Four Insulate Britain eco-zealots including activist who glued his face to the road are facing jail after being convicted of public nuisance for blocking road in City of London
- Insulate Britain activists guilty of causing public nuisance for blocking road
- Matthew Tulley, Ben Taylor, George Burrow, Anthony Hill, convicted at court
Four eco-zealots including a man who glued his face to the road as activists brought rush-hour chaos to the heart of the country’s financial sector are facing jail.
Matthew Tulley, 44, Ben Taylor, 38, George Burrow, 68 and Anthony Hill, 72, blocked traffic between Bishopsgate and Wormwood Street in the City of London on 25 October 2021.
They were convicted of causing a public nuisance by a jury at Inner London Crown Court.
Judge Silas Reid bailed the Insulate Britain protesters ahead of sentence on 31 March.
The judge has sparked controversy by gagging activists from referring to climate change as their motivation for blocking traffic in a series of recent trials.
Pictured left to right: Insulate Britain activists Ben Taylor, Anthony Hill, George Burrow and Matthew Tulley have been convicted of causing a public nuisance
On Friday he jailed Dorset councillor Giovanna Lewis, 65, and horticultural worker Amy Pritchard, 37, for seven weeks each after they ignored the order.
David Matthew, prosecuting, earlier told jurors: ‘You are trying the defendants for what they did as part of a group called Insulate Britain.
‘At this point, Insulate Britain was blocking a number of roads.
‘Blocks on roads had been going on for some weeks and so the police had officers waiting around.’
Mr Matthew told jurors the group decided to target the City of London.
‘In the middle ages it had walls all around it. It has been the heart of the country’s financial sector.
‘It has its own police force, the City of London Police.
‘The importance of the area attracted Insulate Britain’s attention.
‘Insulate Britain had a go at blocking this part of central London.
‘Mr Tulley managed to glue his head to the road.
‘There is nothing wrong with protest. There is nothing wrong with trying to get your point across. But even if it is done in a non-violent way, there are limits to what you can do.
‘You can imagine the diversions and the effect that those diversions would have had on other parts of the road network.
‘Bishopsgate is a big bus route.’
Mr Matthew told the jury that the number of bus passengers that would have been affected was between 5,600 and 8,500.
The eco-zealots were convicted of causing a public nuisance by a jury at Inner London Crown Court (pictured)
Giving evidence City of London Police Sergeant Robert Payne said: ‘That junction is one of the main junctions in the City of London.
‘That route is used by a majority of buses’
‘There was a line of protesters with banners sitting across the north-south lanes.
‘One protester had glued their face to the road. That was the main risk of harm to an individual at the time.
‘A number of protesters had glued their hands or bodies to different carriageways.’
‘I have never seen the junction like that. It was absolutely gridlocked. It was chaos. That junction is paramount to the City of London. It was like I’ve never seen it.’
Insulate Britain has demanded a national programme to insulate all homes by 2030.
Taylor, of Bury, Lancs, Tulley, of Holmfirth, West Yorks, Burrow, of Kendal, Cumbria and Hill, also of Kendal, all denied but were convicted of causing a public nuisance.
