No prison for Heathrow paint sprayers

Two Just Stop Oil Supporters who sprayed Heathrow departure boards with orange paint during the Oil Kills, international uprising to end fossil fuels in July 2024 have been spared prison.

Phoebe Plummer and Jane Touil were sentenced by Judge Duncan at Isleworth Crown Court on 29 June, after being found guilty of criminal damage in a second trial in May for their Heathrow action on 30 July 2024 to demand a fossil fuel treaty to end oil and gas by 2030.

They must each pay a £500 fine plus a victim surcharge and will face three months on an electronic tag with a curfew of 10pm to 7am and community probation for a year.

In her mitigation statement yesterday Jane said:

Last week I visited some friends and their newborn baby. They had bought an air conditioning unit to keep the baby safe as their house was life-threateningly hot. They were lucky. They could afford to buy one and can afford to pay the increased energy bill from its use. This summer will be one of the coolest summers their baby will experience in its lifetime.

Last week the London Ambulance Service declared a critical incident. It recorded the highest number of calls in one day in its history and the highest ever number of Category 1 calls in a single day – it’s a category 1 if someone has a cardiac arrest or stops breathing.

The heatwaves of 2022 killed over 3,000 people in this country and over 69,000 across Europe. The death toll this year will be much higher. The situation is much worse in other parts of the world – places where most people don’t have access to air con. I won’t go into the chaos caused by climate breakdown last week, including at Heathrow.

Accelerating climate and ecological breakdown are not my subjective beliefs. They are objective reality. This is not ‘my cause’. It is OUR CAUSE – everyone who wants to live, to have enough to eat, enough water, a livelihood, a home, a stable society with the rule of law.

The climate crisis has not come out of nowhere. Fossil fuel companies knew in the 1970s and 80s that this would happen if we continued to burn coal, oil and gas for energy. They deliberately lied and spread disinformation for decades to delay the transition to cleaner, greener energy. Their money has bought political influence.

In the worst crisis humanity has ever faced and following decades of political failure, the government response has been to pass repressive anti protest laws to silence dissent instead of introducing the bold policies necessary to avert disaster.

While people of conscience are imprisoned, those responsible for the harm continue to profit from the destruction of our life support systems. The police and courts collude in the repression rather than holding to account those responsible for the continued destruction of our only home.

I acted to raise the alarm – to try to prevent mass suffering and mass death. I acted in the time-honoured tradition of civil disobedience to achieve change in the face of overwhelming injustice and entrenched power. I acted out of love, compassion and desperation. I acted to protect life. The law says this context is irrelevant.

I have always tried to live and act according to my conscience. I call on everyone in the courtroom and in this country to learn about the situation we are in and to listen to their consciences.

The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is that good people do nothing.

Thank you for listening.

Featured image via Just Stop Oil