Insulate Britain protesters return to streets of London and M25

The group are calling on the government to better insulate homes

Author: Alice YoungPublished 8th Oct 2021
Last updated 8th Oct 2021

Protesters from Insulate Britain have blocked a junction of the M25 motorway and a major road in central London.

The climate activists said about 40 demonstrators are sitting on the road at junction 25 of the M25 at Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, and on the A501 at Old Street roundabout.

The protests caused long queues of rush hour traffic on Friday morning.

Insulate Britain admitted its actions on the M25 are "in breach" of an injunction obtained by the Government last month.

Tracey Mallagan, a spokeswoman for the group, said:

"If governments don't act soon to reduce emissions, we face a terrifying situation.

"We won't be worrying about shortages of pasta or loo rolls because law and order breaks down pretty quickly when there is not enough food to go round.

"The Government won't be wondering if there are enough hospital beds or ventilators, but whether there are enough people left to bury the dead.

"The Government is destroying our country. Boris Johnson should be taken to court for treason. Our flesh and blood are being tossed aside as expendable."

The Met Police say they are responding to both protests, to move on the activists.

In a post on Twitter, the force says:

We are responding to two protests this morning which are blocking roads.

Activists are disrupting traffic around Old Street roundabout, #Islington. They're also disrupting motorists at Junction 25 of the #M25.

We're on scene and working quickly to get traffic moving.

We know that some activists have used super glue to frustrate our efforts and to delay Londoner's even further.

We train for these scenarios and have specialist teams on hand to help remove people and make arrests

Hear all the latest news from across the UK on the hour, every hour, on Greatest Hits Radio on DAB, smartspeaker, at greatesthitsradio.co.uk, and on the Rayo app.