A fuel price protester arrested after taking part in a ‘go slow’ demonstration on the Severn Bridge claims she was detained for 11 hours in a squalid police cell ‘with blood up the walls and sick over the toilet’.
Vicky Stamper was one of the 12 drivers arrested on Monday after slowing traffic on the M4 between England and Wales.
She was part of a group of demonstrations held up and down the country on Monday protesting the price of fuel – as it neared £2 per litre.
Last night, a ringleader of the fuel protests, haulier Tariq Akram, said the British public was behind the demonstrations.
But, amid fears of a Canadian-style ‘Freedom Convoy’ blockades targeting London, Home Secretary Priti Patel urged police to use tough new powers the protesters bringing Britain’s roads to a halt.
Meanwhile, the treatment of the fuel price protesters has also been contrasted with the police handling of Insulate Britain activists and, more recently, those from Just Stop Oil.
Police were accused of having a ‘soft touch’ with with Insulate Britain protesters after one officer in Birmingham was filmed telling activists ‘I don’t want to put good people in a cell’.
Now Ms Stamper, a former HGV driver from Cwmbran, South Wales, has claimed how she was left languishing in ‘absolutely disgusting’ conditions for 11 hours following her arrest.
The 41-year-old also claims she was ‘starving’ due to being ‘allergic’ to the curry officers offered her during her time in custody.
And to add insult to injury, she says she was hit with a £150 charge to get her car back after it was seized by officers during the protests.
But today Gwent Police hit back, insisting that every one of its cell is cleaned ‘thoroughly’ before being allocated to new detainees and that officers had offered to pick up food
Speaking about her experience at Newport Police Station, Ms Stamper, who has submitted a formal complaint to the force, said: ‘They refused to give me a phone call to (my partner) Darren.
Vicky Stamper was one of the 12 drivers arrested on Monday after slowing traffic on the M4 between England and Wales
Ms Stamper (pictured here being arrested by police), a former HGV driver from Cwmbran, has claimed how she was left languishing in ‘absolutely disgusting’ conditions for 11 hours following her arrest
Ms Stamper was part of a group who held up traffic on the Prince of Wales Bridge on Monday protesting the price of fuel – after it hit £2 per litre
‘The cell was absolutely disgusting. There was blood and vomit on the toilet so I had to hover.
‘One of the custody officers came in at about 6pm and said, “You’re being interviewed in five or 10 minutes”.
‘But then I was kept in the cell for another couple of hours.’
She also said she ‘starving’ because the food she was ‘allergic’ to the chicken korma she was offered during her time in the cell.
‘They brought me a chicken korma and I said, “I can’t eat that, I’m allergic to curry.” Garlic, chilli, the lot.
‘Then they brought me a ham salad sandwich and I couldn’t have that because I’m allergic to tomatoes.
‘If they’d let me ring Darren he would have been able to come by and drop food off.’
Ms Stamper was initially arrested on suspicion of breaching a police notice not to drive under 30mph.
Two convoys had been holding up traffic since around 7am with slow-moving roadblocks on both sides of the bridge.
The demonstration had started at 6am with one set of protesters – including Ms Stamper – gathering at Magor services and another on the England side of the bridge.
One officer told the Magor group that it would not be ‘acceptable’ for the convoys to travel ‘up and down’ the M4 at under 30mph.
The eight vehicles in the Magor convoy travelled over the bridge and into Wiltshire before heading back and being stopped by arresting officers on the Wales side of the bridge.
The other convoy was stopped at around the same time on the England side.
Ms Stamper, who drove the Corsa while partner Darren was in the passenger seat, said she had thought the protest would involve a stationary blockade on the bridge rather than a ‘go slow’.
She added: ‘I was expecting us to stop on the bridge. When I passed I thought, ‘Where the bloody hell are we going?’ Darren was reading the leaflet police had given us. He said, ‘Just make sure you don’t go under 30mph.’ So I put cruise control on.’
On the way back from Wiltshire, Vicky said she was ‘way out in front’ of the rest of the convoy. ‘
I could see they were dipping behind and didn’t want them to get in trouble. I kept stopping for them to catch up and putting my hand out of the window to hurry them up.’
Police surrounded the convoy and arrested the drivers. Vicky was taken to a Newport police station at around 11.30am, spending about two hours in a reception area before being placed in a cell.
Ms Semper said: ‘The interview was at about 8.15pm and it went on for about two hours. They were asking me why I was the ringleader.
‘I was like, “I wasn’t – I just saw a flyer on Facebook for a standstill blockade”.
‘Then they said it was a rolling one, and I was like, “You told us it was a rolling one, not us”.
‘We didn’t agree to that because that’s using more fuel, it doesn’t make any sense. So that makes us look like d*******s because we were using fuel to do the protest.
One officer told the Magor group that it would not be ‘acceptable’ for the convoys to travel ‘up and down’ the M4 at under 30mph
Fuel Price Stand Against Tax members were arrested yesterday as Priti Patel urged police to throw the book at them while eco protesters causing months of chaos have received small fines or even praise from a judge for their commitment to green issues (bottom row). Welder Richard Dite, Vicky Stamper, 41, and farmer Andrew Spence (top row, left to right) say that they are protesting about fuel because they fear they will be put out of business
‘I was simply going with the flow. I didn’t arrange all of this. I couldn’t organise a p***-up in a brewery, never mind that. I’d have been proud if I did it.’
Ms Stamper said she was released from custody under investigation at 10.18pm, ‘starving and in need of nicotine’ after allegedly being denied a request to smoke.
As part of her arrest, police also impounded Ms Stamper’s Vauxhall Corsa and the other vehicles involved in the protest.
