Charlie Gilmour: The celebrity scapegoat

On the 9 December last year, despite a month of protests throughout the country, Parliament passed a bill to treble University tuition fees. Students clashed with police and later mobbed a royal convoy containing Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall.

As you sit back and enjoy the summer break, that cold December day may seem like a long time ago. However, the story surrounding it is still unfolding. It is one of unfair imprisonment and shocking police brutality. It is one that confirms students place as the victims of the most undemocratic policy process enacted by the British Government since the decision to go to war with Iraq.

Charlie Gilmour, the adopted son of Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour, took a lot of the headlines following his actions during the 9 December riots. The 21 year old was famously photographed hanging from the Cenotaph war memorial in Trafalgar Square.

Now Gilmour’s status means he is being made an example of. Last Friday he was sentenced to 16 months in prison for violent disorder. This sentence was not for swinging on the Cenotaph. It was for kicking a Topshop window, sitting on the bonnet of one of the cars in the royal convoy and throwing a bin.

Gilmour did not actually hurt anyone and has apologised unreservedly for his actions. The Cambridge University student was quite disturbed following an emotionally scarring meeting with his biological father. He had fallen into drug use and, by his own admission, had spent the week leading up to the protests “tranquillised out of his mind”.

Gilmour’s actions were silly but his sentencing is wrong. Emily Apple, from the police-monitoring group Fitwatch, described it as “politically motivated”. She said, “You just have to compare the kind of sentences that are given to drunk people who get into fights. People have stabbed their victims in the street and got less than 16 months.”

Gilmour has been made an example of, his case acting as a deterrent for future protesters. Cambridge has not confirmed whether he will be allowed to continue his degree after prison. However, while Gilmour’s story is sad, the story of two other students that attended the 9 December protests is tragic and disturbing.

200 police officers have been assigned to hunting down and punishing student protesters over the past 6 months as part of Operation Malone and Operation Brontide. There have been many victims. On June 9 and 10, 44 student activists appeared at Westminster City Court, charged with offences including violent disorder and affray. Among them was Alfie Meadows.

Meadows, 20, studies at Middlesex University and only became involved in student activism after his beloved philosophy department was threatened with closure. He denies the charge of violent disorder levelled against him.

There is a darker side to Meadows’ story. He suffered bleeding to the brain and had to undergo a 3-hour operation after being hit by a police truncheon at the protest. According to Meadows’ mother, he was subject to an unprovoked assault while trying to leave a kettled area.

The Home Secretary, Theresa May, personally promised that the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) would investigate Meadows’ case. However, the police officer responsible has yet to even be identified, let alone questioned or brought to justice.

This would be surprising but Meadows is not the only victim of police brutality at the December 9 protests to be ignored by the IPCC. Jody McIntyre, 20, who suffers from cerebral palsy, was tipped out of his wheelchair, dragged across a road and hit with a baton. It is all on video and has been viewed by hundreds of thousands of people but the IPCC found that the police were justified in their actions.

McIntyre said, “I never expected to receive any kind of justice or honesty from an investigation which consisted of the Metropolitan Police, whom I consider to be one of the most corrupt and inept institutions in the country, investigating themselves, but their report on my case was even poorer than I could have imagined.

“Even with regard to my ejection from my wheelchair, the police officers involved try to justify their behaviour by referring to the fact that mounted officers were preparing to charge and that I was in the way. I find it stunning that their justification for their violence towards me is that I was in the way of a violent attack on a crowd of protesters, which included children. Remarkably, the report even contains the suggestion that I threw myself from my wheelchair.”

6 months on from 9 December and the Government have given the final go-ahead for Universities to charge up to £9000 a year in tuition fees. Over a third of Universities have already said they will charge the maximum amount and all of them will raise fees significantly.

The coalition Government, one half of which signed a pledge promising to abolish tuition fees altogether if they came to power, have radically instead raised them and savagely cut funds for teaching.

Should you choose to protest about this – even if you don’t harm anyone – you could end up in jail like Charlie Gilmour. Even worse, you will be at the peril of a police force that is not accountable for its actions. You could be dragged around like the disabled Jody McIntyre or beaten to within an inch of your life like Alfie Meadows.

The British Government has praised student led movements in the Arab Spring uprisings this year for their work in promoting free speech and democracy in states that do not value either. Perhaps they should look at the parallel situation happening a little closer to home.