THE POLICE AND DEMONSTRATION NUMBERS
Whatever the issue, campaigners and protestors, are now used to the farce of the
estimates given out by the police for the numbers on demonstrations when
contrasted with the experience of those participating. The most notorious
example was the initial figure of 70,000 given out on 15 February 2003 for a
demonstration which was the largest in British history, with up to two million
protestors on the streets.

Last Saturday was another milestone in the endlessly repeated saga, when the
police gave their initial estimate as 2 to 3,000. Following complaints, this was
quickly raised by the police to 10,000, a figure that was then adopted by most
of the media.

How do we know the figure of 10,000 was nonsense? The combined total of placards
distributed at the start of the rally by Stop the War, CND, BMI and just two
other organisations affiliated to Stop the War was over 10,000. Many more
placards were distributed by other groups. Look at any picture of the march and
it is clear that only a minority carried placards. The ratio is around 5-10
people not carrying placards to one person carrying a placard. The maths is
quite simple for the whole demonstration.

Stop the War has made a formal complaint to the Metropolitan Police and sent a
copy of the complaint to all media sources in the country. We know that many of
our supporters have sent complaints to newspapers and television news
programmes. What the motivation is for the ever predictable under-estimating of
numbers attending demonstrations is anyone's guess!


Source: Stop the War Coalition E-Newsletter.