A-Infos (en) Britain, HEREFORD Anarchist Federation GROUP Heckler #12 Feb/Mar 2010

Hay unites to save school ---- Parents and teachers from the Hay-on-Wye area have taken up 
the fight to save their local high school from closure. ---- As we go to press over 2,000 
people have joined the âSave Gwernyfed High Schoolâ Facebook group after documents were 
leaked confirming it as one of seven earmarked for possible closure by Powys County 
Council. ---- Activists have already held public meetings in the area and the campaign is 
gaining momentum. Join their Facebook group to stay up to date with the campaign.  Cameron 
gets a makeover ---- Billboards promoting Tory cuts were defaced and destroyed around the 
country (centre and right) with Hereford making its own Elvis-themed contribution (left). 
Tory party central office later ordered their withdrawal after large numbers of billboards 
were defaced.

----------------------------------

Nobody likes a Tory

likes âAnd we canât
stand Labour
either!
âRevolution in
local Labour
Partyâ: The
recent âcoupâ in
Hereford Labour
Party and why
theyâve never
been the party
of the working
class. Read it on
the Heckler blog at
http://tinyurl.com/
ykme8eq

Nobody lWiggin is a Wonka

Tory MP for north Herefordshire, Bill Wiggin, ended up in
the chocolate after labelling concerned Cadbury workers as
âwhingersâ.
In relation to Cadburyâs takeover by Kraft, he said âWho
wants to hire a whingeing workforce when you can have
a positive, up-beat one?â He then offered to meet with
workers for a âphoto shootâ, but the invite was turned down.
The takeover of the company by US firm Kraft has led to
concerns about possible job-cuts and outsourcing. Union
reps at Cadburyâs Marlbrook factory near Leominster have
written to Bill expressing the anger of the workers.
Uniteâs Jennie Formby said: âCadburyâs workers are
campaigning to protect jobsâitâs not whinging, itâs
standing up for their livelihoods, homes and families.â
Bill refused to apologise, instead he blamed the unions.
He had also refused to sign an early day motion calling
for Cadbury to stay independent and has previously
condemned Uniteâs campaign to keep Cadbury jobs in
Britain. He later responded by saying: âThe prospects of my
constituents under Kraftâs ownership could be jeopardised
by Uniteâs ill-judged campaign.â Yeah right Bill, and
imagine the jeopardy Cadbury workers at Marlbrook would
be putting themselves in if they sat back and did nothing!
Last year Wiggin, who went to Eton with David Cameron,
was embroiled in the expenses scandal after claiming Â11,500
on a phantom mortgage. His attitudes towards constituents
and Cadbury workers alike are appalling and show he doesnât
give a damn for the people he supposedly represents.
We support the Cadbury workers and their very valid
concerns and believe the people of Herefordshire deserve
much better than this slimy individual.

----------------------------------------------

Malvern hotel staff stage sit-in protest

Workers at the Foley Arms Hotel in Malvern held a sit-in
protest after an unexpected closure on 25th January.
The sudden closure by the hotel owners resulted in 21
staff being laid off without pay, with them first being told of
the news via e-mail.
Over a dozen staff occupied the hotel for the week,
preventing it from being repossessed and refusing to leave
until their wages were paid.
Former manager, Nigel Thomas said: âI received an e-mail
asking us to vacate the building and hand over the keys. I
told him [the owner] until we have been paid Iâm going to
stay.â Staff were paid and left the building on Friday 29th.
Well done for digging your heels in.

