to weaken in its Notts heartland, and Lynk's outfit Leicestershire North SUPPORT FOR the breakaway UDM is beginning has failed to make the headway it anticipated in Derbyshire. But that doesn't mean plain sailing for Notts loyalists. In the last few weeks the area Coal Board have stepped in HARD against the use the Royal member of the Women BARNETSON reports. of every house.
tified or charged by the army or courts.
'Plastic 'It's a weapon of suppression.
or against anything, against you' who was murdered by stabulary (RUC) while August 1984.
been intured'. the brutality we put up with everyday. threat of plastic bullets. TWO WOMEN with direct experience of police and army brutality in the north of Ireland toured the Midlands speaking our of plastic bullets. Emma Groves was blinded by the British army in 1971. Brenda Downes' husband was killed by Ulster Constabulary (RUC) in August 1984. They spoke in Nottingham at the end of January with Pam Oldfield, a national committee of Against Pit Closures. GRAHAM 'LET our heartbreak and misery put a stop to plastic bullets now before you have to suffer them too.' That's how Brenda Downes summed up the reason for the tour she and Emma wert on.
Emma Groves was shot in the face with a rubber bullet in 1971 by a British paratrooper. On 4 November 1971 the paratroopers were putting the whole district in which she lives under house arrest. That meant one 'para' standing in the lobby To lift the morale of herself and her 11 children in the house she had one of them put on a record. As the music started one of the 'paras' in the street fired into their living room, hitting Emma Groves directly in the face. She has been blind ever since. The soldier responsible was never publicly idenare being stockpiled by 15 police forces in Britain,' Emma Groves warned.
Whenever you go into the streets protesting against unemployment this weapon will be used Brenda Downes was the wife of John Downes the Royal Ulster Conat a Republican rally in The RUC, in an attempt to inhale te namonals community and disperse the demonstration, had been firing plastie bullets at the crowd earlier in the day. Though many people had been injured the rally went on. As John Downes had been separated from Brenda and her daughter during the rally it was not until half an hour after returning home that she heard he had 'I went to the Royal Victoria hospital. They didn't know if John had been injured or not. I later found out the truth.' The RUC officer who shot John Downes at point blank range was chargquest and the RUC claimed he was killed by a ricochet — even although it was filmed and shown From the miners' strike you've seen some of you to demonstrate and protest with us against 'I feel honoured to have been asked to speak,' ment are two words that spring to mind when discussing the policing of the miners strike. They words that are facts of life for Irish republicans. For many years the repression has seemed remote to most working people in Britain.
'The policing methods used in handling trade union disputes today are reflections of the war in Ireland. The police were organised like an army. They made full use of dogs, batons, shields, snatch squads and, towards the end of the strike, 'In an issue of The Miner one headline read police first took up occupation in our villages. The article linked the miners battle against the police forces of the British state to those of Irish people against repression, and the daily harassment suffered by black people from both the police and 'Remember the tactics used by the state acais the miners. It demonstrates clearly that the British ruling class will not confine to the North of Ireland