Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

"Back To Work Therapy, Is No Therapy At All"

LogicGater | 29.06.2015 03:45 | Public sector cuts | Repression | Social Struggles | London

On the 26th of June 2015, members of the Mental Health Resistance Network and Blac Banner Collective @blacbanner disrupted the launch party of the so called Living Well Hub in Streatham Job Centre. Many believe that having therapists in the JobCentre Plus will only lead to further sanctions and targeting of the most vulnerable in our society. For further background search the hashtag #NoForcedTreatment.

Banner drop from inside
Banner drop from inside

A question for the Lambeth Collaborative
A question for the Lambeth Collaborative


"We are very proud to have had Iain Duncan Smith visit us a few months ago" Matt - Member of Staff at the JobCentre Plus in Streatham.

It was quite disturbing to hear Matt convey these feeling to members of the Blac Banner Collective as we are well aware that so many people have needlessly died at the hands of IDS and evil policies implemented with the Lib Dems as part of their coalition from 2010 to 2015. It has recently been reported by Disabled People Against the Cuts that "The Department for Work and Pensions has been ordered to disclose the number of Incapacity Benefit and ESA claimants who have died between November 2011 and May 2014."

A number of months ago, members of the Collective were approached by the Mental Health Resistance Network to produce some banners for a demonstration that was coming up on June 26th against the opening of the so-called 'Living Well Hub' in Streatham JobCentre. Many people believe that this will led to forced therapy with refusal resulting in a benefit sanction.

We were even more disturbed when we heard that there was to a be a 'launch party' to be held in the JobCentre of the 26th of June 2015. This event had been organised by Natalie Sutherland who works for the NHS. She is based at the Lambeth Collaborative.

We had no idea of the name of the project behind the 'Living Hell Hub' when we began our first banner, we used the words Professional or Collaborator and included an image inspired by the Peanut comics. It turns out it was more appropriate than we first realised.

On arriving in Streatham an hour ahead of schedule we were shocked to see the level of police presence in the area. A meeting place for the main demonstration had been organised for the War Memorial Gardens as the rest of us who would be attending the 'party' gathered at different spots throughout the area to avoid detection.

A few minutes after 2pm, which was the official beginning of the party, we began to move off in pairs towards the JobCentre, we were still not really sure if we would be successful or not in gaining access. However, to our relief and surprise, we had no such problems and we were eagerly welcomed by DWP staff who seemed overly excited that people had taken the time to come to their launch. So excited was Matt from the JobCentre, that myself and 'Angry Bear' felt he would soon burst out crying with tears of joy when he recalled his experience of meeting Iain Duncan Smith, Chief Executioner of the Tory Party.

Little did they know that we were there to rain on their parade. Despite having spent over 12 hours the day before finishing the banner for inside the JobCentre and being really tired, we were determined to give it one final push to make sure that the voices of those most affected by these insane initiatives got heard.

Twenty minutes after arriving in the party venue and helping ourselves to the free refreshments, we set about organising ourselves in pairs, luck had dawned on us that day as the windows of the third floor of the JobCentre which was to hold the party was right above the demonstration outside. Two activists from the Mental Health Resistance Network and Southwark Association for Mental Health took control of the banner with the slogan "Back To Work Therapy Is No Therapy At All" and dropped it from one of the windows to the cheer of the crowd below. While a member of the Blac Banner Collective took control of the megaphone and set off the siren which continued for over 20 minutes into the beginning of the official speeches.

Having achieved our objectives and fooled both the police and G4S security we decided to leave of our own will. What was meant to be a walk of shame for us, became a party of shame for them as we left many of us chanted "Shame on you", "Back to work therapy, is no therapy at all" and "collaborators!"

We left by the front door to the cheers of the crowd. During the course of our action in the JobCentre they had been motivated continuously outside by speeches from amongst others, speakers from the Mental Health Resistance Network who had organised the event and Psychologists Against Austerity, which were audible from inside the building and had attracted a lot of attention from the genuine attendees.

LogicGater
- e-mail: anon(at)politicalart.org
- Homepage: politicalart.org

Comments

Display the following 3 comments

  1. Good Effort — Crow
  2. well done — james
  3. Please to support the protest — Jonathan Bartley
Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech