Tranche 1, Phase 3, Day 3

11 May 2022

The third day of the 2022 Undercover Policing Inquiry hearings concerning the management of the Special Demonstration Squad 1968-82 included opening statements from:

Rajiv Menon QC (representing Tariq Ali, Piers Corbyn and Ernie Tate)
Dave Morris (activist, Inquiry core participant)
Kirsten Heaven (representing Other Non-Police, Non-State Core Participants [through the co-ordinating group])
Summary of Evidence of ‘Madeleine’ and Julia Poynter

Rajiv Menon QC (representing Tariq Ali, Piers Corbyn and the interests of Ernie Tate)

NB: Ernie Tate sadly passed away in 2021, without receiving any meaningful disclosure from the Inquiry.

SECRET HEARINGS AND MASSIVE REDACTIONS

Rajiv Menon QC

First of all, Mr Menon spoke about the secret hearings that have been held during the last year, known as the ‘T1P4 hearings’. In his view, it is “fundamentally wrong and unfair” to conduct closed hearings as part of a so-called ‘Public Inquiry’.

The transcripts of those hearings have been heavily redacted, and we are told that this is being done “in the public interest”. Evidence was taken from five officers in T1P4, but we are not being told their real or cover names. Instead of being supplied with copies of their evidence, we have a document of ‘Unattributed Excerpts‘.

This was especially ridiculous in the case of officer HN21:

“an officer who was perfectly willing 20 years ago to speak openly about his undercover role in the BBC documentary True Spies, is unable to give evidence in open session to a Public Inquiry.”

This is someone who admitted having a sexual relationship with at least one woman, but we have not been permitted to question him or find out more about this.

It is estimated that 50% of the evidence gathered during T1P4 has been redacted, and might therefore remain secret forever. Menon repeated the request he made last year – that the Inquiry reconsider the need for such redactions, and commit to regularly reviewing decisions about disclosure, so that names and information can be made public in future if circumstances change.

POLICE VIOLENCE

Mounted police intimidate protesters, Southall,, 23 April 1979 [Pic: John Sturrock]

HN41 says that he was warned by senior Special Branch officers not to go with his target group “because the uniform police were going to clamp down on the demonstrations” and “management considered the dangers were more than normal”.

Mr Menon states there is no doubt uniformed police were under secret orders to use violence at anti-fascist demonstrations. Meanwhile intelligence from the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) seemed to heighten a view within the police that all anti-fascist demonstrators were subversives so fair game for police truncheons.

POLITICAL BIAS

According to DI Angus McIntosh (officer HN244), there was a “high level policy decision” not to infiltrate extreme right-wing groups. This confirms what we already knew about the prejudiced nature of SDS surveillance. Yet, given HN41’s observations, who exactly made this decision and why?

Mr Menon asks us to bear in mind that the SDS was an integral part of the secret state. Senior offices and politicians were well aware of the SDS’ existence, something borne out by the disclosure we have had.

He also lets the comments of SDS manager Geoffrey Craft (officer HN34) about “mob rule”, “lefties” and “scruffy, hairy so-and-so’s” speak for themselves, having described it as “classic ‘Reds under the Bed’ stuff with a dose of McCarthyism thrown in for good measure” [Inquiry document number MPS-0747446, not yet published on the Inquiry website].

GOOD – FOR NOTHING?

Following up on his earlier points on HN41, he addresses the claimed success of SDS in combating public disorder by asking:

“Are Red Lion Square, Grunwick, Lewisham and Southall supposed to be police ‘successes’? If so, perhaps this gives the measure of what the police were trying to achieve at the time”.

Really “scraping the justification barrel” is the suggestion that the unit’s usefulness includes working out that some groups pose no threat at all, by infiltrating them for long periods of time (which we see in many of the SDS Annual Reports).

ALTERNATIVE INTELLIGENCE GATHERING METHODS

He next looked at whether there were less harmful ways of collecting intelligence, using the case of SDS officer Roy Creamer and the anarchist scene of the late 60s/ early 70s. DI Creamer was described by noted anarchist Stuart Christie as “the Yard’s dialectician of dissent.”

Creamer was curious as to what made anarchists tick. He was the epitome of what Menon called the ‘direct approach’, as opposed to the ‘oblique approach’ developed by Conrad Dixon and the other spycops.

Instead of going undercover, he established friendly relationships with targets and talked to them. The barrister suggested the ‘direct approach’ was a proportionate and less damaging approach to the gathering of intelligence than the SDS method.

However, we at the Campaign Opposing Police Surveillance strongly recommend you never talk to coppers, especially if they seem friendly!

SDS & MI5

Menon next moved to a theme of increasing importance in the Inquiry – the relationship between the SDS and the Security Service (aka MI5) [see Inquiry document MPS-0747446 when they upload it to the Inquiry site].

He emphasised the Security Service’s interest in this new unit from the moment it was founded. They recognised the Squad’s potential value as a long-term intelligence gathering operation against all those it deemed ‘subversive’. If anything;

“MI5 were the organ grinders, and SDS were the monkeys. Only the monkeys did not know to whose tune they were really dancing.”

Even Craft says that: “the Branch were the legs of the Security Service… SDS was only a development of that”, and that the SDS provided the Security Service with “a huge base of information for their vetting activity”.

Opening statement of Rajiv Menon QC

Dave Morris (representing himself)

This was a relatively short statement from Morris, who has already given several previous opening statements to the Inquiry and a witness statement.

His name appears in multiple SDS reports released by the Inquiry. He was active in various anarchist and environmental groups:

“I have been involved since 1974 in a range of groups and campaigns trying to encourage the public to support one another and empower themselves where they live and work, to challenge injustice, oppression and damage to the environment, and to make the world a better place for everyone.

“The various groups I have been involved in over the decades have been open and collectively-run, and engaged in the kind of public activities which the public are invited to join in or to replicate for themselves, and which are essential if humanity is to progress and survive.”

These groups challenged the government and powerful companies, as well as ruthless and unaccountable elites which were ‘subversive of society and people’s real needs.’

Morris said:

“I am proud of the many groups and campaigns I have been involved in and believe that such efforts should be supported, not undermined.”

One of those campaigns which is now known to have been infiltrated was the Torness Alliance anti-nuclear campaign.

Having noted that the Inquiry’s Chair, Sir John Mitting, had been furnished with an education in Trotskyism from Tariq Ali, Morris correspondingly provided Mitting with a primer on anarchism, explaining that some institutions simply cannot be reformed but must be replaced by genuine democracy.

He helpfully provided a list of books for the Chair to read in order to better understand anarchist thinking:
Anarchism – A Very Short Introduction by Colin Ward
Demanding the Impossible by Peter Marshall
On Anarchism by Noam Chomsky
and just in case Mitting was partial to science fiction, Ursula Le Guin’s classic The Dispossessed.

Morris mentioned one spycop, ‘Tony Williams’ (officer HN20), who became treasurer and secretary of the London Workers Group and whose reporting was no doubt passed on to the Security Service for blacklisting purposes. Apparently the SDS told the Security Service they considered Williams’ withdrawal from the field ‘no great loss’ as he had not been ‘particularly productive’.

Morris criticised the Inquiry for continued delays and other problems to do with the publication of documents – some of which were released so late in the day that there was insufficient time for anyone to process them properly.

Morris was particularly critical of the police and the Inquiry for failing to prioritise the welfare of the spycops’ victims. He made the point that those undercover officers had a duty of care towards the public. The police’s sudden championing of privacy and human rights, when it came to applying for anonymity, was hypocritical and self-serving, and only because they themselves were now being exposed to public scrutiny.

Finally, in a slightly surreal moment, Mitting asked Morris which book he would select from his list if he could only pick one. Dave unhesitantly went for Peter Marshall’s Demanding the Impossible, although he warned that it was a “weighty tome”.

Opening statement of Dave Morris

Kirsten Heaven (representing the ‘Non State Non Police Core Participants, through the coordinating group’)

In previous hearings we heard shocking evidence of what Heaven described as “an unjustifiable, unlawful, and profoundly anti-democratic system of surveillance that was fundamentally flawed”.

Managers are now in the spotlight to answer for that regime. However:

“The witness statements disclosed in this Inquiry contain a litany of denials and an apparent unwillingness to accept responsibility or admit knowledge on key decision making and events. The managers appear reluctant to give a full and honest explanation of why things went so badly wrong within the SDS in the Tranche 1 era (1968-1982), and beyond.”

Basically, if they retain a sense of loyalty to the police, it is deeply misplaced, Heaven said, referring to the recent appalling exposures:

“This is an institution which has been found to be institutionally racist, institutionally corrupt and marred by a culture of toxic masculinity, homophobia, misogyny, and sexual harassment.”

OVERSIGHT

These managers emphasised to their funders at the Home Office how robust their supervision of the undercovers was. Yet there was no code of conduct or formal training.

“Did the managers conceal these practices from their political masters or was it – as the non-state co-operating group suspect – that the cover-up went to the highest political level?”

In order to understand the problems of the SDS we must understand who controlled the unit, and the extent to which the SDS was being directed by the likes of other parts of Special Branch and the Security Service, referred to as the ‘customers’.

Worryingly, there is disclosed evidence that although they were aware of the problems, the Home Office and senior police officers all turned a blind eye. This meant there was no effective external oversight of the SDS, or of wider Special Branch.

Police detain man, Lewisham, 13 August1977

Additionally, both the Home Office and the Security Service knew that the SDS activities of the time were unlawful. This was the reason for shrouding it in secrecy, a secrecy that allowed the abuses to flourish.

As raised in other Opening Statements, a problematic definition of ‘subversion’ was used to justify reporting on pretty much anything and anyone. The Security Service was able to exercise its influence over the affairs of Special Branch to shape how the unit operated.

Senior police officers were willing to go along with this, and ignore the lack of public order benefits of these deployments. Claims that the SDS benefited and improved the police’s attitudes to public order simply don’t stand up. Heaven used the events of Red Lion Square, Southall and Lewisham as examples. The Brixton riots of 1981 demonstrated just how useless the unit when it came to predicting or preventing public disorder.

There was no real attempt to evaluate the usefulness of the unit more generally. Annual Reports were written up in order to justify its existence and ongoing funding. It was the duty of the managers “to consider the threat to freedom of speech and democratic principles posed by the SDS”, and they failed to do this.

MANAGEMENT OF THE SDS

Heaven noted that the SDS was managed loosely and wonders whether the early ‘free and easy’ style became the blueprint for the future. Despite claims of close supervision, the managers remained blind to the various sexual relationships, and the sexist banter, of these officers.

As to the standardisation of the lengths of deployments to four years, she wants to know if there was a “positive and considered managerial decision to extend all deployments well beyond twelve months”, adding:

“It is not rocket science that the longer a UCO [undercover officer] is deployed, the greater chance there is of collateral intrusion, the development of close personal ties, sexual and intimate relationships, misconduct and abuse of power and trust”.

The lack of training given to both undercover officers and their managers is concerning. The Inquiry must look at what basic police training was at the time to understand how much they knew about legal principles such as entering private property without a search warrant or conduct issues such as sexual relationships while on duty. How did the managers reconcile this with the activities of the SDS?

DODGY REPORTING

As previously evidenced, there is much reporting which is distressing and inappropriate, peppered as it is with racism and misogyny. Nobody pointed it out at the time. The SDS managers all now say that these reports were produced for others to comment on, evaluate and use.

However, these senior officers were responsible for the unit’s work, and as such have a duty to explain this reporting along with the other practices that took place under their watch.

CONCLUSION

The SDS, as an operation, was never lawful. These abuses were aided by the Home Office sanctioning and maintaining the unit’s secretive existence, leading to a “catastrophic failure of policing at the heart of British democracy”.

The way that the unit acted during this period (1968-1982) paved the way for the abuses committed later – we were told that their “abhorrent practices survived and even flourished following legal reforms.”

Opening statement of Kirsten Heaven

‘Madeleine’ and Julia Poynter: Written statements

These written statements, from two ‘civilian witnesses’, were published in full today. The Inquiry prepared a short summary of each, and read it out loud. We prepared our own, below:

‘Madeleine’

Special Demonstration Squad officer Vince Harvey during his deployment

‘Madeleine’ was deceived into a relationship with an undercover officer known as ‘Vince Miller’ (officer HN354), who infiltrated the Walthamstow branch of the Socialist Workers Party (1976 -1979). Since then Vince’s real surname (Harvey) has been released.

It turns out that he reached the level of Superintendent before retiring from the police, and went on to a top job, National Director at the National Criminal Intelligence Service. The Undercover Research Group have published a summary of Vincent Harvey’s post-undercover career.

(‘Madeleine’ had already provided the Inquiry with a written statement in February 2021, and gave compelling evidence in hearings of May 2021. Also see Charlotte Killroy QC’s statement on her behalf this week)

COLD AND CYNICAL TACTICS

Vince Miller’s postcard to Madeleine, 1979

In her statement, ‘Madeleine’ recounted the stressful and “excruciating” nature of her live witness testimony at the Inquiry in May 2021, where she suffered “intrusive questioning”.

This was so bad that other women from ‘Category H’ suffered “such significant distress that they were unsure if they would be able to continue their participation in the Inquiry”. This raises serious questions about the treatment of witnesses, who are in effect sexual abuse survivors.

‘Madeleine’ mentioned Vince sending her a postcard at the end of 1979, after he disappeared from her life, giving her false hope about him. She now knows that this was “a cold and cynical tactic”, perpetuated on other women by other undercovers who’d disappeared in similar ways.

MANIPULATED BY THE INQUIRY

She then recounted how she’d generously acceded to the Inquiry’s request not to demand Harvey’s real name, in order to ‘protect’ one of his family members.

However, she then found out more about his long career in policing, which involved many public appearances. She was shocked to learn that while Harvey was its Director, the National Criminal Intelligence Service had responsibility for the Animal Rights National Index (a forerunner of another undercover political policing unit, the National Public Order Intelligence Unit) and the National Domestic Extremism Database:

“I think it is imperative that he is required to provide evidence relating to this role in later tranches.”

Perhaps most disturbing for ‘Madeleine’ was the revelation that Harvey had been in charge of a child sexual abuse investigation, Operation Pragada, saying she felt “physically sick” and “turned her stomach” on finding this out.

‘Madeleine’ now feels manipulated into the decision she made not to demand his real name. The Inquiry would have known about his later senior policing roles. It is a disgrace that they allowed this to happen.

INCOMPLETE RECORD OF REPORTING ON ‘MADELEINE’

Former SDS officer Vince Harvey, 1999

Madeleine has always maintained that the 23 Special Branch reports in her witness pack could not be a complete record of the reporting on her.

Having now come across a report of a meeting that took place at her home, but did not mention her name, she believes that Harvey purposefully omitted her name from the list, due to his involvement with her.

‘Madeleine’ now wants to check all 175 reports produced by Harvey – which the Inquiry has chosen not to publish – to see if they refer to events that she attended with him. All reports thought to have been authored by this officer should be disclosed.

Opening statement of ‘Madeleine’

Julia Poynter

Julia is also a former member of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), and knew both ‘Madeleine’ and ‘Vince Miller’ back in the day. She has come forward and was able to collaborate her old comrade’s accounts of the time. Poynter also knew ‘Phil Cooper’ (officer HN155) who infiltrated the SWP (1979-84) after ‘Vince Miller’ had ended his deployment.

Poynter was shocked that the Inquiry held 62 reports which mentioned her name. She described her political trajectory, going from being a disillusioned Labour Party member to joining the SWP in 1975, where her “main focus was anti-racism work through my involvement with the Anti Nazi League”.

MISSED OPPORTUNITY

Poynter says that when she attended a Trade Union Conference on Undercover Policing in November 2019, she saw ‘Vince Miller’s name on a document listing all the undercovers, but did not connect this with the man she knew. If only the Inquiry had released a photo at that time, she would have been able to identify him:

“I could then have provided this evidence to the Inquiry at a much earlier date.”

Two years later, listening to the 2021 hearings, Julia realised that ‘Madeleine’ was an old friend of hers, who she had not seen for many years. She was shocked that Harvey was still maintaining that this had only been a one-night stand:

“It was clear to me at the time that it had been a significant relationship for her.”

‘PHIL COOPER’

Poynter went on to discuss her interactions with ‘Phil Cooper’, who she met through her boyfriend. Cooper and her then-partner set up Waltham Forest Anti Nuclear Campaign (WFANC) in about 1980. Cooper said in his written statement that he had not formed any significant friendships in the group.

However, Poynter recalls that:

“[her boyfriend] and Phil got on very well and were good friends. WFANC would meet at our house and Phil would attend those meetings. My memory of Phil is that he was a real laugh, very much into drinking and having a good time.”

Cooper drank heavily, and smoked weed regularly. On one occasion, she says he was so inebriated that he fell off his chair and broke it.

Poynter addressed many of the Special Branch Reports which mentioned her name. One such report describes a 1981 SWP branch meeting – a fireman contact has offered to help carry out a personal investigation, following a spate of racist attacks on Asians in the area.

According to the report:

“The SWP intend to use this information to stir up further unrest within the Asian community in Walthamstow.”

She does not accept this cynical interpretation – what’s been left out of the report is what had actually happened – in early July petrol had been poured through the door of an Asian household in the area, killing Parveen Khan (28) and her children Kamran (11), Aqsa (10) and Imran (2). She stated:

“The community were rightfully angry and we were reaching out and helping to build alliances in the community. It is offensive that the police were spying on us carrying out this work rather than spending resources identifying the murderers, who as far as I am aware have never been caught.”

Opening statement of Julia Poynter

Transcript of the full day’s hearing

The current round of Undercover Policing Inquiry hearings, focusing on Special Demonstration Squad managers 1968-82, continue until Friday 20 May.

<<Previous UCPI Daily Report (10 May 2022)<<

>>Next UCPI Daily Report (12 May 2022)>>

Tranche 1, Phase 2, Day 14, part one

11 May 2021

Evidence from witness:
‘Vince Miller’ (HN354, 1976-79)

Special Demonstration Squad officer ‘Vince Miller’ while undercover in the late 1970s

The 11 May hearing of the Undercover Policing Inquiry focused on a single police witness: Officer HN354 who, as ‘Vince Miller‘, infiltrated the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) from 1976-1979.

