Bit of a heads-up really. A fitwatch callout was circulated to fitwatchers yesterday as follows:
I quote:
“please forward x
Celebrate Fitwatch’s 1st Birthday at Climate Camp
This year’s Climate Camp will also celebrate Fitwatch’s first outing to a major protest. Since then we have gone from strength to strength.
Use Fitwatch tactics all week, and join us to celebrate our anniversary on the day of mass action (9th August). Together we can render the FIT ineffective, and you too can experience the pleasure of forcing a cameraman to retreat.
During the year, we have received criticism on our blog for being “professional protesters”. However, we agree. We take protest seriously. We want to be effective, and to do this we need reclaim our anonymity.
Fitwatch - bring the professional back into protesting!”
AS SchNEWS SWINGS ITS LONG LENS TOWARDS STATE SURVEILLANCE
It’s time to get yer party masks out- FITwatch are celebrating their 1st birthday! FITwatch have been a welcome presence at demos - obscuring the view of the police Forward Intelligence Teams and preventing police evidence gathering and intimidation of crowds.
FIT teams (for the uninitiated) are uniformed officers, whose job it is to build profiles on those opposed to the status quo. The same few officers from a variety of police forces turn up at anti-capitalist, anti-arms trade, animal rights, squat evictions, the climate camp etc etc. Taking literally hundreds of photos at often very innocuous events, their job is to build understanding of our networks. They in turn pass that information onto agencies such as the National Public Order Intelligence Unit and the National Extremism Tactical Co-ordinating Unit. If you’re on a demo and you see a group of cops with ‘blue-topped’ Hi-Vis jackets and long lens cameras then you’re probably looking at the FIT.
Their methods could be charitably described as ‘pro-active’ as they follow and harass activists who have the misfortune to make it onto one of their spotter cards. One individual who’s made the way up this ladder of enhanced surveillance told SchNEWS “Police men who at first are total strangers accost you in the street by your first name, trying to give the impression that they’re ‘onto’ you in some way. You then get singled out for stops and searches and on big demos you might even get the pleasure of your own police escort! You don’t have to have been convicted of any crime to end up on the list – mere suspicion is enough”.
One of their spotter cards fell into the hands of activists at the DSEi 2003 Arms Fair and revealed the bizarre range of people considered potential sources of disorder – including comedian/activist Mark Thomas. At least one campaigner has been driven to the edge of a nervous breakdown by their constant harassment. They’ve also received criticism from the NUJ for cataloguing photographers who regularly attend demos.
The FIT teams were first deployed as a police tactic against football hooligans – travelling to games around the U.K and Europe spotting known ‘troublemakers’. Plans are now afoot to roll the tactic out as a form of social control on council estates. Announcing she intended to extend FIT operations to problem estates, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith admitted she wanted targets “harried and harassed.” And this is exactly what they are doing on demonstrations - they are trying to harass people enough they no longer attend..
For a long while the movement didn’t really deal with the issue, almost adopting a policy of ‘ignore them and they’ll go away’ and not letting them know the chilling effect they were having on political activism.
Within the last year however the tables have been turned, and no street action is now complete without FITwatch, who have been very successful at changing the vibe at demos, by blocking off the cameras with massive black banners and following the evidence gatherers - basically doing to the FIT teams what the FIT have been doing to us for years. With these tactics, they’ve been honing the art of creating blind spots in the police’s intelligence, making spaces in which activists can feel safe. And ironically the FIT team seem rather coy themselves - they don’t like being filmed. Generally they try to get other cops to effect arrests and keep their names from becoming public knowledge.
FIT team personnel don’t have a very high turnover – just think how long new recruits must take to memorise all those names and faces. That means that some of them at least have become very familiar to us.
Until the arrival of FITwatch on the scene, a couple of coppers with some oversized camcorders seemed plenty enough to put the frighteners. A year of activity disrupting the police’s invasive strategies and, in FITwatch’s own words:
“FIT no longer feel safe on our demonstrations. According to their own statements, they have felt ‘intimidated’ by our tactics, and we have at times, rendered their intelligence gathering operations ‘ineffective’. We have seen several demonstrations where the cameraman has had to be ‘withdrawn’, and we have shown we can do this even when our numbers are small.”
Wednesday 4th June, Brighton. The Carnival Against the Arms Trade, tying in with the smashEDO campaign, saw a turnout of some 600-odd people assembling at The Level in Brighton then marching on the EDO offices where a Noise Demonstration was staged.
One of the interesting sights was of the number of folk who’ve clearly taken the fitwatch approach to heart and were doing their best to prevent police FIT and local intelligence-gatherers from photographing the protesters.
