420

Share-&-Enjoy,

Up the Revolution,

Tim Dalinian Jones

PS: For the sake of topicality (and coz my beloved MacBook Pro is still away at the menders) I'm uploading these photos as soon as possible, without the photo-editing and captioning that normally characterises my Indymedia Action Reports.

Footnotes

All these photos are 'CopyLeft' This means you are free to copy and distribute any of my photos you find here, under the following license:

• Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License

» Human-readable summary -http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/

» Attribution: tim.dalinian.jones@gmail.com

NB: The pix above are auto-downsized versions for onscreen webpage display. If you would like the free, unedited, full-sized versions (up to 3072x2304px, 7.1Mpx, typically c. 3 MB) just click on an image: bingo! You can also right-click on an image and choose ‘Open Link in New Tab' (or similar) to open a full-sized version alongside the report webpage. If you'd like to take a copy of the full-sized image version, right-click on it and choose ‘Save Image As...' (or similar). Share and Enjoy!