RESIZE YOUR PHOTOS FOR THOSE ON DIAL UP!!!

BUT, still a good action!

You call it a picket - the comment above calls it an action.

From pics looks like you started on pavement and not blockading, but leafletting. If a few drivers drove away after being talked to, imagine how much more money you would have lost them if you'd blockaded them, like all the other solidarity actions with Rossport and the Niger Delta around the country that have gone on over the last weeks.

Nice one nonetheless...maybe next time...

A blockade might be nice in theory, but you'd find yourself nicked pretty sharpish, a picket can be maintained for several hours if enough people are willing to stick about, not to mention that a picket has much better propaganda value, which is better for the campaign in the long term. So whether a blockade would necessarily lose the station more business is pretty open to debate, I'd have thought.

With a relatively small group of people like this, a blockade really isn't going to last very long.

Let's not get into a long debate which won't be resolved about whether to blockade or picket - in the end it's a matter of choice by the group. But you can do both, and thus get the effectiveness of each in one action...

However, from my standpoint, it's a pity not to start with a blockade, and move onto a picket. You start by blocking entrances, and then when you have to move ('cos of police) onto the pavement, you might choose to, and from thenceforth, it's a picket. The change is as good as a rest, and people will tend to stay around longer 'cos it's less boring!

It's not true that you'd get nicked pretty sharpish (unless you punch all coppers when you see them, or become frenzied by uniform to torch the place!). Sometimes the police are arsey and get you out of the way, sometimes they just leave you there. Sometimes the garage asks the police not to arrest because they don't want the publicity of a court case. There are ways of improving your chances, or at least longetivity, by using tripods, arm tubes or lower-tech devices (such as sitting down and linking arms). A blockade is a tactic that can be adapted, and can be very effective with a small group of people.

Check out all the different protests at Shell garages over the last few weeks - most of them were blockades, with rooftop occupations; some lasted a little time, some lasted half a day.

As to propaganda value, I don't get it. Both tactics would be of course improved in effectiveness if they were being repeated day after day, all over the country. Short of that, I don't think there's much propaganda value in either, though it's not to be written off, especially if you have good press work and arrests/court cases, which gives you the hook the meedja are into.

We had wanted to do a blockade. The numbers and confidence of those involved didn't permit it. Hence we restricted ourselves to a picket. Maybe next time, if more people commit themselves.

You're dead right. I think I know the problem: like you say people think they are going to get nicked straight away. That rarely happens with Public Order offences (especially when there are loads of witnesses).

Usually, the plod can't be arsed with the paperwork and will just try and move you on with a warning. They'll probably also try to convince the complainant not to go for charges and give tham a chance to resolve the situation amicably.

In terms of dealing with the plod, I have found so long as you keep your cool, be polite and appear to be reasonable and sympathetic to the police position etc. blah. you can get away with a lot- no-one likes getting the piss taken out them, and the police are better positioned than most at having the upper hand.

Maybe someone (more experienced than me) should write a manual on this very subject?

Anyway, nice one for getting out there and doing something. I'm sure the victims of police brutality at Rossport appreciate the gesture of support.

to the macho people talking about how you should had blockaded blah blah...why didnt they come to blockade themselves!? rather than criticising come down and join...at least these guys spent some time doing an awareness day!

I'm constantly amazed why some publishers see fit to blank people's faces on fluffy actions where nothing criminal is going on. Obviously the only real crims here are shell for flogging fuel paid for by other's blood, livelihood, ecology etc. When the local rag or TV station covers the action will they too blank out faces? Hardly. As often as not, the face blanking is totally ineffectual anyway as the FIT team will have taken their own pics and it's a doddle for them to marry up their own pics of faces with your pics that still include their clothing, hair style etc. The main effect of publishing blanked pics like this is that any casual viewer from mainstream society is left thinking that indymedia etc are sites where a load of crims hang out. "Well they must be doing something very wrong. Why else would they hide their faces?" And then they'll move on never to return. Further destructive marginalisation is all this will ever achieve. I and many others are really fed up with us being marginalised by the wrong mesaages being sent out.

If you want to know why I blanked the faces, just have a look at redwatch. It's full of pics pulled off indymedia.

A note on dealing with the cops. We did get a visit after about an hour. Two of us had agreed to speak to them. We walked straight over and politely suggested that we go somewhere quiet to talk. We then told them what we were doing and what our timescale was. I was then asked my name and address, I told them I'd rather not give it. End of discussion. Off they drove.

My guess is have someone to talk who looks respectable, is preferrably middle aged and who knows how to be politely assertive. Also know what you are going to say in advance. In other words, take the initiative, don't let them. I know they are reluctant to nick people cos it involves loads of paper work.