Noisy visit in Widnes

Date: Thursday 11 December 2003

Today Cheshire Against Bayer paid a visit to Bayer's pesticide manufacturing site in Widnes to protest against Bayer's involvement in GM crops.

Three people attempted to enter the office and got as far as the entrance lobby – the second door leading to the reception was already locked. So we made ourselves comfortable in the thoughtfully provided arm chairs whilst a well practised security procedure kicked in on the site. The two receptionists swiftly locked away all their files and papers, site security scuttled up and down the stairs and the tannoy announced “there is a peaceful protest”.

After playing with the internal phone in the lobby for a bit we got the site manager on the phone, who agreed to come and talk to us – in a while. With the help of a megaphone and some wistles we then entertained the staff in the building by telling them all about Bayer's sins. 30 minutes later the police arrived and two of us were invited in for quite a detailed discussion with the manager, who was very anxious to point out that his site had nothing to do with GM. However he refused to pass a statement to his bosses demanding Bayer pull out of GM.

Meanwhile people outside held up banners and caused a racket with drums, megaphones, wistles and airhorns, the cars in the staff car park were leafletted and most passers-by gave their support. Site Security did a very good job at barricading the gates, telling a few delivery lorries to come back later - Just a handful of energetic people proved to be quite effective!

Apart from a lot of noise and disruption our presence caused at least one little bit of economic damage – feeding six police officers in the staff canteen can't have come cheaply!

After two and a half hours we decided we needed some lunch ourselves...

Bayer Cropscience listen up - We are the headache that won't go away!


for more info on why we are targeting Bayer visit

www.stopbayergm.org