Miller has submitted two written statements, one written on 18 November 2018 and a second (supplementary and consolidated) statement written on 10 March 2021.

During his deployment, he had sexual relations with four women that we know of, including ‘Madeleine’ (a member of the Walthamstow branch of the SWP) whose compelling evidence we heard yesterday. Madeleine’s written statement is also available.

Miller disputes some of Madeleine’s account of their relationship.

Miller was questioned by David Barr QC, Counsel to the Inquiry, whose performance was notably focused and sustained, keeping the pressure on highly significant issues. Though we have been critical in the past, it is just as important to note when he shows himself the right person for the job.

The day was particularly long by Inquiry standards and covered a vast amount of ground; so much so that this report will focus on the earlier part about his joining the Special Demonstration Squad and abuse of women. We will publish part two, covering the political activity he was involved in and end of his deployment, separately.

TESTIMONY BEGINS

Asked whether he was interviewed before joining the Metropolitan Police’s Special Demonstration Squad (SDS), Miller it was nothing more formal than a casual discussion about what would be involved.

He remembered that one of the first things they asked about was his marital status. Miller explained he was the first unmarried undercover to be deployed. He was in a relationship at the time, but not cohabiting. He thought being married was preferred, because having a wife meant some form of support whilst enduring the stress of an undercover deployment.

BACK OFFICE & REPORT WRITING

There were only a certain number of officers in the field at a time, so he worked in the unit’s back office until there was a ‘vacancy’.

He would take calls from undercovers and pass on messages. He said that reading undercovers’ reports provided him with ‘snapshots’ of information, and the content and style expected in the SDS.

Miller provided some new insights into the reporting process. As SDS reports were based on intelligence from undercover, they were given a higher security classification than standard Special Branch ones. He said the Registry File references which appear in the reports attached to names and groups were added by back office staff like himself. Sometimes information from various officers would be merged into one report, or split; this was done by management, who would also check the reports.

A document [UCPI0000010718] from July 1976 refers to a photograph of a Revolutionary Communist Group member being shown to informants at the request of the Security Service (MI5), and the individual being ‘positively identified’ as a result.

Miller added:

‘I would say that almost every report that was submitted on the groups we were working with would be copied across to the Security Service.’

He says that Superintendent Derek Kneale would visit the SDS back office every hour, and sometimes visit to the safe house. Kneale knew the squad ‘very well’.

LEARNING THE TRADECRAFT

Asked how he learned his tradecraft, Miller said the spycops shared tips amongst themselves, such as what vehicle to get. He came to know all his contemporaries during his time in the squad.

Together, they attended meetings at the safe houses twice a week. Occasionally, officers would talk to the managers in private – ‘managers always made themselves available’.

However, they also gave the deployed officers leeway, as there was no communication once in the field.

SWEATING

The next question was a crucial one: whether he received any guidance on personal relationships with activists. Miller says he cannot remember any discussion about this.

Barr then read from the ‘gisted’ (summarised and censored) statement that Miller had previously submitted to the Inquiry [UCPI0000034356], which noted an individual was keen to start a relationship with him.

It said:

‘[Miller] did not reciprocate for the very reason that this was contrary to SDS directions, morally questionable and could have compromised his deployment.’

Contradicting what he had said earlier, this was just the first of various inconsistencies in Miller’s testimony. It was from this point that his demeanour changed from the relatively relaxed to more nervous. Eventually, he could be seen sweating.

Miller said this woman’s approach to him was half way into his deployment and confirmed she was not one of the four he admits having sex with. He says he had no physical sexual relationship with this woman, but she ‘very much gave the impression’ of wanting one.

He also confirmed a private conversation between him and the SDS head, CI Geoff Craft (HN34), about it:

‘I said I thought it was becoming an issue, and… asked what his opinion would be if such situations developed. He then said that he didn’t think it was a very good idea.’

He clarified that this advice referred to both a relationship and sex. He also admitted it was good advice, which he should have followed.

Barr probed what Miller had meant by ‘morally questionable’:

‘Because we were not being totally honest with the other persons involved in the relationship.’

Barr steadily drew Miller out through his questioning, and got him to admit:

‘If it’s sexual extending over a long period of time, I’d have definitely said that was wrong, yes.’

And whether a one-night stand in his cover name was also morally questionable?

‘I now have to accept that was an incorrect act.’

COMMITTING CRIME

Miller was asked about guidance on undercover officers committing crime. He said that they were told to avoid carrying heavy wooden banner poles at demos in case ‘an enthusiastic police officer’ thought they constituted offensive weapons.

He also admitted to drink-driving during his deployment, explaining it was:

‘considerably more common then than now.’

On ‘legal professional privilege’ – confidnetiality between lawyer and client, which was breached by officers who were arrested when undercover – Miller said he was aware of the concept but not the term.

SUBVERSION – IT’S WHAT MI5 SAYS IT IS!

Ask about his understanding of ‘subversion’, Miller said that ‘to be brutally honest’, he was not ‘really concerned’ about the definition of it – it was whatever the Security Service defined it to be. If they said an organisation was subversive, it was good enough for him.

Pressed further he said:

‘I think the subversive would seek to change things without going through the parliamentary system.’

Although asked if there was any guidance on what he should and shouldn’t report, he instead gave an answer on who was and wasn’t to be reported on. He said that MPs shouldn’t be and ‘you had to be very careful with reporting journalists’.

Miller made the point he ‘was essentially a foot soldier’, and if some information seemed sensitive would seek authority or permission from his managers.

IDENTITY THEFT

He was also asked more about how he created his false identity, ‘Vince Miller’. It was standard practice for SDS officers to steal the identity of a dead child as the basis for their undercover persona. He thought it unlikely that the deceased children’s family would find out, so did not worry about this. Nor had he given consideration as to how they might feel if the identity theft ever came to light.

Asked how he felt, upon reflection, so many years later, his response was neither to apologise or express regret. Instead he spoke of how current technology has made the practice obsolete.

This is another theme of Miller’s evidence; despite clearly being distressed by some of his actions, or at least being made to acknowledge their consequences, he never steps up to take this opportunity to make amends, nor offer any apparently genuine contrition.

