The City of London Corporation is restarting legal proceedings against the group camped outside St Paul's Cathedral after talks with protesters "got nowhere".
Occupy London arrived at the churchyard on 15 October and successfully stalled eviction attempts by entering into dialogue with institutions that wished to remove them.
But last week it rejected two proposals from the Corporation – to scale back part of the camp to allow improved fire access and to remove all tents from Corporation land by 2012 – and it is this position that led to today's vote from the Corporation's planning and transportation committee voting to press ahead with eviction.
Stuart Fraser, the Corporation's policy chair, said: "We paused legal action for two weeks for talks with those in the camp on how to shrink the extent of the tents and to set a departure date – but got nowhere.
"So, sadly, now they have rejected a reasonable offer to let them stay until the New Year, it's got to be the courts. We'd still like to sort this without court action but from now on we will have to have any talks in parallel with court action – not instead.
"We are getting reports about vulnerable people, cases of late-night drinking and other worrying trends, so it's time to act. It will clearly take time but we are determined to see this through.
"Lawful protesters who stand or walk are a regular part of London. But tents, equipment and now, increasingly, quite a lot of mess, are not what a highway is for and others are losing out."
Occupy London said it rejected the corporation's offer, saying the terms were "unreasonable" and served "only to establish the ground work" for the camp's removal.
Occupy London arrived at the churchyard on 15 October and successfully stalled eviction attempts by entering into dialogue with institutions that wished to remove them.
But last week it rejected two proposals from the Corporation – to scale back part of the camp to allow improved fire access and to remove all tents from Corporation land by 2012 – and it is this position that led to today's vote from the Corporation's planning and transportation committee voting to press ahead with eviction.
Stuart Fraser, the Corporation's policy chair, said: "We paused legal action for two weeks for talks with those in the camp on how to shrink the extent of the tents and to set a departure date – but got nowhere.
"So, sadly, now they have rejected a reasonable offer to let them stay until the New Year, it's got to be the courts. We'd still like to sort this without court action but from now on we will have to have any talks in parallel with court action – not instead.
"We are getting reports about vulnerable people, cases of late-night drinking and other worrying trends, so it's time to act. It will clearly take time but we are determined to see this through.
"Lawful protesters who stand or walk are a regular part of London. But tents, equipment and now, increasingly, quite a lot of mess, are not what a highway is for and others are losing out."
Occupy London said it rejected the corporation's offer, saying the terms were "unreasonable" and served "only to establish the ground work" for the camp's removal.
by Riazat Butt taken from http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/nov/15/occupy-london-eviction-attempt
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