‘Occupy London’ Protesters Evicted from London City Office Block
Occupy London have been evicted from their office space base. The group were using London City office space of a former bank as an ideas workshop.
The Occupy London protesters have been evicted from the London City office they were inhabiting.
The protesters were using disused space owned by Swiss bank UBS on Sun Street near Liverpool Street Station. Police are said to have evicted around 50 people from the building, labelled the ‘bank of ideas’, in the early hours of this morning.
The eviction came after UBS won a legal case against the group who then attempted to occupy a new London City office at Leadenhall Street. This location was once home to the now deceased Iraqi Rafidain Bank and was the former site of Midland bank at St Alphage Highwalk. However the group were again evicted by police.
The group also took over but later abandoned Roman House in Barbican amid fears that the contractors employed to strip asbestos from the building would lose their jobs.
Arrests were also made at the time of the evictions with one man being held on an alleged assault and criminal damage charge, it is believed that this is a bailiff who drove his car at the protesters after being questioned by a journalist.
A statement from Occupy London said: “As the events were scaling down, at around 4am, one of the bailiffs who was being asked by journalists about the lack of identification, assaulted a photographer by punching him in the face, then got into his car and drove straight into a number of protesters and media at speed.”
The movement took control of the London City office in November of last year in protest against the banking sector and the governments response to the financial crisis. It was at this point that they turned the space of the former bank into the ‘bank of ideas’.
The building had been empty after it went into administration last year.