Miller did several things to make it harder for anyone to delve into his identity, for instance choosing a child with no father listed. He also picked a different first name to use, ‘Vincent’ being neither his or the dead child’s real first name.

He had a fake job with a firm installing Portakabins, partitions and suspended ceilings. This was a real firm, and he set things up with them so if anyone called for him, they would say was out and about, the job supposedly taking him to different work sites. This was, he said:

‘a good buffer to keep the communications under some kind of control’.

FEAR OF BEING FOUND OUT

Though there was ‘constant concern’ about being identified as a police officer, Miller had no contingency plan. Officers were told to contact the SDS office immediately if anything happened.

Miller relates how he was once recognised by a uniformed officer at a demonstration. To his good fortune, the officer didn’t approach him at the time, but he did report Miller’s involvement in this activist group to New Scotland Yard.

He seems to have made up some elements of his ‘legend’ on the spur of the moment to deal with questions as they arose. Some stand out as they have been used by various other spycops. In response to a question about what he was doing at Christmas, he said his parents had died, effectively ending that line of conversation.

He made up a story about a previous ‘toxic’ relationship to explain his lack of a record collection and other belongings. He says it was ‘purely and simply to explain the circumstances under which I was living’, adding that his bedsit was the sort of place that nobody would want to stay for long.

Despite these similarities to the cover stories of colleagues, Miller says he has no idea what other spycops officers’ legends were. Rather, he was able to draw on his personal experience of a break-up to inspire his cover story.

WALTHAMSTOW SWP

He was told to find a group in Walthamstow to spy on. He chose the local branch of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP).

Asked why they were a suitable target, he said the SWP were:

‘defined as subversive by those who are more expert in that field’

He added that the Waltham Forest branch ‘was an active group’.

Miller says the Walthamstow SWP was the only group he joined. In another of his inconsistencies, he then played the need to target the Socialist Workers, saying the SDS regarded the party as a ‘feeder organisation’ from which they could move to other groups:

‘One from which you could be disaffected and join a less populist, more idealistic line.’

Rock Against Racism carnival poster, 30 April 1978

Later he said he used his position in the SWP to meet more people, to cast his net wider, though little evidence of that has been provided in terms of his reporting.

It was easy to infiltrate the group – he just approached local paper sellers and they invited him to their public meetings at the local pub, the Rose and Crown.

Asked whether he influenced the direction of the group, Miller says he deliberately chose not to read up on left-wing theory before joining the party. Instead he presented as ‘politically naïve’, waiting for the party to educate him about politics.

Once Miller joined, he attended pickets and other demos, as well as birthday parties, socials and fundraisers. He was even on the social committee of the Outer East London District.

However, he only remembers attending one music event – the Anti Nazi League’s large Rock Against Racism concert in Hackney on 30 April 1978.

He would also help members of the group move house, and go to the pub with them during and after meetings and other events. He would go back to their houses, where drinking would continue.

OFFICIAL: NAZIS ARE NOT SUBVERSIVE

Barr asked Miller if he considered infiltrating the far right, to which Miller gave the curious reply:

‘I don’t think I should talk about the far-right deployments at this stage.’

Throughout the hearings, it is clear that the SDS had a political bias against the left and were seemingly wilfully ignorant (at best) of the dangers the far-right posed.

Miller followed this line no uncertain terms:

‘I’m not sure at that time [the far right] was classified as subversive, and therefore would not have been within our remit.’

He did not mention the public order part of their remit, or the general policing requirement to stop murders, violent assaults, arson, harassment and property damage being perpetrated against Black and minority communities.

BOOZY AFTERNOONS AT SDS SAFE HOUSES

The meetings at the SDS safe houses were attended by the undercovers, the managers, office staff, any new recruits, and occasionally more senior officers. The safe house he recalled was a large flat, with two or three bedrooms, and a living room where the group met.

Miller would submit his diaries and written reports – usually hand-written, although he thinks typewriters were issued later. They would sometimes get feedback if these reports were not at the desired standard. He had several corrections on compliance with Special Branch’s house style.

Asked about the topic of conversations at the safe house, he said they would discuss likely attendance numbers at demonstrations. They would work together to identify individuals (e.g., from an album of photos which was passed around).

Miller went on to explain the value of the peer support – there was nobody else these officers could discuss issues with, as they could not talk to their families about their work:

‘And of course, because this was a rolling group, there was almost every likelihood that what you were finding difficult as a new field officer had been met by somebody else, who had said, “look, I tried this and it did work,” or, “it didn’t work”. It was very much a laid-back thing as the afternoon went on. Which is where you’d got a sort of informal exchange of information, but also a release so that you could actually talk about things somewhere.’

He said these afternoons were ‘relaxed’ and ‘laid back’, and suggested that they got more so, especially if the spycops were drinking. The managers would leave at some point and the undercovers stayed until it was time to go to their political meetings in the evening.

‘We were doing a job that not many people could or would do, and it was valuable’

He says that there were always opportunities for SDS officers to discuss welfare issues with their managers, but:

‘we’d probably have turned it down even if we needed their help.’

Such discussions also included the demands of being deployed in the different groups. For instance, those spying on the Maoists complained about how much reading they had to do.

However, Miller noted they couldn’t just ‘sit on the outside and take the Mickey’ out of their targets – they had to take them seriously and have some respect for their political beliefs in order to be effective.

‘I think police officers have to deal with what they have to deal with, and you just have to accept that people have strange views and our views that don’t chime with yours, and cope with that.’

NO BANTER

Asked about the kind of ‘jokes’ that were told, Miller spoke of the need for ‘stress relief’. However, he claimed they were more likely to joke about other police officers than about their targets.

Unlike the account in the witness statement of his colleague, ‘Graham Coates’ (HN304, 1975-79), he does not recall any banter about individual undercovers or any ‘sexual jokes’:

‘It was not like the stereotypical rugby club atmosphere after the match type atmosphere.’

In particular, he denied hearing any banter like, ‘he’ll have made her bite the blankets again last night’ (a cringingly unforgettable piece of evidence from Coates’ evidence a few days previously).

Asked if any of the jokes might have been considered offensive by feminists at the time he said:

‘Someone may well say “did you hear the Jim Davidson joke of last night?” His humour would no longer be acceptable, but that might be going round and you’d be told that.’