It seemed that no sooner did the camera-wielding cops focus their lenses than fitwatchers appeared as if from nowhere, photographing in turn, holding up banners in front of the cop cameras, and generally making their presence felt.
The constantly repeated sight of cops running away in an effort to seek new vantage points from which to snap their pics was truly inspirational.
“…Street Journalism includes covering a lot of political and social protest, of which there are plenty in London.
But in recent months - that seems to have coincided with the introduction of the 2008 Counter Terrorism Act and subsequent publicity campaign - according to various work colleagues, it seems the London Metropolitan (Met) Police Forward Intelligence Teams (FIT), also known as Intelligence Gatherers - or the now infamous name of the FIT Squad - are taking particular interest in the Street Journalists.”
First came FIT… the presence of Police Forward Intelligence Teams at football match crowds and the like.
Armed with cameras they maintained a high-profile presence to allegedly “deter” acts of hooliganism etc.
But somehow their remit then became extended such that they began to monitor protests, demonstrations, and so forth.
So then came fitwatch… a response on the part of political activists to such unwarranted encroachments on individual freedom of movement, association, and privacy.
More recently FIT and other police surveillance-type units have even been spotted outside public meetings attended by those wishing to engage with social, political, and environmental issues. Photographing and making notes about attendees willy-nilly.
There can be little doubt that at the very least this behaviour on the part of the police is intimidatory, and possibly could even be construed as harassment.
And equally there can be little doubt that the police must be only too well aware of how provocative such tactics are, especially to folk living in a supposedly “free” and “democratic” society.
And now the latest development… apparently FIT are no longer content to photograph and document political activists and the socially concerned. Oh no. Now they’re even targetting mainstream media photographers!
Which is of course meeting with some resistance. And at long last this dubious police practise (which should have been reined in long ago) is starting to be challenged in the courts.
From (and with thanks to) Nottingham photographer Tash’s blog, One Eye on the Road…
“FIT are beyond the evidence gathering we have all come to know. There is an intimidatory component to their activities. Protestors, Football Fans, Animal Rights activists, Travellers and Festival attendees have know this for years. The NUJ and journalist are the latest group to be added to be targeted by these folks.”
Read the full article, which includes lots of useful links at One Eye on the Road!
“On Tuesday 6th May, people had initially met on the corner of Abbey Bridge and the road leading to Lenton Lane. Then, arriving together, about 60-70 people gathered at the UK headquarters of Heckler & Koch, based within the Easter Park Industrial Estate on Lenton Lane, Nottingham,Heckler & Koch are the world’s second-largest manufacturer of handguns, assault rifles, submachine guns, machine guns and grenade launchers.
Many wondered why a peaceful and lawful protest continues to attract the levels of surveillance this and similar events have done in the recent past. In addition to Nottinghamshire Police very own ‘Evidence Gatherers’ [EG]
At this event, some say that they were honored, that we again warranted the attendance of an officer from the Forward Intelligence Team of the Metropolitan Police CO 5494 PC Ian Skivens [CO stands for ‘Commissioners Office’, officers deployed ‘extra’ to divisions]. He last came to nottingham on 1st April.”
Check out the article (which includes lots of photos) at Indymedia
“Protestors trickled in down the path from Tower Bridge, dispersing among the crowds of camera-toting tourists and their toddlers, high school volleyball teams on school trips, students and local workers. But what was planned as a protest against the elections and a blockade of the BNP became little more than a demonstration of power by the London Metropolitan Police and the now-notorious Forward Intelligence Team (FIT)…
“However, despite the thousands of leaflets printed advertising the action, and despite the months of planning, postering and stickering, barely one hundred protestors gathered at City Hall for the demonstration. Many stayed home, or at a distance, soured by the persistent police presence at such widely-advertised protests, and wary of further encounters with the FIT team…
“At least two hours before the scheduled 6pm protests, police officers had already established a concentrated perimeter around City Hall, stretching beyond the borders offered by the picturesque London and Tower Bridges. “Suspiciously dressed” passengers were systematically stopped and searched by officers on foot at Underground stops. By five o’clock the small brownfield off the south side of City Hall was filled by 24 police vans encircled by police cameras mounted on tripods and multi-story cranes…
“Police medics and hundreds of police officers swarmed around City Hall, patrolling the area in pairs, equipped with earpieces and accompanied by the FIT-team outfitted in blue vests. As demonstrators arrived in small groups, FIT-team officers slowed into motion, tailing individuals, photographing groups of would-be protestors, stopping and searching anyone wearing a black hooded sweatshirt.”
