Church and State blog: Letter to the British Prime Minister

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Letter to the British Prime Minister

Last night at 1.50am we received our second visit by the police to the porch we sleep in at night (and in which we have been sleeping since being forced to become rough sleepers on 3 November 2006) in respect of this mysterious policy to “clean” the City of London of rough sleepers – and I say “mysterious” because there is no mention of it anywhere, not even on the ticket PC 601B issued each of us before leaving. Initially we were again told we would be arrested if we did not leave, but subsequently we were told we wouldn’t be arrested if we decided not to leave, so we stayed put because … where are we supposed to go at 2.00am carrying all our bags and with barely enough money to get by for the weekend?

The police seem determined to get us out of the porch by hook or crook (for the first visit see blog of 9 May “Letter to the Mayor of London”). Which might explain why PC 601B would also say that the police have received a complaint that we block the porch door: we bed down at 9.00pm and get up at 4.30am, and for over a year and a half have never had a complaint against us of any kind. Well, this “complaint” seems to me to smack of the same good timing as PC 698B ordering us at 2.20am on 9 May to leave the porch or be arrested within hours of Declan being diagnosed with, err, a sprained ankle – his Certificate of Attendance from the Royal London Hospital also states that he was "advised to rest, elevate and ice ankle".

Writing to the Mayor of London and the Registrar of the European Court of Human Rights (see blog of 13 May “Letter to the European Court under Article 34”) doesn’t seem to have done much good, so this afternoon Declan wrote to Prime Minister Gordon Brown. After all, Article 34 of the European Convention on Human Rights establishes a duty on Convention states not to hinder the effective exercise of the right to apply to the European Court of Human Rights.

This is the letter via Email the PM Form, which was confirmed as received:

Subject: Heavey v. the United Kingdom (Application no. 22541/07)

Dear Prime Minister

I am writing to bring to your attention a submission I made to the European Court of Human Rights on 12 May 2008 in the above case, citing a violation of Article 34 of the European Convention on Human Rights. (Article 34 establishes a duty on Convention states not to subject applicants to any improper indirect acts or contacts designed to dissuade or discourage applicants from pursuing a Convention remedy.)

I will forward to you by registered post a copy of my email letter of 12 May to the Registrar of the European Court of Human Rights, Mr Erik Fribergh, together with attachments: (i) copy of my email letter of 9 May 2008 (and attachment) to the Mayor of London, Mr Boris Johnson, in respect of an order from PC 698B of Bishopsgate Police Station on the night of 8 May instructing my wife and I to either leave the porch we were sleeping in or be arrested due to police "cleaning" the City of London of rough sleepers, and (ii) copy of my Certificate of Attendance of 8 May from the Royal London Hospital stating that I had a sprained ankle and was advised to “rest elevate and ice ankle”.

I can confirm that my most recent letter from the Court is a letter of 22 November 2007, reference ECHR-LEO.1R CO/PHA/gz, signed for the Registrar by Legal Secretary C Ovey, stating: "I acknowledge receipt of your letter of 22 September 2007 and enclosures. With reference to your request for priority under Rule 41 of the Rules of Court, I can inform you that the Court will examine your application shortly, possibly by the end of January 2008. It would therefore appear unnecessary to consider your request."

I can also confirm that, in addition to the order from PC 698B of Bishopsgate Police Station on the night of 8 May that my wife and I leave the porch we were sleeping in or be arrested, last night at 1.50am we were woken by PC 601B of Snowhill Police Station and told to leave the same porch or be arrested – again, due to police “cleaning” the City of London of rough sleepers – although the police officer subsequently informed us that we would not be arrested if we did not leave, so we stayed. PC 601B also informed us a complaint has been made that we block the porch door, which we deny. (We have been sleeping in this porch without any complaint against us for over a year and a half – we were forced to become rough sleepers on 3 November 2006. We bed down at 9.00pm and get up at 4.30am, save Saturday and Sunday when we get up at 6.30am.)

As stated in my letter to Mayor Johnson of 9 May, there is no mention in any newspaper, homeless organisation website, or in london.gov.uk that there is any kind of police operation – or that one is going to be undertaken or has ever been undertaken – to expel rough sleepers from the City of London. This morning the Manna Centre, a day care centre for homeless people, made no mention of it.

I should also point out that the tickets PC 601B issued my wife and I state that the reason for the encounter was “Welfare” and the outcome “ATP” (Allowed To Proceed). Further, all our contacts are within walking distance of the porch, and we have never found a more suitable place to sleep.

In relation to our ongoing efforts to get ourselves off the street, my wife and I are in the process of trying to raise £4,000 to run a campaign in support of my petition to the United Nations on therapeutic cloning and the use of stem cells for research and for the treatment of disease, which since 22 October 2007 has been signed by 519 scientists and academics, including 22 Nobel laureates.

Please would you acknowledge receipt.