Later he insisted he didn’t remember any racist joking or opinions, ever, by anyone, and says he is ‘absolutely certain’ of this. He added that he was only referring to the SDS, not the entire police service, when he said this.

Did the managers join in with banter? His response to this question was about people ‘having different personalities and ways of interacting’.

REPUTATIONS OF OTHER SPYCOPS

Next, Barr turned to asking questions about other SDS officers’ reputations with women.

He began with Richard Clark (‘Rick Gibson’ HN297, 1974-76), who had sexual relationships with four women including an activist called Mary. Miller confirmed Gibson’s reputation as a ‘ladies man’, but says he only knew of this after the officer had moved on from the SDS. They remained friends after their deployments.

What about ‘Jim Pickford‘ (HN300, 1974-76)?

‘He probably crossed the line.’

Miller said that Pickford never spoke to him about sexual relationships, or about falling in love (not just with activists but with anyone):

‘I think I heard stories when he was getting married for the second or third time.’

Next, he was asked about ‘Barry Tompkins’ (HN106, 1979-83). He said that that officer was ‘somebody who enjoyed the company of women’, but that he didn’t try to seduce any in Miller’s presence.

Miller says his deployment didn’t overlap with that of ‘Phil Cooper’ (HN155, 1979-83) but recalled that he ‘got into all sorts of scrapes’ – mentioning ‘women, drinks and all sorts of things’. He doesn’t remember any rumours about Cooper having sex while undercover, but:

‘I wouldn’t put it past him.’

BANTER?

Barr tested the consistency of the day’s witness evidence, by returning to ask again about the jokes and banter – did he hear any on the subject of the spycops having sexual relationships?

Miller insisted that it:

‘was never a subject of banter in my presence.’

Barr then followed up on evidence from previous days about manager turning a blind eye. Miller said he isn’t sure if they were even aware of the relationships:

‘It was certainly never openly said, “yeah, get on with it” or anything like that.’

Last week we heard ‘Graham Coates’ describe how he was granted permission to transfer his attention from the SWP to anarchists, at his own request (because he says he personally found anarchism more ‘fascinating’).

How important was officer retention to the unit’s managers? Did this mean that undercovers’ requests were accommodated wherever possible?

‘They were generally tolerant of our requests. I don’t know if there’s a particular line here, but yes, they were very supportive and understood that you would make requests at certain times.’

HEAVY DRINKER

Asked about his alcohol consumption, Miller said he would drink every day and would have, on average, three pints, while the other SWP members sipped on a half a pint.

In her evidence, Madeleine said he was ‘always first to the bar’. Miller quickly agreed with this, seemingly proud of his reputation as a heavy drinker. Pausing for thought, he then said this was part of his tradecraft.

In particular, he claimed, he got into the habit of going into the pub ahead of the others in order to check who else was there, and ensure there was nobody who would recognise him in his real identity. He says even nowadays he still does this, and tends to position himself with his back to the wall in pubs.

BACK TO WALTHAMSTOW SWP

Miller says he got to know Wlathamstow SWP branch members well, however, wasn’t ‘an expert on their private lives’. He didn’t spend as much time with the married members of the branch, who had their own personal and professional lives going on.

However, he kept a distance between himself and the activists generally, and kept communication under control. He didn’t invite them round to his cover flat, he didn’t make himself easily available. He chose when to spend time with them.

Barr asked about him spending time at SWP members’ homes. He recalled the house-share where ‘Madeleine’ and other members lived. What did he know about her?

‘I believe I knew that she had been married and was no longer with her husband, and pretty much that was it.’

He was reminded that he filed a report in July 1978 [UCPI0000011289] about Madeleine’s wedding, which had taken place in 1976. Was this usual practice?

His excuse is that there was already a Special Branch file open on Madeleine, and he was simply making sure it was kept up to date. He says he didn’t attend the wedding, and doesn’t remember meeting Madeleine’s husband (also a SWP member).

However Madeleine’s evidence contradicts this – she says he visited the couple’s flat.

WHITE SHIRT

There followed an unusual line of questioning – about whether he wore a white shirt during his deployment. In his statement, Miller denied doing so. However Madeleine has provided the Inquiry with photographs taken of him back in those days, and he can clearly be seen in what looks like a white shirt.

Miller quibbled about the photograph – how could they tell what colour the shirt was, given it was a black and white image? When pressed, he did concede he wore white shirts on occasion, but couldn’t quite bring himself to admit that his original statement was, as Barr charitably put it, ‘mistaken’.

Though these sort of exchanges appear trivial or odd, there are generally solid legal reasons to this strategy, which was particularly highlighted by the evidence of both Madeleine and Miller. In this there was a dispute of fact around the relationships, so in asking these questions Barr was starting to test the veracity of Miller’s account.

It is a problem that it is not being done properly by the Inquiry in other cases, such as when undercover ‘Dave Robertson‘ (HN45, 1970-73) disputed Diane Langford’s account of his exposure. However, it is heartening to see the Inquiry do it properly in this particular instance.

RELATIONSHIP WITH MADELEINE

After the lunch break, David Barr QC zoomed in on Miller’s relationship with Madeleine, in what became the most intense set of questioning at the Inquiry to date.

Unlike other sessions, Barr did not let incomplete answers simply stand and move on. If he wasn’t satisfied with the answer he would rephrase the question, and then once again if he thought it necessary.

Barr also compared what Miller said now, to what he had said in his first witness statement three years ago, and in his supplementary statement of this year, and inquired what had caused him to change his mind or brought back memories. Barr additionally picked up on when Miller said something different to what he had stated earlier.

What did not come over in the transcript was Barr’s use of pauses. Miller would often take time before answering, and Barr would let the response linger a bit before moving to the next question. This added to the tension, you could hear the proverbial pin drop in the hearing room as people collectively waited for the next move. Sometimes the questions were just devastating.

Miller squirmed, his quite red face flushing as his body language gave him away. He seemed to want to disappear under the table, looking down, becoming smaller. Only when the topic of Madeleine was finished did he straighten up again.

It’s difficult to capture that tension in this report without having to include too many extensive quotes.

THE RELATIONSHIP BEGINS

Barr started a question to introduce the topic of Miller’s relationship with Madeleine, asking him what Madeleine’s attitude to the police was.