---------------------------------------

Hereford Heckler â the first two years

This issue marks the second anniversary of the Hereford Heckler, first printed
back in February 2008. Almost 40,000 copies have been distributed during this
time through pubs, shops, out on the streets but mostly door-to-door across
many areas of Hereford.
The first issue focused on the planned closure of almost 40 schools across the
county and was launched by Hereford Solidarity League members who took
part in the âsave our schoolsâ march in Hereford. The campaign was successful
with the council agreeing to keep the schools open, although a review is
planned for 2011.
As well as this we have campaigned against the closure of the LEA
swimming pool, which was used by many schools and community groups
across Hereford. We have also written extensively about the housing
shortage in the county. At the start of 2009 it was revealed that the councilâs
housing waiting list hit over 5,000 and with plenty of empty buildings and
available land across the county we found this a disgrace!
Anti-fascism and anti-racism has always been a major part of our politics. In
an interview for BBC Hereford & Worcester radio in May 2009 we exposed the
Hereford Farmersâ Club as a venue hosting local BNP meetings. Despite our
contradicting evidence, the club claimed to be âunawareâ they were taking place.
In the run-up to the European elections last year we extensively delivered
thousands of anti-BNP leaflets across Hereford. And in October we organised
a protest against a major BNP fundraising event being held in Ross-on-Wye,
which saw many local people turn out to show their opposition.
In recent months we have been campaigning against the Edgar Street
Grid development. We have covered the councilsâ disgraceful lack of public
consultation, the greed of the developers and the idiocy of the plans. In
November 2009 we organised our own âmarch against the ESGâ, which linked
up with hundreds of supporters from the Itâs Our City campaign for a lobby at
the Shire Hall. The council largely ignored the 10,000-strong petitionâbring on
round two!
Our own group has grown during this time, backed up a large group of
supporters. In November we held a successful fundraising gig that packed out
the venue, with similar events planned for 2010. Hereford Solidarity League
now also has an internet presence with a blog, a Youtube channel and a
Facebook page.
Over the coming months we will be planning an âelection campaignâ and
launching a manifesto of our own, and upping the ante in the fight against the
ESG. Watch this space.
Hereâs to another two years of the Hereford Heckler!

----------------------------------------------------------

Love Hereford, Hate ESG

Love HerefoAfter a well-earned Christmas break, the campaign against the Edgar
Street Grid has swung back into action.
As we go to press, Itâs Our City have called for objections to the link
roadârunning from Edgar Street to Commercial Roadâwhich is an
integral part of the ESG masterplan.
Itâs Our City recently faced an almost disastrous loss of support
after a statement was released to the local press in support of the
alternative DRE Group plan proposing a âTesco on stiltsâ, and other
retail development, on the cattle market site. IOC have since come
forward to dismiss the statement supporting a plan that is essentially
much like the ESG itself.
âThe âpress releaseâ supporting Roy Englandâs plan was not agreed
by the campaign,â said campaign leader, Mark Hubbard.
âThe person who wrote it and sent it out has now resigned from the
Itâs Our City campaign and will no longer be taking any part. There
should be NO retail development on the ESG siteâit will kill our
historic town centre.â
Regardless of this, Itâs Our City desperately needs to start involving
more local people; public meetings need to be less of a âshowâ

and more about involving everyone in decision makingâwhat the
campaign does should be up to its supporters and not the people who
have taken it upon themselves to run it for us.
Secondly, the campaign needs to step up its action and forget about
the importance of looking ârespectableâ. Respectability never won
the vote for women, it never won a strike or defeated the poll tax.
Herefordshire Council have ignored a petition of almost 10,000 people;
this campaign will fail unless the council see the active involvement
of the thousands that have signed this petition. Letâs get out on the
streets and make our really voices heard! No ESG!
Hereford
Solidarity
League
demonstrate
at the Shire
Hall against
the ESG

--------------------------------------------------

Life in the UK citizenship test

As part of a film about what it means to
be British, three members of Hereford
Solidarity League recently took the same
citizenship test that immigrants are given.
Despite being British as can be, all three
failed.

Supposedly the test is to ensure that those
who want to live here have knowledge of
the English language and culture. Looking
at a sample of the questions here, we have
to ask what is the relevance?
Before we get critical about the test, letâs
explore our attitudes to immigration:
Tory: Weâll put a cap on immigrationâ
only our rich friends get in.
Labour: Only we can decide who gets in.
Lib Dem: A combination of the above
BNP: Only white, blond, blue-eyed,
English speaking, British people get in.
Lefty guilt: No borders, we colonised, we
made war, they all should come in.
In the 80s Margaret Thatcher raped the
country of any prosperity, leaving the
working class deskilled and demoralised.
Despite their so-called best intentions,
the gap between rich and poor increased
during the Labour years and Cameron
is already threatening to cut education
budgets, making university training
available only to the toffs, who use their
training and skills to further exploit those
of us who did not have the opportunities to
begin with.
The result? England has no choice but to
import doctors, nurses, teachers, dentists,
radiologists, social workers etc. Worse
still, the obsession with social mobility and
the greed of business owners has crippled
Britain of builders, painters, engineers and
mechanics, leaving us with no choice but to
import and further exploit these workers.
Arguably, Britain is only a little island,
but who of the above can we live without,
those who can pass an irrelevant test?


