Bristol Quakers led a silent vigil outside Bridewell Police Station on 4th April 2025.
Quakers are proud of their long history of speaking truth to power through peaceful protest. From 8.30 to 9.30am on Thursday 4th April Bristol Quakers led a vigil involving about a hundred people standing in silence outside Bristol’s Bridewell Police Headquarters in solidarity with London Quakers who at midday would be standing quietly outside Scotland Yard to protest against the violation of Westminster Quaker Meeting House a week earlier.
On the evening of Thursday 27th March 2025 more than twenty Metropolitan Police Officers, including some armed with tasers, had broken into our Westminster Meeting House and arrested six young women who had hired a room in the building. These young people were members of a group called Youth Demand who are committed to non-violent action in response to climate change and the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
None of the those arrested have since been charged, although their homes were raided by Police while they were in custody. Quakers in Britain condemn the Police action, arguing that recent legislation such as The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and the Public Order Act 2023 have criminalised many forms of protest and allow police to halt actions deemed too disruptive.
(www.quaker.org.uk/news-and-events/news/quakers-condemn-police-raid-on-westminster-meeting-house).