Miller claimed not to remember, but said SWP members generally distrusted the police, as they were more likely to be right-wing. They believed the State would not hesitate to tap their telephones or intercept their mail. The police would often protect the fascists’ demonstrations, and were seen as the ‘repressive arm of the State’.

Miller said his relationship with Madeleine was ‘quite marginal’ before it became sexual in late summer of 1979. They would have met at the weekly meetings, and socially, but always as part of a larger group of people.

He says he has no memory at all of the location when they first got together. Madeleine told us it was a house party in Ilford, and he has no reason to doubt her memory on that.

Indeed, whilst he was wary of admitting much, Miller did not dispute much of Madeleine’s detailed recollection of the start of their relationship; that he was in a chair and she sat on his lap, that they spent the evening chatting and flirting, that neither of them had an excessive amount to drink, and that he drove them back to Madeleine’s flat. What he did question was whether he actually pulled her on his lap.

In his first witness statement he had sought to excuse the four sexual encounters with his consumption of alcohol. Now Miller was clear that he was not blaming it on alcohol, nor on Madeleine:

‘Whoever made the invitation, I could have declined. It is therefore my responsibility.’

Miller said that back at her place, they sat in the lounge chatting with her house mates, when she invited him up to her room. He claimed he was surprised that she would say this with others present.

Barr noted that, as a serving police officer on duty, this would have been the time to say no. He asked Miller for his reasons to decide otherwise. The answer was sobering:

‘I think the prospect of not driving home and spending a pleasant evening continued and overcame my hesitation.’

Barr bluntly asked him; did you go into the bedroom because you wanted sex – despite the fact you were a serving police officer on duty?

‘I think I’d have to say yes.’

ON TAKING PRECAUTIONS

Miller gave no consideration to what would have happened if Madeleine had got pregnant.

In fact he said that, as she was a feminist, it was her responsibility:

Q. Did you use contraception?
A. Not that I recall.
Q. Did you give any thought to the consequences of fathering a child when you were in fact an undercover police officer?
A. No, I didn’t. I think my perception was that as a full feminist socialist supporter, then if there was any need for protection, then she would have mentioned it. I didn’t see her as some kind of shrinking violet, or something like that. This was a member of the women’s movement, and women had the same right to ask for things and to insist on things as a man. And I would have supported that then. I incidentally still do. So she would have had the right – absolute right to insist, if it was necessary.
Q. But in the absence of any insistence?
A. Then I assumed everything was safe. In contraceptive terms.

Despite knowing she was recently out of an abusive relationship, Miller presumes she would never have felt pressured by him.

He remembers using the bad-breakup story as part of his ‘legend’, but while Madeleine recalls talking about it in bed, Miller has no recollection of sharing more with her about this previous ‘toxic’ relationship. Nor does he remember telling her, or anyone else, that he had been grown up in a children’s home.

Miller is not denying her account of this, he just can’t remember it. This was one of the occasions where Miller seemed really close to admitting more. We can only assume that listening to Madeleine’s account the day before had caused him to shift on what he had been prepared to acknowledge in his own evidence.

‘MORALLY QUESTIONABLE’

Barr returned to the passage from Miller’s gisted witness statement and honed in on the phase ‘morally questionable’.

He asked Miller if he thought it was morally questionable to have a sexual relationship over a period of time. Miller responded:

‘I’d have definitely said that was wrong, yes’.

And what about a one-night stand, was that morally questionable?

‘On reflection, I would say it was.’

And at the time?

‘Well, obviously there was an occasion when my worries about such things were overcome. I have to accept that [it] was an incorrect act.’

Miller said it hadn’t occurred to him that his cover story of past pain and not wanting to be hurt again might evoke feelings of sympathy, intimacy and protectiveness amongst those he told it to.

BETRAYAL

Asked if he thought Madeleine would have had sex with him if she knew who he really was, Miller wavered:

‘Difficult to say. If she knew who I really was then possibly she would have liked me, if she knew that I was a police officer then almost certainly not… But I’m both a police office and a person, so she might have seen the person not the police officer. And therefore I can’t really answer that.’

Despite admitting it was wrong that he had manipulated trust built up over several years of knowing Madeleine, Miller objected to it being described as a betrayal:

‘That’s a very strong word… “betrayal” seems to me a little over the top’

It was in this context that Miller said:

‘I think I would reflect on the fact that my field name was out in the public domain for some time and didn’t generate any reaction. So, I think my feeling was that she wasn’t overly concerned by the situation.’

VINCE THE VAMPIRE

Miller claims that his social contact with Madeleine didn’t increase at all after this – he doesn’t remember sitting at tables with her, or having sex with her at least once a week subsequently, as she remembers.

Instead, he pointed out that they were now in different branches of the SWP so didn’t necessarily meet up regularly.

He says they weren’t a couple:

‘we just bumped into each other, as you would, without arrangement.’

Barr kept pressing, saying ‘but you did sleep with her more than once, didn’t you?’

Miller responded:

‘I slept with her on the first occasion is the only one I remember.’

Madeleine’s relationship with Miller described in a friend’s diary, January 1980

The Inquiry showed an extract of a diary entry from 9 January 1980 [UCPI0000034310], written by a friend of Madeleine’s, describing Miller’s habit of leaving her bed in the dead of night and never staying over until morning. It memorably described him as an ‘over-sexed vampire’.

As Miller agrees he stayed over the first night, this must refer to a number of subsequent occasions, Barr noted.

Miller avoided the point by saying arguing it was not a contemporary document as Barr claimed.

Barr replied unwaveringly: ‘I said near-contemporary..

Miller apologised for being aggressive and, with that, managed to avoid answering the question, though he did not challenge the accuracy of the document.

A RELATIONSHIP

Ask more about Madeleine’s memories of the time, Miller said he didn’t think it was necessarily obvious that she was fond of him, and wanted more of a relationship with him.

He says they remained on friendly terms. He repeatedly stated that he had little or no memory of many events in this time. Particularly, while Madeleine has clear recollections of the last time she saw him – at his leaving do, when he was with another woman – Miller said he has no memory of saying goodbye to her before he ended his deployment.

