Anti-GM action - 29-30/09/04 - Sainsbury’s Haydock (Merseyside) depot blockaded
G M Free | 30.09.2004 15:12 | Bio-technology | Health | Liverpool
Sainsbury’s Haydock depot blockaded for three and a half hours.
This was in protest over Sainsbury’s selling milk from cows that have been fed GM feed.
Lots of lorries stopped.
No arrests
This was in protest over Sainsbury’s selling milk from cows that have been fed GM feed.
Lots of lorries stopped.
No arrests
At 2340 on Wednesday September 29th about 25 people from the North West blockaded Sainsbury’s Haydock distribution centre in Merseyside.
A circle of six people locked to each other with arm tubes in front of the main gate. Meanwhile others stopped lorries, talked to drivers and locked the second gate (emergency gate) with a decent bike lock.
Each hour a depot is shut is said to set back Sainsbury’s by three hours and cost them £100 000 to £150 000.
This is not the first time the depot has been blockaded;
Back in July, Sainsbury’s distribution centres around the UK were simultaneously blockaded.
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/294268.html
Last December workers at the depot were on strike over pay and conditions (see below)
Farmers groups have also blockaded the depot with tractors and farm vehicles in the past.
Just after 0300, a mobile CCTV van arrived at the emergency gate with eight coppers, and a car with two more cops. They got rid of the lock in no time and lorries began leaving through the emergency gate.
This gate has never been used to get lorries out and in when the depot has been blockaded in the past. It looks like Sainsbury’s were hit hard by the last blockade and have had to make contingency plans for a repeat scenario.
The vast majority of Sainsbury’s lorry drivers were supportive – they are pissed off with Sainsbury’s because of how they treat their workers and most were anti-GM too.
Noone was arrested and all the blockaders and their equipment got home safely, happy in the knowledge that the blockade had cost the supermarket chain £350 00 - £500 000.
More general info here: http://www.geneticsaction.org.uk/
Info on strike by workers at Haydock;
Socialist W***er report http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/print_article.php4?article_id=626
BBC Report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/england/merseyside/3244930.stm
Indymedia report of Nationally coordinated blockades https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/294268.html
Initial post on Indymedia about this blockade plus comments
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/09/298414.html
Mainstream press coverage of this blockade http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3563931
A circle of six people locked to each other with arm tubes in front of the main gate. Meanwhile others stopped lorries, talked to drivers and locked the second gate (emergency gate) with a decent bike lock.
Each hour a depot is shut is said to set back Sainsbury’s by three hours and cost them £100 000 to £150 000.
This is not the first time the depot has been blockaded;
Back in July, Sainsbury’s distribution centres around the UK were simultaneously blockaded.
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/294268.html Last December workers at the depot were on strike over pay and conditions (see below)
Farmers groups have also blockaded the depot with tractors and farm vehicles in the past.
Just after 0300, a mobile CCTV van arrived at the emergency gate with eight coppers, and a car with two more cops. They got rid of the lock in no time and lorries began leaving through the emergency gate.
This gate has never been used to get lorries out and in when the depot has been blockaded in the past. It looks like Sainsbury’s were hit hard by the last blockade and have had to make contingency plans for a repeat scenario.
The vast majority of Sainsbury’s lorry drivers were supportive – they are pissed off with Sainsbury’s because of how they treat their workers and most were anti-GM too.
Noone was arrested and all the blockaders and their equipment got home safely, happy in the knowledge that the blockade had cost the supermarket chain £350 00 - £500 000.
More general info here:
http://www.geneticsaction.org.uk/ Info on strike by workers at Haydock;
Socialist W***er report
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/print_article.php4?article_id=626 BBC Report
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/england/merseyside/3244930.stm Indymedia report of Nationally coordinated blockades
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/294268.html Initial post on Indymedia about this blockade plus comments
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/09/298414.html Mainstream press coverage of this blockade
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3563931
G M Free
Comments
Hide the following 5 comments
BBC coverage
30.09.2004 15:34
watcher
wehooooo
30.09.2004 16:02
this is how we should stop companies jsut block them, and cost them thausands. well done guys keep it up.
anarchkit
Sainsbury's blockade photos
01.10.2004 10:14
Thanks for your reactions - we had fun too! More of the same, and who knows at which depot......? Yes please.
blockader
Meat shelves stacked with lettuces!
08.10.2004 13:47
By Friday lunchtime, a day and a half after the blockade, Sainsburys stores in Manchester had empty shelves in some meat and dairy lines. The situation seemed to get worse for Sainsburys that day, recovering by Saturday. At one Sainsburys store in Fallowfield, Manchester, anti-GM activists handed out leaflets and spoke to potential customers about their unlabelled GM milk.
Good news was received from further afield... a researcher in Derby reportedly noticed large gaps in dairy and meat produce shelves, which had been instead stacked with vegetables! (Lettuces received a special mention). When the researcher rang Sainsburys to enquire about this unusually healthy approach to shelf-stacking, the first person to answer said "it must be that blockade". Further enquiries met with a denial that there had even been a blockade and mumblings about computer problems ... we can imagine what the truth was!
Perhaps anti GM protesters could apply for money from government 5-fruit-and-veg-a-day initiatives?
happy vegan
Sainsbury's profits plunge...
20.10.2004 18:55
"Analysts slashed their profit forecasts for Sainsbury's yet again today, as the struggling supermarkets chain was forced to confirm fears of a sharp fall in first-half profits"
Shares fell again to new low. "Underlying profits for the half year to 9 October will crash to between £125 million and £135 million" (compares with £366 million last year).
Now figure in the cost of the first national Sainsbury's blockade over GM-feed, at £3.5 million (that's £150,000 per hour per depot), and work out the percentage effect we're having on their profits (& also why they successfully stopped us the second attempt)!!
HOORAH - bring it on....
gloater