Ms Stamper, who said she recently lost her job as a HGV driver due to the rising fuel costs, was told she must pay £150 to get her car back, rising by £21 each day she failed to pay, she claimed.
‘If I paid that I wouldn’t be able to do any shopping for two weeks – I would have to go without food so my 16-year-old son can eat,’ Mrs Stamper said.
She later phoned Gwent Police on Tuesday morning to complain.
She said: ‘I said I’d like to report my car stolen. They said, “Right, do you have any idea who it was?” I told them, “Yeah I know exactly who it was”. They said “who” and I said, “You lot.”
‘I told them they’d taken it off my partner who was more than capable and insured to drive it home. He ended up paying £16 for a taxi from Magor services. Eventually the police hung up on me.’
Ms Stamper said she had to take a loan from her mother to pay off the impound charge.
She said without the car she would have been prevented from getting to two HGV driver job interviews this week in Newport and Bristol.
Responding to the claims, Gwent Police’s Chief Superintendent, Tom Harding, said: ‘Custody is a place of work and under Welsh law you cannot smoke in a workplace.
‘Every cell is thoroughly cleaned before being allocated to new detainees. While in custody, we attempt to cater for all dietary requirements and where that is not possible, we offer to purchase the appropriate food outside of custody.
‘On more than one occasion, Ms Stamper was offered food that was available in custody and officers offered to purchase food of her choice from outside of custody.
‘We would invite Ms Stamper to get in touch directly and would be happy to review any complaints.’
It comes as a ringleader of the fuel protests that brought UK motorways to a standstill yesterday has today warned Boris Johnson he should be ‘worried’ and declared: ‘The general public was supporting us’.
Haulier Tariq Akram organised a rolling roadblock on the M180 between Doncaster in South Yorkshire and Grimsby in Lincolnshire during the morning rush hour.
He said: ‘Boris needs to be worried as the general public was supporting us. People got involved that we didn’t expect to’.
Mr Akram said that unlike Insulate Britain eco warriors, who glued themselves to roads to shut them, Fuel Price Stand Against Tax (FPSAT) kept one lane open on routes to allow traffic to pass or emergency services such as police cars and ambulances to get through. But many drivers joined the protest instead of rushing through, the businessman claims.
He said: ‘The public would continue for a mile or so and then get on their way. We will be hit by people who hate us, but the response we have had is more positive. People are saying thank you for doing it, and standing up for us’.
FPSAT now plan to target London and have proposed meeting in Parliament Square at Midday on Friday July 22, after driving slowly through the capital during the morning rush hour amid fears ‘go slow’ protests could escalate dramatically this summer.
The Government is said to fear that slow-moving convoys on major routes could become regular and see the start of a new movement akin to the gilets jaunes across the Channel, where working class protesters wearing yellow vests shut down France over economic problems and the cost of living.
It came as Priti Patel urged police to take a ‘zero tolerance’ approach and use tough new powers to stop them and said officers should arrest and charge the drivers.
Her broadside came as a Tory MP warned that rising anger at the soaring price of filling up could see Canadian-style ‘Freedom Convoy’ blockades targeting London.
Conservative MP Robert Halfon called for Chancellor Rishi Sunak to go further than the 5p per litre reduction in fuel duty implemented in March’s Spring Statement, and said the growing wave of anger should not be ignored.
‘I don’t want anything that disrupts people in their ordinary lives,’ he said. ‘But I’m worried that this is a precursor to even more protests that are going to spread around the UK. If we’re not careful, we’re going to have a Canadian-style situation, with truck drivers descending on Parliament.’
The maximum penalty for ‘wilful obstruction of a highway’ was recently increased to six months in jail and an unlimited fine. Previously the offence carried only a low fine of around £100 to £150, which many eco protesters have faced, in a string of cases where one sentencing judge even praised their commitment to green issues.
On one occasion a police officer was filmed telling Insulate Britain fanatics to ‘just be careful’ because ‘I don’t want to put good people in a cell’ having offered them ‘another 10 minutes’ to block a road in Birmingham. Yet yesterday fair fuel activists were surrounded by as many as 100 police officers, arrested and had their vehicles towed.
One FPSAT member told MailOnline: ‘Priti Patel is going for us – but all we want is a fair deal on fuel so we can do our jobs. Look at how the climate change protesters have been treated. They cause chaos, are arrested and then released on bail the next day to do it all over again’.
Critics have blasted the ‘soft touch’ approach police have taken against climate activists who in some cases have been arrested dozens of times in recent months only to pop up again to shut down roads, oil refineries and even glue themselves to British national treasures such at Constable’s The Hay Wain at the National Gallery yesterday and a copy of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper at the Royal Academy of Arts in London today.
On Sunday a mob stormed the British Grand Prix at Silverstone in an act Martin Brundle claimed could have seen them ‘sliced into 100 pieces’ or kill a driver, fan or race marshal.
Six people were charged yesterday, including Just Stop Oil ringleader Louis McKechnie, a John Lennon lookalike who has already been arrested 20 times.
Last year police came under criticism for their response to Insulate Britain protesters, who caused chaos on motorways, including the M25, by walking into active lanes.
But police were accused of a ‘soft touch’ after videos emerged of officers asking protesters to ‘just be careful’.
Another one said: ‘I don’t want to put good people in a cell.’
Police in France meanwhile have taken a slightly different approach. Video emerged last month of officers ripping the hands of protesters off the road after they glued themselves to it.
The group behind the protest is ‘Dernier Rénovation’, the French equivalent to Insulate Britain, who campaign for the thermal renovation of buildings.
Protesters again tried to disrupt traffic on the roads earlier this month. But video shows police dragging the activists off the road and out of the way of traffic.