UCPI – Daily Report: 9 December 2024 – ‘Callum’

At the Undercover Policing Inquiry, Monday 9 December was devoted to the evidence of two witnesses, ‘Callum’ and ‘Walter’, who had been involved in hunt saboteur activity in the 1980s.

There were a lot of restrictions on what could be reported in order to protect the identity of the witnesses. They were in the hearing room behind a screen. We’re doing separate reports for them.

RECAP

This was the Monday of the seventh week of ‘Tranche 2 Phase 2’, the new round of hearings of the Undercover Policing Inquiry (UCPI). This Phase mainly concentrates on examining the animal rights-focused activities of the Metropolitan Police’s secret political unit, the Special Demonstration Squad, from 1983-92.

The UCPI is an independent, judge-led inquiry into undercover policing in England and Wales. Its main focus is the activity of two units who deployed long-term undercover officers into a variety of political groups; the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS, 1968-2008) and the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU, 1999-2011). Spycops from these units lived as activists for years at a time, spying on more than 1,000 groups.

Click here for the day’s video, transcripts and written evidence

WHICH SPYCOPS

Callum has submitted a 74 page witness statement and 14 exhibits (photos, etc) to the Inquiry.

He started by saying that has been involved in animal rights and hunt sabbing since the early 1980s. Additionally, he was part of the anti poll tax campaign in 1990.

Callum was mostly spied on by officer HN2 Andy Coles, but was also reported on by HN10 Bob Lambert, HN5 John Dines, HN87 ‘John Lipscomb’, and HN17.

HUNT SABBING

He started hunt sabbing aged 17, having seen a Hunt Saboteurs Association (HSA) advert in the Daily Mirror and then joining his local group.

The HSA was the first animal rights organisation, founded in 1963. It aimed to centralise the movement and share tactics. It was a time long before social media, and the mainstream media didn’t report on it, so street stalls, leaflets, gigs, and zines were the main methods of communication.

The HSA published a magazine, Howl, mostly discussing tactics. The organisation was always very democratic.

Callum explained how sabs would use various methods to distract the hunters’ hounds, such as hunting horns, sprays to cover scent, and recording of hounds in cry to distract.

Sabs did not want to get into confrontations with hunters – to do so would distract from saving the animals. The idea was to stay away from the hunt and observe, so they could accurately judge where to intervene between the hunt and the fox.

Hunters, on the other hand, were often violent to sabs (something that continues to the present day). Callum described how they’d be charged down by horses and whipped. Sometimes hunters would get off and assault sabs. Their terriermen would try to corner sabs and attack them. Hunt supporters also used to get involved, blocking, assaulting, and sometimes hiring people to come and attack sabs.

Callum never saw sabs initiate violence. He was also clear that self defence isn’t violence.

After particularly serious violence or egregious behaviour by a hunt, sabs would call for a ‘joint hit’ – the next time the hunt met, sab groups would come from far and wide to show that such attacks would only mean greater disruption to the hunt.

Sabs didn’t want the police to know their plans in advance because police were invariably on the hunters’ side, and after the Criminal Justice Act 1994 introduced the offence of aggravated trespass, sabs would get pre-emptively arrested.

Callum used to get phone calls from police officers on a Friday telling him if he turned up to a certain hunt that weekend he would be arrested just for being there. This illustrates his point that it wasn’t about what was legal, but that the police took the side of the hunters irrespective of the law.

In private documents the police are clearly aware of which side is the violent one, but all the stuff written for external consumption demonises the sabs. The Special Demonstration Squad’s annual reports to the Home Office talk about ‘serious violence’ happening, implying it’s the sabs committing it rather than the other side.

We’ve already heard from spycop Bob Lambert that the HSA was actually ‘entirely lawful’.

LIPSCOMB’S LIES

Callum and other hunt sabs were spied on by HN87 ‘John Lipscomb,’ and we were shown a report submitted by him [MPS0743621], of a discussion of tactics that took place between around 35 hunt sabs in April 1988.

Under the subheading ‘Violence’, the report says that ‘many of the saboteurs present had recently received a trashing from farm hands hired by the Surrey and Burstow Hunt. Callu advocated that all saboteurs should arm themselves with heavy tsicks every time they entered a wood’.

It goes on to note that Callum ‘frequently carries a 12 inch spanner tucked inside his boot’. Callum dismissed the suggestion of the spanner outright, saying ‘the idea is ridiculous’.

He confirmed that he did recommend carrying sticks when going into woods though. He explained that in open country you can see the hunters and avoid them – ‘get at least a fence between you and them’, he advised – but in woodland you can’t tell if people are close by. Entering unarmed and facing the prospect of coming up against a group of terriermen armed with spades, sabs would be less likely to be attacked if carrying a piece of wood.

