With the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill (CJIB) coming closer to becoming enforcable in January, this time led by Ben Westwood, fetish photographer and son of the acclaimed fashion designer Vivienne Westwood, CAAN took to the streets of Westminster again to protest against the prying eyes of an intolerant government and their puritanical agenda.

Protesters gathered by the Westminster tube station on an unusually sunny October day, guarded by a large number of cheerful police officers, and started handing out leaflets to the press and the public and and making placards ready. Two chained and gagged models joined Ben Westwood and he answered questions from press crowd and posed for photos while CAAN waited for the police to confirm we had completed the correct paperwork to allow us to demonstrate in the restricted area and allow us to start our protest.

After an hour of posing and preparing, a small army of police including two squad cars and a van blocked off parts of the road to allow our number free reign to protest safely in the area, with placards, slogans, fliers and chains in all directions. The kinky caravan led by Ben and his bound models, progressed around Parliament Square, surrounded in equal measure by press and police, with the police moving us onto the road when we ran out of accessible pavement.

At the end of the march, we continued to pass out a large number of fliers giving the public more information about the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill (CJIB), and specifically sections 62 through 65, those that deal with the ownership of 'extreme' images, or any image which "portrays, in an explicit and realistic way" among others, "an act which threatens a person's life," (I.e. Being tied to a train track – say goodbye to Dita Von Teases book) or "an act which results, or is likely to result, in serious injury to a person's anus, breasts
or genitals," (so no cutting out the ball busting clip in the last James Bond film and placing it in your pornography collection).

CAAN activists then leafleted on their way to the BBC for Ben to do a live interview, feeling pleased the issues had made it into the mainstream news finally.

The public took the event well, entering in the spirit in some cases, and in others, asking questions about why we were there and reading our flyers. Once again we found that nobody seems to have heard of the new laws relating to governments interference in the sexuality and sexual behaviors of harmless citizens.

It was a well planned and executed protest on a fine day, what more could we ask for? The law repealed of course!

By Chris Hilliard

For more information on our cause, please go to  http://caan.org.uk/press/