This article was originally published in print on Friday 29th November 2024.
Last term Daniel was a student at Oxford, reading Biochemistry. Now they are in a cell at HMP Forest Bank, a category B prison.
Over the summer they were arrested and charged with “conspiracy to cause a public nuisance” for allegedly planning to take part in a protest with the environmental activist group Just Stop Oil. Among their actions as a student, they are known for spray painting the Radcliffe Camera orange, as part of a coordinated protest with ten other UK universities, and disrupting play at the Ashes by running onto the field with the characteristic orange powder, which has stoked controversy in recent years and made the front pages of The Times, The Guardian and The Telegraph. 68% of British adults disapprove of Just Stop Oil, according to a poll conducted by YouGov last year.
Both of Daniel’s actions were taken with Just Stop Oil as part of their demand that the UK government immediately halt all new oil and gas licences, which has since been met. The groups aims have now shifted to call on “the UK government to sign an international treaty to stop extracting and burning oil, gas and coal by 2030”.
Daniel is one of 22 Just Stop Oil supporters who are currently in prison. As one of those who are being held on remand, they have not yet had a trial which is fixed for six months after the date of their arrest.
Daniel tells me: “I have friends who have been remanded to prison for a protest and then been found not guilty at trial, or who have had their cases dropped because of a lack of evidence – they don’t get that time back. But I am also aware that I could be in here for much longer.”
Sentences for non-violent protesters in the UK have become harsher in recent years. The offence of “conspiracy to cause a public nuisance” carries a maximum sentence of ten years and was brought in by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act of 2022. The Act was pushed through by the former Home Secretary Suella Braverman to deal with climate change protestors, specifically naming Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil.
This July, five Just Stop Oil supporters were handed the longest sentences for peaceful protestors in UK history, receiving four to five years for discussing shutting down the M25 on a zoom call. This comes as prisons are nearing capacity, causing the government to grant the early release of a number of violent offenders.
“Although I took action knowing I could go to prison,” says Daniel, “it doesn’t make it any easier, it is a really difficult and sometimes scary place to be in. On an average day I am locked inside my cell for 20 hours, where I mostly read and write. The exceptions are days when I work in the prison garden or have a visitor.”
The cell where they spend the majority of their time is approximately 6 by 8 feet and contains a bed, a desk, a chair, a sink and a toilet, leaving little space to stand. There is a barred window which does not open so any fresh air comes through a metal vent in the top corner of the room.
One of the most frustrating parts of prison life is the bureaucracy: “the smallest requests can take weeks and rules change without warning.”
Daniel recalls how their dad was almost turned away from a recent visit, after travelling from London to Manchester to see them: “He didn’t bring a utility bill with him which wasn’t required the week before, so he had to frantically run out of the prison and find a printing shop. Other visitors who couldn’t get a bill in time were not allowed in, leaving prisoners who were expecting visits sat alone at tables while they watched the reunions around them.”
Even communication for this interview felt the restrictions, from them not having enough pens to write with to the extortionate cost of phone calls which use up their limited weekly allowance. On one occasion they hung up the phone because Paddington 2 was playing on their small television: “Paddington was unfairly imprisoned,” jokes Daniel. “Maybe I’ll relate to him.”
The reality is vastly different. “Although I generally feel safe, horrible things do happen on the wing. There are people struggling with their mental health who have set fire to their cells or had overdoses as a result of their addiction. Fights break out frequently – which I try to talk people down from when I can.”
Although Daniel is not religious, they have started attending the chapel. Twice a week the prison holds a Bible study group, inside a spacious room with the Martin Luther King quotation, ‘Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that’, framed beside the door.
“The chapel is a really valuable space within the context of prison. It is the only place I feel like I am treated like an equal human being by the staff and it’s a space where more of the men feel comfortable opening up about their emotions.”
Daniel also tells me about the support they have received from outside. When they were first imprisoned, they were inundated with letters and emails both from people they know personally and those they’ve never met. A part of their cell is covered with photos, postcards and drawings, sent to them, all stuck to the wall using toothpaste – the only adhesive available. “I have photos of my family. I also have the mugshots of my co-defendants which came in the evidence pack. I have a Free Palestine poster I made myself. One of my favourites is a postcard of a red panda. I have poems written by friends. There’s also a postcard from Santorini, presumably from a girl on her family holiday, which says:
‘You are doing a good, a really good thing don’t stop! It is NOT fair you got put in prison and hope you get out soon! Lots of love from Hazel (aged 12).’”
Having spent 3 months in prison, Daniel is already one of the longest serving inmates on the remand wing. I asked if being in prison had made them regret any of the actions they had taken, they responded: “In short, no.
“The steady criminalisation of peaceful climate protestors is a sign that we are having an effect on the fossil fuel industry. The offence I was charged with was drafted by the Think Tank Policy Exchange which receives funding from Exxon Mobil. They are clamping down on those who try to threaten their economic interest. If you acknowledge that the use of fossil fuels is the largest contributor to the climate crisis, which is having a devastating impact around the world, to not act to prevent it is a sort of doublethink.”
To illustrate this, they reference a paper published in the scientific journal Nature: “A 2022 article (by Lenton et al.) ‘Quantifying the human cost of global warming’ projects that one-third of people will be placed out of conditions suitable for human life by 2080, forcing the majority to move or die. Another paper by Pearce and Pancutt, ‘Quantifying Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Human Deaths’ predicts that on our current trajectory of global warming one billion people will be killed by the end of the century.
“These effects of flooding, crop failure and overheating will be felt most acutely in the global south, which have historically contributed the least to carbon emissions, eliminating cultures and ways of life.”
“The UK government is aware of all this” says Daniel, mentioning the former chief scientific advisor to the government, Sir David King. “King stated that ‘what we do over the next three to four years, I believe, is going to determine the future of humanity’, that was in 2021. The government is still knowingly pursuing policies which top scientists have told them will lead to mass death.
“A lot of people fall into the trap of soft denial, believing that someone more qualified or important will solve the problem for them. But in reality, that’s just an unhealthy coping mechanism.
“When I started my degree, I thought that I would go into research on ways to make food more climate resistant. While that is still a valuable career, I came to realise that for the past 50 years we’ve had the most brilliant scientists dedicating their lives to research and alerting the public about the climate crisis who have been largely ignored. We’re still on track for catastrophe. What is most needed right now is people willing to act in civil resistance to force governments and entrenched power to listen.
“We need to act now, and it’s been proven time and time again that the government does not respond to non-disruptive protest. It was only after the mass civil disobedience and countless arrests with Extinction Rebellion in 2019 that the UK government became the first country in the world to declare ‘a climate emergency’. Just acknowledging the problem.”
I asked what they thought the future of student activism would look like. They replied:
“I can imagine that increasingly universities will have to grapple with more activism on campuses. The situation is only going to get worse, and students won’t want to sit by and watch that happen.
“Universities are the centres of learning and research; they are the most aware of the problem and I’d expect them to act with the most urgency. They have a responsibility to safeguard their students and should be talking to them candidly about how climate breakdown will impact their futures.
“Universities need to look beyond small inward reforms and ask themselves what they can do to meaningfully affect government policy.”
I asked if there was anything Daniel looked forward to doing when released:
“I’d really like to see my friends and choose my own music. Being inside has also made me want to see the sea.”
Views held by Daniel do not reflect those of Cherwell.