Having been hospitalised, had bones broken, been stabbed and shot at by hunters and their supporters, Callum was keen to deter further violence. He re-emphasised that seeking confrontation would only have distracted from the point of being there, to save the hunted animals. Avoidance is the first tactic, a fight is bad tactics.

Lipscomb also wrote an end of season summary of hunt sabbing for Special Branch’s C Squad [MPS0743655, 14 May 1989]. In it, he talks about the decline of one hunt sab group as a ‘boost, from the police point of view’.

The report talks of discord between groups, attributed to Callum’s violence. In fact, Callum explained, one person at another group had done a deal with police not wear masks or carry hound whips to steer hounds. Callum’s group didn’t see the benefit, and anyway no group can make agreements on behalf of others. His group still worked with many others.

Lipscomb’s witness statement to the Inquiry says the group sought out violence and were a public order issue wherever they went.

Callum dismissed the claim. He recalled that the sabs needed to find ways to reduce the hunts’ violence, so they would try to counter the impression that all sabs were weedy, feeble vegans, incapable of defending themselves.

They got camouflage jackets and masks to look identical, which didn’t just make them look a bit more intimidating, it also meant the hunters couldn’t easily tell which sabs were women, and they were reluctant to hit women so would err on the side of caution. It also made it hard to identify individual sabs for arrest.

He recounted one incident of him being badly wounded by masked hunt supporters. The police arrived and even the ambulance driver had to tell them to leave Callum alone. The police didn’t take any action or even investigate, until Callum wrote to his MP about this matter.

Callum had seen the unmasked face of one of these attacker, someone he recognised as one of two ‘whippers in’ employed by a Hunt. The police brought the other whipper-in to an identity parade. Callum addressed the man by name and explained why he was innocent. He named the guilty man, but nothing happened. The police never arrested anyone, let alone charged them.

BRIXTON HUNT SABS

Brixton sabs were renowned for their supposed aggression in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Other groups used this reputation, telling sketchy hunters that Brixton were coming, and it made the hunters back off. They were trying to reduce violence, and it worked.

HN87 ‘John Lipscomb’ says in his witness statement that Brixton sabs would trash cars and were a constant threat to public order because of their hatred of rich people and the hunt, and general desire for violence.

Callum scoffed at this. If those things happened it would have been reported, yet there are no such press reports. He says it was all ‘smoke and mirrors’.

In reality, it was just another hunt sab group, no different from the rest. But the word ‘Brixton’ had resonances for hunters. It implied criminality, drugs, city living, Black people – all things that scared rural bigots.

ALF

Hunt sabs were described by police as ‘the link’ between the animal rights movement in general and the Animal Liberation Front.

Callum says there was certainly a link, animal rights was a new community and quite amorphous. Sabbing wasn’t a gateway to the ALF though. One again at the Inquiry, it’s clear the police see movements as being like them, with specialist units and assigned ranked roles. Activism isn’t like that at all.

We were shown a Special Demonstration Squad briefing note written by HN2 Andy Coles, possibly with contributions from others [MPS0245213]. It claims most ALF activists come through the HSA because sabbing is a ‘fertile training ground for militant activism’.

Yet Callum was the only sab in his ALF group, so it’s really not much of a ‘fertile ground’.

He said that his motivation was to save animals and change people minds. He saw ALF raids – going into farms or labs in the dead of night and taking animals away – were very effective. His first two arrests had been for simply leafleting. Being peaceful and law abiding didn’t preclude arrest, so he thought he might as well do more radical action, directly saving lives and with less risk of arrest.

Callum emphasised that it was non-violent. They did the minimum damage to get access, rescued as many animals as they had homes for, then went back in and did graffiti and damage as ‘economic sabotage’. He said that if that counts as ‘violence ‘then the RSPCA kicking a door in to save a trapped dog is also violence.

If they had just taken animals and not done the graffiti as well, a battery chicken farmer might not even have noticed the 100 missing chickens from the thousands at the farm, and it would be no loss as they were only worth pennies each.

They never confronted anyone, if they saw security patrols then they called it all off.

POLL TAX IMPRISONMENT

Callum said that, frustrated at the police’s refusal to act against a hunter who’d severely assaulted him, he intended to use incendiary devices to damage the hunter’s vehicle in the dead of night. This plan would later prove to be his undoing.

The Poll Tax was one of the most unfair and hated policies of the Thatcher government. The Prime Minister had called it her ‘flagship policy’. It replaced local council rates – taxation based on property value – and replaced them with a fixed charge per person. A family of four adults in a terraced house would pay four times as much as a single person living in a mansion.

