Workers Solidarity Movement

"Sit down my arse" - the opening words of a Garda inspector at a Drogheda water charges protest. A mob of Gardai went on to single out one young man and strip him out of his clothes as they drag him along the ground before arresting him.

Interestingly the Garda were using Section 8 of the Public Order act to try and intimidate the water charge resistors worth. We haven't heard of any attempt to use the 20m exclusion injunction in the last week apart from the court case that saw suspended sentences arising from when they used it weeks back. [ Watch video ]

As is common on many water charge protests the community initially responded to Garda provocation by putting their hands in the air, a parallel gesture with the Ferguson protesters even though in the south of Ireland uniformed Garda are not routinely armed.

In 2007 Garda at Rossport were instructed to use brute force rather than arrests against the community in the infamous 'No arrest Policy' that they later wrote about in the Garda review. The eyewitness account of this period is well worth a read.

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Over 100 Garda were deployed last night (24 Nov) against water charge resistors in Limerick who were protesting at a Fine Gael rally at the Greenhills hotel addressed by Enda Kenny and attended by Fine Gaels Senator Martin “water just doesn’t fall from the sky’” Conway.

Over 200 anti water charge campaigners had gathered outside with placards reading ‘Bury Irish Water before they bury us.’ After some four hours in the buildings Enda snuck out a back entrance.

About half the Garda present were reported to be non-uniformed secret police types whose deployment en masse at all sorts of protests has become increasingly common in the last decade. On Mayday in Dublin this year a gang of four of them were even observed videoing everyone on the passing trade union march.

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Enormous convoy of 26 Irish Water trucks being prevented accessing Aulden Grange in Coolock this morning - video