Yours sincerely
Declan Heavey

cc Mr Boris Johnson, Mayor of London (together with attachments herein referred to)
Mr Erik Fribergh, Registrar of the European Court of Human Rights (together with attachments and copy of the two tickets issued by PC 601B herein referred to)

Church and State

MAYOR OF LONDON RSI PROPERTY
DAY 406 IN A WEEKLY PERIODIC TENANCY
SUBJECT TO A SECTION 21 NOTICE

(SEE PARA. 3 BELOW)

1. Our 308 Honorary Associates include 20 Nobel Prize laureates. Declan and I are engaged in a project that deals with the publication of issues significant to social policy in a number of key areas, e.g., climate change, population, futurism, atheism, and free speech. Established as Network for Church Monitoring, a non-profit company limited by guarantee, our main publication, found at the website, Church and State, calls attention to subjects, not the least which have been critical of the interaction between religious and secular institutions. We have been the target of numerous threats and actions, e.g., the former resulting in threats to Declan's life, and the latter, which have led to vandalism. The various incidents are on record with the police and other official agencies.

2. There are no less than 63 Nobel Prize laureates on the Church and State website from 20 Honorary Associates, eight articles, nine book excerpts and 33 petition signatories. (For example, one Nobel laureate signed our Nobel petition in support of human embryonic stem cell research and gave us permission to excerpt from one of his books.) Our list of associates also includes 18 US National Medal laureates, and six Turing Award laureates (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in computer science). We have published one article and excerpted from the books of seven members of the British House of Lords. And there are 31 knighted professors on the site from 13 Honorary Associates, one book excerpt and 21 petition signatories. These figures are despite the never-ending assault on our email (this link reveals the targeting of our emails to, among others, a close colleague in Washington, DC as well as space advocates and Nobel laureates).

3. This is Day 406 for us living under the threat to life of a 'no fault' eviction by Peabody Trust.[1] We live in a Mayor of London's Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) property. Peabody's appalling new terms of tenancy have forced us into an unstable weekly periodic tenancy that poses a threat to Declan's life and inhibits our ability to exercise our rights. Declan accumulated quite a history with the Housing Ombudsman Service before he received the Ombudsman's decision not to investigate a referral from Lyn Brown MP on jurisdictional grounds. The Ombudsman was asked to consider whether or not our tenancy has been renewed like for like; and whether, if not, it should be in light of the landlord having accused us of not signing a like-for-like agreement. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will not accept a referral of discrimination from Ms Brown, the Commission's helpline (EASS) having grossly distorted the complaint against Peabody. We no longer have pro se access to the courts (see next paragraph).

4. This eviction matter came before District Judge Ruth Fine at the Central London County Court on 30 June 2020, when both counsel for St Mungo's (the charity in effective control of our tenancy) and Declan presented their positions. Declan lost the case and was ordered to pay £1,850 in costs. A publishing colleague in America cleared these costs within 24 hours of my blog post about this hearing for strike out on a related issue that was the essence of the claim, i.e., that St Mungo's would take a phone call to confirm that we are clients of the Mayor of London's RSI programme. Within a week of the hearing, St Mungo's had agreed to take this phone call for us both, the Court having ruled that they were not obliged to do so despite our circumstances. This time we escaped bankruptcy (counsel for St Mungo's asked for £3,407.50 in costs), but consider that to seek pro se access to justice in the courts has become far too dangerous for us. Declan currently has before the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman the decision of the Information Commissioner that allows St Mungo's to continue processing coercive support plans without our knowledge or consent and that also poses a threat to his life.

5. When it comes to traffic, we have had 10.7 million hits in the past three years on Facebook; however, I left the platform on 13 March 2021 for one year rather than risk being banned for life. It is indisputable that with any sort of level playing field Church and State would have far exceeded 2.5 million hits last year. In addition to a large variety of blocks without explanation, Facebook had so severely restricted our Page's distribution by October 2020 that it was almost as good as an unpublished page.[2] Currently, we are up to their 85th block since 1 December 2015, and as usual without an explanation. This block records as one half of their 3rd double block in the first five weeks of this year that lasted 60 days. Our traffic has also been curtailed by over 2.5K blocks on access to Church and State since 26 July 2016, including 29 full distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks since 17 May 2019 that have lasted for as long as 54 hours at a time.[3] About 70% of our hits are from Americans.

"This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site." Don Collins, Founder, International Services Assistance Fund, Washington DC

Last updated: 26/06/21

_________________________

[1] Once a fixed term has elapsed, the landlord has the option to seek eviction even if the tenant has upheld their obligations in full (though of course the landlord must still apply for and obtain a county court order).

[2] 17/10/20: We have permission to publish this ISAF letter of 30 September to Facebook COO Sheryl Samberg. Facebook has so severely restricted our Page's distribution since 4 September that it's almost as good as an unpublished page

[3] Since October 2019, we have been defining a full DDoS attack as having such a high volume of up to 4-minute blocks on access to Church and State that we don't bother recording them all.

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Saturday, May 17, 2008

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