A police report on the huge protest against the Poll Tax in March 1990 says Brixton hunt sabs were there having ‘opportunist’ involvement in fighting with police.

Callum says it’s just further demonisation of the Brixton group. Again, the police are thinking regimentally. In reality, he was there on his own, not with sabs. He remembers the march as well-mannered. But at Trafalgar Square police surrounded the protesters and closed in.

HN5 John Dines – who was arrested undercover on the day – says people were punching, kicking and throwing stuff before the police waded in. Callum laughed at the gall of the claim, it’s well established that the police provoked the protesters, and he pointed out that a BBC documentary had proved that.

The police were doing snatch squads, darting into crowds and pulling someone out for arrest, attacking those nearby with truncheons. Callum saw a sergeant knock a woman to the ground and continue to beat her.

Callum got between them, the officer swung for Callum, who punched him back. In the ensuing retaliation and arrest Callum sustained a bruised head and cut hand. He was not arrested on the Poll Tax march, but was arrested months later at home. His home was searched and the incendiary devices found. Like so many arrested for the Poll Tax protest, he was given a lengthy prison sentence.

HN87 ‘John Lipscomb’ thinks he identified Callum from photos of the protest he was shown at an SDS meeting. We were shown the SDS annual report 1990-91 that claims that it was evidence from their officers that led to the arrest.

Callum says the spycops’ reporting on him would have had a significant impact on his sentencing, if that had been revealed in court. One again, police withheld evidence from a court case that the defence had a right to see. This is a miscarriage of justice.

AFTER PRISON

He remembers getting a lot of mail sent to him when he was inside, ten letters a day, books and magazines, and a massive pile of Christmas cards. That feeling of solidarity was essential for his mental health.

After getting out, his natural instinct was to ‘pay back’ this support by helping others in the same way.

He pointed out that if you look at any progressive movement there is always some illegality. Even if you don’t agree 100% with what someone’s done, it’s important for their movement to look after them when they’re in prison.

Callum says he has never done anything illegal since coming out of prison. He had a son, and started a career. He wanted to pay back the support he had in prison, so started helping out with the ALF Supporters Group (ALFSG).

He explained that the ALFSG was fundamentally about supporting ALF prisoners. Sections of the constitution were read aloud that make that clear. They tried to raise enough money to support animal rights prisoners in a wide range of ways, such as helping them access vegan food and toiletries while they were inside, money for travel expenses, phone calls, postage, etc.

The £24 a year membership was a lot at the time, so most of their members were older people with good jobs.

They produced a newsletter, but had it carefully vetted by lawyers to ensure there was nothing that could be seen as incitement.

HN2 ANDY COLES

Callum has supplied a photo of a party held to celebrate his release from prison. HN2 Andy Coles is in the photo, and Callum thinks this is the first time they met. However he doesn’t recall speaking to him on this occasion.

Callum first spoke to Coles on an animal rights info stall when Coles, as was standard for spycops, had a van and offered the use of it as a way to ingratiate himself. Callum said this was very useful transporting all the merchandise for stalls, or making the lengthy trip to London to collect the ALFSG newsletter from the printer.

We were shown a report by Coles [MPS0745986] saying Callum had returned to hunt sabbing now his probation over, and he was ‘itching to have a go at hunt heavies’ and wants to be generally violent.

Coles’s witness statement to the Inquiry [UCPI035074 page 106, para 224] said he ‘slogged his guts out’ to become second in command of the ALFSG, doing the admin and keeping the membership records with a computer bought from campaign funds.

Callum says Coles is lying about all of this. There was no hierarchy with a second in command, nor a computer bought by the Group. At most, Coles would have seen address labels when he was doing the quarterly envelope stuffing for the newsletter. That was the limit of his admin work.

Coles claims to have helped write the ALFSG newsletter, Callum says that’s nonsense. He could have submitted an article like anyone else, but doesn’t remember that he did.

It’s apparent that Coles lied about other things too – for example he’s reported that ALF activists informed people that they planned to do actions before actually doing them.

Callum was very clear that there was a ‘very strict security culture’ amongst animal rights activists at this time. Nobody talked about the actions they had done, never mind those they hadn’t even done yet. And those, like him, who weren’t actively involved did not need or want to know!

The ALFSG had initially been set up just to support ‘ALF’ prisoners, but mergedtheir prisoner list with the Support Animal Rights Prisoners (SARP) one, and broadened itssupport to include hunt sabs and other animal rights prisoners. The ALFSG was a public, wholly law abiding group. Coles basically spent three years watching Callum do legal activity.

