Around 300 people gathered to protest outside Hackney town hall as the councillors met to vote on millions of pounds of cuts. The town hall front entrance was ringed with three layers of crash barriers with police deployed with riot shields at the doors.

There was about an hour of speeches from local anti-cuts campaign groups, trade unions groups and local community groups as well as a performance of a special anti-cuts rnb style song. Around the corner people stood in a queue to be searched before being let inside to the public gallery (no food, or drinks, or other items were allowed inside).

Chanting "Whose Town Hall? Our Town Hall!" the crowd began marching around the back of the town hall, and banging and kicking the doors as police intervened to protect the doors. Next up people took the road to blockade it for an hour, as police looked on.

Meanwhile inside the meeting 40-50 people in the public gallery made their views heard, condemning the cuts -  at one point the meeting was suspended due to the heckling from the gallery.

The council passed the cuts at around 9.45pm

http://london.indymedia.org/events/7492
http://hackneyalliance.wordpress.com/