Just Do It: A Tale of Modern-day Outlaws Page #2

The target is Lord Mandelson,

Minister for Business

and everyone's favourite unelected,

slimy politician.

The plan is to draw attention

to the fact that he is responsible

for the Vestas factory closing down.

We're saying Mandelson

has the power

to put a huge investment

into the car industry.

Generally, he's good at helping

high-carbon industries,

but when it comes to a failing

wind-turbine factory,

he's incapable of giving them

any incentive to stay,

promising that there will be a demand

within five years.

Tomorrow Sally chains herself

to Mandelson's house

and could be arrested.

So, have you been arrested?

You've not? Are you prepared to be?

I guess I have to be prepared to be!

Yeah.

It's a slow decision. I'd met people

who had been arrested.

I'd heard their stories

and knew what it entailed.

You make a theoretical decision...

I guess the crunch point

of the decision

was in saying I'd get involved

with the Mandelson action.

If they can bail out the banks

with 1.4 trillion pounds,

they need to bail out

our green future.

As hoped, the stunt propelled the

Vestas struggle into the headlines.

When I changed from medicine, there

was a lot of uncertainty in my life

about what I would do

instead of this career plan,

but as I've got more involved

in activism,

I think it's become really clear to me

what the most urgent things are.

Activism is a whole other education,

outside of this narrow education

you sometimes get in Cambridge,

being taught

to think in an academic way,

disconnected from the real world.

And I want to use the education

I've got here

and put it into the real world,

and learn from the people.

So, that's what really excites me

about having these two worlds.

Pitching up on the doorsteps of places

like airports and power stations,

Climate Camp

run direct-action training camps

and have shifted the climate-change

debate in the UK.

But if you've seen Climate Camp

on the news,

you'll know they are frequently

portrayed as violent hooligans.

Police say this was why they had to go

into the Climate Camp.

There's a knife

which was discovered in a tree,

and here we see grappling irons

that could be used

to scale a building,

and these are white suits

that protestors might wear, they say.

Also, we see bolt croppers.

They could be used

to try to take down any fences.

And over here we see wetsuits.

The protesters said they'll try

to reach Kingsnorth by any means -

by air, by land and by sea.

Now, Climate Campers may be

extremists, and they definitely are,

and they may even be prepared

to break the law, which they often do.

But let's be clear - previous Climate

Camps have faced police violence.

But the campers have resisted this

peacefully.

This is not a riot!

This is not a riot!

This year the Camp is in London,

targeting banks

that finance climate change.

Marina's in a group

from the south coast.

Today's Times.

Page 12 and 13.

An image of a petrol bomb exploding -

which is ludicrous,

because we use biodiesel, not petrol!

We're doing some basic techniques

that might come in useful

for the first 24 hours, while

we settle down with the police.

If we do need to use

blockading techniques,

before we have our defences built,

then these will be the sort of things

we'll use - bodies.

That's all we've got.

If you were going to give me

the bumps, you'd do it like this.

Yeah, so four people.

That's rigid. Easy to pick up.

Now, try floppy.

Face the other way!

That's a lot harder.

That's a really good way of doing it.

Across London, groups of campers

are gathering at meeting points,

ready to pounce on the secret location

for this year's camp.

Today we're doing

the Climate Camp bicycle swoop.

Would you like a flyer?

We'll receive a secret message,

revealing the location of the camp,

and we'll all be swooping there.

We've received a text message.

It says there is an intricate plan,

and they would like us

to all stay together.

I'm very excited about today.

There's a lot of unknown things,

so that kind of makes me nervous,

as well.

We don't know where it is.

It's a secret.

Who hasn't taken part in any meetings

involving consensus?

In a big meeting, if you agree,

it's hands up and wiggly fingers.

We're not a mad cult, unless you think

Climate Camp is a mad cult.

It feels ridiculous to begin with,

but when meetings are working,

it's very effective.

"Left out of Blackheath station.

Up the hill,

bear left onto Hare and Billet Road.

Walk to the top,

and the site is on your right. "

It's then a race across London

to secure the site,

before the police can stop them.

They've done it here. Wow!

You've had your training. It will

count more when the police arrive.

Months of meticulous planning

has paid off,

and the site is occupied

before the police arrive.

Let me hear a massive cheer

for getting Climate Camp 2009 started!

The Climate Camp is a temporary

encampment, totally autonomous.

There's no hierarchical

power structures.

Everything is run through consensus.

It doesn't seek

to be given permission to be there.

Climate Camp is about direct action

and seizing power

and making the changes

that you want to see.

And it's in its nature

and it teaches that

to everyone who comes.

Well, here we are on Blackheath,

in London,

taking on capitalism, which is quite

scary for the capitalists, I hope.

And we expected

three-deep riot police.

We expected to be doing

all sorts of naughty things

that I can't tell you,

cos we might need them in future.

And we get here, and you can't even

get a copper when you need one.

Hi. All right.

Have a successful camp. Bye-bye.

Have a nice night.

It's a camp where people can come

together and do workshops,

training, share ideas,

plan direct action together.

A lot of us knew each other.

We already had a form of affinity.

We'd done a few different things

together already.

And we came together

to plan and carry out an action.

The police may have made themselves

scarce, but they're watching.

Since the plan needs to be top-secret,

the activists take precautions.

They remove batteries from phones

and are careful about what they say.

I was just gonna say another thing.

I don't know...

Talking about the target might be OK,

just as long as the time and the date

is not talked about.

I don't know.

There's no need to say it,

if everyone's seen it,

so we could just refer to it.

Can we use another word,

instead of the target?

And we all know

what we're talking about.

"The target", maybe?

So, I don't think we'll be able

to blockade the whole building,

but we wanted to blockade

the front of the building

and stop people getting in there.

I think probably three ladders,

with people at the top,

and people at the bottom locked on.

The idea of this was to blockade it,

to reclaim it as the people.

It's our bank. We're reclaiming it.

And we're gonna build it

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