‘I’m surprised he wasn’t pulled out after 12 months because it’s not telling them anything about me… I’m sort of an absence in his reports, which is odd, you know, you think he’d be saying lots about me, what I was doing, but there’s very little about me actually, because I wasn’t doing anything which could bring me to the attention of the police.’

TACTICAL EXAGGERATION AND LIES

Coles said he visited animal rights prisoner Robin Lane with Robin’s wife. It was actually Callum who went. Once again, we see undercover officers taking real events and putting the wrong name in – either claiming they did something so they appear more involved, or else doing something criminal and then attributing to others.

This is now looking like tradecraft rather than many individuals stumbling on the same tactic. Either way, it must’ve felt so easy for them, how would the bosses ever know what was true (unless a public inquiry eventually put the documents to the people involved)? Three of the officers we’ve seen who did a lot of this – Bob Lambert, Roger Pearce and Andy Coles – were promoted to Special Branch management roles where they had long and successful careers.

Coles reported a list of people contacting the ALFSG wanting to find out how to become ALF activists. Callum says this is talking as if they were applying to be members of the ALF, which is risible. He said there was only the occasional person doing anything like that, and that they used to politely decline. They couldn’t have done that even if they wanted to. Also, the enquirer’s sense of security was so poor you wouldn’t want to work with them anyway!

Coles reported that a group of people who were planning an attack on a meat facility asked if they’d have ALFSG support if they were imprisoned for it. Callum says that too was ridiculous on several levels. Firstly, they’d already know that prisoners were supported.

But more to the point, for security reasons, activists did not tell people in advance about actions. The ALFSG could only find out who did an action after it happened, if the people were arrested and imprisoned. Again, there was a very strict security culture for everybody’s sake. They didn’t want to know who did what!

Coles claims he was given an ALF spycatcher role, and talked of a prospective trip to Belfast to investigate a suspected mole. Police records show that management declined permission, saying it was too risky for him to go.

Callum says there was no ‘spycatcher’ involved in the case, let alone any chance of Coles going. In reality, eight people had been arrested for ALF action. They’d been badly abused in the cells with beatings and being burned with cigarettes. One of them had given full statement incriminating others in order to protect themselves and get a lesser sentence.

The ALFSG did not support ‘grasses’. Callum went to find out what happened and agreed the ALFSG would not support that prisoner. This person was not an ‘informer’, just someone who grassed very readily in order to protect themselves and get a lesser sentence.

Once again, a spycop exaggerates what’s going on and takes credit for someone else’s deeds in order to seem important.

Callum was frequently stopped by the police at the time, presumably because the police thought he was still an ALF activist. Coles was ideally placed to tell the police that he wasn’t, but doing so would have undermined the stories he was telling his bosses.

COLES’S RELATIONSHIPS

Callum was asked about Coles claiming at the time that he’d had a one night stand with a known animal rights activist. Callum hadn’t previously noticed Coles having any romantic or sexual interest in anyone, and he’d thought Coles might be gay. This was the only time he heard anything sexual from Coles.

Callum says Coles never told him about being any kind of ongoing relationship. He’d said he was a delivery driver, who moved around a lot, and being single fitted with his lifestyle. He didn’t seem interested in a relationship.

Here’s an officer spying for years who didn’t appear to Callum to ever have a relationship, and Callum thought that was fine. So much for other officers saying having relationships was vital to establish credibility and acceptance.

FAMILY INTRUSION

Coles visited Callum at his home and at his parents’ home. He says it was totally unnecessary for Coles to name and report on his young son, who was under six when Coles left. His excuse was that it was to identify Callum’s partner.

We were shown a long, hand written letter, supposedly sent from Budapest on 1 January 1996, from Andy to Callum, his partner and child.

It says he was glad to hear Callum was well, as he said he was going to leave the country with little detail.

He says he didn’t believe it when, years later, he was told Andy Coles was a spycop. Even when he was shown photos he couldn’t quite accept that this man who came over their house, walked their dog, and played with their son had been doing it all as a paid police role.

Callum highlighted the fact that Andy Coles doesn’t really report anything much about him or his partner. What was he doing in spending so much time with them? How can he justify befriending a young family for three years?

‘it’s a betrayal of a friendship… this is somebody we considered a friend, he came to our house, we walked our dogs together, he played with our son and we had no ill feelings about him whatsoever, there was nothing we can say “oh yeah Andy, he was a bit of a twat” or something, you know, it was a case of he’s a nice guy, helped us out and then went abroad…

Now it’s all tainted… it changes the view of your life.’