call out for blockades at Glenneagles
Started with summary of proposal to date, including input from blockades meeting on Saturday.
Discussed various practical communication techniques. An SMS messaging system is being set up but we may also need radios or something.
Main focus of discussion was how to co-ordinate the blockade. [Call out is for autonomous blockades but co-ordinated so that: a) the blockade is complete and b) diversity of tactics is respected and groups don't get in each others way]
Two ideas discussed but REJECTED were:
a) Dividing the areas geographically (i.e. the Germans take this junction, the English that junction, etc.). (Rejected because people might have very different and possibly conflicting plans and still live in the same country and also because we don't want to organise along nationalistic lines.)
b) Having a small action co-ordination team, who knew details of all the plans and who could be approached by groups to check their plans didn't clash with others. (Rejected because it's not a good way of organising and anyway no-one would be on that group!)
Discussed not co-ordinating the blockade at all but also rejected that.
Agreed that we wanted to allow space for different styles. (Explicit agreement that there should be some space for "lock-down" style blockades usually used in Scotland). We want to find a way to do this without allowing the state to target certain groups.
Recognised that this is not a new problem and that we may not find a totally perfect system but have to do the best we can and learn from past experience.
Discussed deciding it totally on the spot (all leave as one group then some stop at one junction and some go on to the next). However, this is not really possible due to the geography (next junction could be a couple of hours walk over the hills!). We want to act in solidarity with each other as much as possible but recognise that the geography makes physically being close enough to provide practical back-up on the spot may not be possible.
Agreed that final decision should be as last minute as possible. Eventually we came up with following plan:
People/groups wishing to take part in the blockade should start thinking about it, planning and talking to each other. People should arrive as early as possible and try to find which other people/groups they would want to practically work with. On Monday (4th) evening there will be a spokescouncil in the nearest convergence centre to Gleneagles. Each group (or collection of groups if several are working together) should send a spokes and this meeting will work out the final co-ordination.