On Saturday 1st February 2003 a coach load of us from Birmingham and Coventry travelled to Dover for the National Demo exactly 8 years after the tragic death of Jill Phipps at Coventry airport. When our coach arrived, there were no other protesters or police at the docks as we were early, so we took the opportunity to walk straight into the docks booking in lounge. We marched round and round in circles holding our banners and placards aloft, chanting `Ban Live Exports`!! The staff and security guards were not happy but they knew there were too many of us for them to move on. When the police arrived we left and joined the crowd that had by now assembled behind the barriers at the roundabout.

Numbers swelled to well over 200 people and we listened to several inspirational speeches before people were allowed to cross onto the island to lay our flowers and tie our personal messages with purple ribbon to the signs, lamposts etc. The traffic was stopped and everyone moved back behind the barrier but sensed that we would soon be back in the road!!

Sure enough, nearly everyone decided to walk up the road at the same time and used the pelican crossing to halt the traffic before crossing the busy dual carriageway. It was no surprise when dozens of people sat down in the road and everyone was chanting `Ban Live Exports, Ban Live Exports`! It took some time for the police to get the traffic flowing again and as soon as they did, protesters had stopped traffic on the other carriageway and many sat down again!! What could be described as a game of cat and mouse continued with protesters all over the road, constantly chanting and handing out leaflets to stranded drivers! As police tried to take control of the situation, they got more annoyed when protesters failed to heed their warnings and inevitably, several arrests were made!!

Traffic chaos at Dover

The picture here shows the resulting tailback as protesters refused to give in even after the arrests, and the cat and mouse game continued for nearly another hour! All of this activity was a flashback to years gone by when scenes like this could be seen every few days at ports (that chose to export live animals) up and down the country.

Eventually, protesters ran out of energy and retreated to the pavements. Protesters from the Midlands said our goodbyes to friends from elsewhere and we boarded our coach bound for home. Everyone felt that we had certainly left our mark on Dover that day and that it was a demo that Jill herself would have enjoyed.

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