--------------------------------------------------

Herefordâs Radical Historyâpart one - The Whitson Riot 1605

At 5 oâclock in the morning on the Tuesday of Whitson 1605, the vicar of Allensmore,
Richard Heyns, was woken by a commotion. From the window of the vicarage he saw
40 heavily armed people carrying out a funeral ceremony. The deceased was Alice
Wellington, who, being a Catholic, had been denied a burial.
England at this time was rife with anti-Catholic feeling due to the Protestant
reformation. The reformation involved the replacement of the leadership of the
Vatican with equally dodgy people closer to home. Herefordshire had become a safe
haven for Catholics. But life for the vast majority of people living in this part of the
county was extremely hard, most people survived by spinning hemp, begging and
scrumping unlike the decadent lives of the privileged landowners.
Heyns, being part of the privileged ruling class, rushed off to Hereford to tell the
bishop what heâd seen. In those days, authority in Herefordshire rested with the
church, the head of which was Richard Bennett, the bishop. Bennettâs reaction to the
commotion in Allensmore was to send the High Constable to arrest those that had
taken part in the illegal burial.
After a struggle in which some of the constables were injured, Leonard
Marsh was arrested in Hungerstone and lead back to Hereford. As
the group passed Belmont they were ambushed by 40 men. Due to
being threatened with more than just a bloody good hiding, the
constables released Marsh.
When news of these disturbances reached London, the king demanded that an
example should be made of the âHerefordshire-menâ. This news emboldened the
ârebelsâ, but worried the bishop and his magistrates, who feared provoking a wider
uprising. And so followed a state of lawlessness that lasted for six weeks, in which
a game of cat and mouse was played between the bishopâs men and the locals. The
constables often rode into deserted villages while looking for the supposed ringleaders.
The communication network that existed in order to evacuate these villages is an
example of the high level of organisation that prevailed during the âdisturbancesâ.
It eventually became clear that the Bishop of Hereford was unable to reassert his
power, so the Earl of Worcester was given the task. Being a Catholic gave the earl
the influence he needed to convince the people to get back in line, and with minimal
effort the rebels of south-west Herefordshire were subdued. As with most uprisings, a
suitable scapegoat had to be found. That person was William Morgan of Kilpeck who
was sent to the Tower of London for supposedly organising, what is now called, the
Whitson Riot.
This article heavily referenced Whitsun Riot by Roland Mathias
(1963) Bowes & Bowes London
Weâd like to hear from anyone who has experience or memories of radical
movements in Herefordshire. Were you involved with a local socialist,
communist or anarchist group? Did you take part in a memorable strike,
protest or march? Did your trade union hold a lot of power and influence
or did you help achieve improvements for its members?
If you have a story, weâd love to hear from you. Please get in
touch with us by emailing kay.bulstreet@hotmail.co.uk

---------------------------------------------------------

Helen Heckler

*â First to Leominster, where village
idiot Bill Wiggin has described
Cadburys workers who are fearing for
their jobs as âwhingingâ. Which gave
me an idea: why not threaten Billâs
job, with no real justification
aside of cutting costs? Donât
worry, he wonât complain, he hates
âwhingersâ.
nâ What have Jesse Norman and a porn
star got in common? Neither will
come unless thereâs a camera on.
*â A poster of David âoneâs daddy
worked down the pitâ Cameron has
been defaced in Hereford, with the
image of Cameron being made to look
like Elvis Presley. Towards the end
of his life the media labelled Elvis
as an unattractive, greedy racist.
But I donât see how any of these
values can be associated with the
Conservative Party.
*â In other news, a recent English
Defence League (think the BNP in
trackie bottoms) protest erupted
into chaos when the EDL members
began brawling with police officers
stewarding the march. Onlookers
described it as âa group of violent
fascists with no regard for basic
morals or principals ... fighting
with the EDLâ.

Hereford 20â28 Luctonians

An action packed derby game, a crowd
of over 1000, quality local beer, itâs just a
shame that Hereford couldnât beat the the
toffs. Oh, and take note Mr Turner, under
16s got in free!

-------------------------------------------

*â Hereford Solidarity League works to build a society based on the ideas of freedom, 
equality and community â

* â Anti-fascism is an important
part of our politics, but we believe that all politicians maintain a system of inequality, 
privilege and control that divides communitiesâ

*â Real
change does not happen at the ballot box and can only come about by independent working 
class action; that is, people looking out for each other
and organising themselves to deal with the problems that they experience on a day to day 
basisâ

*â Our aim is to increase the fighting spirit and
self-confidence of working class people to change things for themselves.
Find us on the internetââJoin our Facebook group âHereford Hecklerâ; visit 
www.herefordheckler.wordpress.com; or email
kay.bulstreet@hotmail.co.uk
_________________________________________
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