BRITISH UNEMPLOYED

Wairarapa Age, 27 February 1934, Page 6

BRITISH UNEMPLOYED

HYDE PAEK DEMONSTRATION. RESTRAINED PROTEST. LONDON, February 25. The general impression left by the Hyde Park demonstration of hungermarchers, delegates to the Congress of Action, and sympathisers was that it was a truly British display of protest restrained by self-discipline. The participants were good-temper-ed and never obtrusive. Police control, fogs in the suburbs, and a continuous drizzle in the West End damped _tho preliminary enthusiasm, but the completeness of the organisation for handling both moving and stationary crowds appealed to French journalistic eye-witnesses, who compared this foresight with the lack of it preceding the Paris riots. Scotland Yard, to which, every metropolitan division reported, was the real nerve centre controlling 15,000 constables and 5,000 special police throughout London, of which 4,000 foot police in gleaming wet capes and 200 overcoated mounted men maintained order at Hyde Park among a crowd of 15,000 to 20,000. The day began with a resumption of the Congress of Action, Sir. McGovern, MJ?., securing the adoption of a resolution demanding the removal of the Labour Party’s ban on the Congress march. The audience frantically cheered Messrs PoUitt and Mann, who had been bailed .out. Congress adopted a mass action programme and appointed a deputation, including Mr. Maxton, Mias Ellen Wilkinson, and Mr. Campbell Stephen, to present it to the House of Commons on February 27. Refusing to receive Mr. MacDonald’s letter declining to hear a deputation and the chairman having appealed to delegates to keep their heads, 1700 members of Congress departed for Hyde Park, escorted by imperturbable police, who impartially distributed their services to other contingents. The only incident en route was the arrest of two marchers at Camden Town for obstruction, after which, dogged, yet pitiful, their companions marched on. Two police officers atop of the Marble Arch directed the influx into the park. Others occupied a control tower inside the park and were assisted by motor-cycle dispatch riders. A telephone installation connected all the out* posts. Squads of police unobtrusively occupied adjacent thoroughfares. Three huge marquees equipped with field kitchens supplied the requirements of the ambulance corps and police.

The size of the crowd fell short of expectations, many being the usual loungers who listen to Sunday orators. Free movement was possible everywhere. The sightseers included an unusual number of fashionably-dressed women. The attendance was only a third of that of the demonstration of October, 1932. The only casualty was a police inspector who was bitten in the hand by a squad leader who was arrested.