Asked if having a sexual relationship with Madeleine would enhance his cover, Miller gave an excuse heard from other spycops:

‘If you’ve been out in the field for some time and not had any relationships, people are inclined to wonder why.’

This is flimsy at best. Many people go for long periods without being romantically involved with others. Indeed, the reason officers like Miller tell stories of historic heartbreak is precisely because it is a credible reason to be emotionally distant.

Given a final opportunity by Barr, asked if he had anything to add about Madeleine that had not been covered yet, Miller squirmed:

‘I think with the benefit of more maturity and hindsight, and less stress, then I will say that the night we spent together was inappropriate and unprofessional. There was no intention – sorry, can I say that again?

She was not targeted in any way; it was not any part of any kind of system; it was not something either expected by the management, or indeed expected by my peer group, to show you are one of the boys. It was in fact something that happened at a convivial evening.

And that’s how it happened, how I reviewed it… I never discussed it with anybody, until these events [the Inquiry], where I felt that total openness and honesty would be what was required.’

This is when the Chair, Sir John Mitting, came in with a question of his own.

Mitting stressed that Madeleine had impressed him when giving evidence:

‘As a sincere and essentially truthful person, trying to tell me, as best as she could remember, what happened between you and her.’

Mitting said he could accept people remembering things differently, but could Miller explain:

‘Is it a case, as can happen in life, of two people remembering a series of events differently? Or is it something more than that?

‘My understanding is that you do not say that she is consciously or unconsciously making this up, you accept that her evidence is genuine; your recollection remains different. I’m simply seeking to ask if there is any reason why your accounts are, in significant respects, different. If you could help me, I’d be grateful.’

Miller responded in couched terms, effectively saying that she could be making it up to make spycops look bad, even though he knows it’s not credible to suggest:

‘It would be inappropriate, I think, for me to suggest there was any other motive for her in trying to diminish the reputation of undercover officers, but that thought would cross my mind… I’m sure you’ll correct me, that if there was any other explanation, that’s the only one I could furnish.’

THE SECOND SWP WOMAN

Barr next asked Miller about another SWP member he reported having sex with. The former undercover described her as being less involved in the Party than other members.

He got together with her at the very end of his deployment, after he’d announced his impending move to the USA. They drank together, and he said he spent one night with her, then met her at a few other party events including his leaving meal.

He agreed that she was unlikely to have had sex with him if she’d known he was an undercover police officer.

Again, he didn’t give any thought to that at the time:

‘It just seemed a happy way of finishing the evening.’

Again, he did not use contraception or consider the risk of pregnancy.

Miller says he never told anyone at the SDS about these relationships.

THE OTHER TWO WOMEN

Miller was then asked about two other women he deceived into relationships which he also recalls as one-night stands. Both incidents were in the early days of his deployment.

He claims there were no links between these two women and the SWP, he just met them in the pub when he was getting to know the environment he had to infiltrate.

Since they were not related in any way to his target group, he had not thought it necessary to mention them in his ‘impact statement’ to the Inquiry. Nor did he come clean when his solicitor was sent a letter by the Inquiry specifically asking for details of all sexual relationships.

He says the circumstances around both were similar, but cannot he recall much else other than that neither woman wanted to continue the relationship.

A point not particularly drawn out was that this was while he was undercover and claiming expenses.

Barr then moved to the issue of how this could have been prevented. If Miller had had stricter guidance from the SDS, does he think he would’ve avoided having these sexual encounters, or it would have just ensured he kept quiet about them?

Miller said he would have made ‘different decisions’ if there had been a ‘stricter regime’:

‘We were completely alone out there, making our own decisions; there was no way of getting support or guidance like that… For me, I guess I’d have needed firmer and more rigorous questions about my activities.

Barr picked up on Miller’s earlier statement of official guidance ‘falling on deaf ears’ so, if there had been any extra guidance, would it have been treated seriously by him or fellow spycops?

Miller changed tactics:

‘it may well be a case of the personality saying it – more than the actual message, that may have had the effect.’

He was asked if there were any qualities which would make someone unsuitable for this kind of undercover work?

Besides the need of a ‘strong personality’, Miller jumped back to saying, ‘I would not consider myself an active womaniser’, before adding that there were some people who would be indeed unsuitable for spycops work.

With that, the questioning on Madeleine and Miller’s other relationships came to an end. For the last quarter of the day, the Inquiry moved on to protests and other activities, including his role as a SWP steward at the August 1977 confrontation between fascists and anti-fascists at the ‘Battle of Lewisham’.

We will cover Miller’s illuminating testimony on those things in a separate report.

Written supplemented witness statement of Vince Miller

<<Previous UCPI Daily Report (10 May 2021)<<

>>Next UCPI Daily Report (11 May 2021, part 2)>>

Tranche 1, Phase 2, Day 13

10 May 2021

Evidence from witness:
 ‘Madeleine’

‘Battle of Lewisham’, 13 August1977

The 10 May hearing of the Undercover Policing Inquiry was focused on ‘Madeleine’, one of the women deceived into a sexual relationship by undercover ‘Vince Miller‘ (HN354, 1976-1979), one of four women that he has now admitted to having sexual contact with.

She is the first person to give live testimony on her experience of the relationship and undergo questioning on it (another woman, ‘Mary’, had her statement read out by a lawyer last week). She gave a powerful account of her own activism and and time as a political campaigner with the Socialist Workers Party (SWP). Despite questions from the Inquiry that crossed the line, she gave an open and quietly compelling description of how she was deceived by Miller.

Miller is claiming it was only a one night stand, but Madeleine steadily demolished that, with a detailed account of the night they got together and their subsequent relationship. She went into the conversations where he emotionally manipulating her feelings, then suddenly withdrew as his time in the field came to an end. This included pointing to records of conversations she had with others at the time.

Miller is giving evidence tomorrow, 11 May.

It was forty years before she learned the truth, in 2018, and was able to deal with the knowledge, but the empathy that guided her activism was clearly now extending to all the other women affected – noting how much damage her younger self would have experienced if she had learned of it at the time.

Madeleine provided a witness statement to the Inquiry in February 2021 but, as Inquiry delays meant she had to produce it in a hurry, it didn’t include everything she has to contribute.

BACKGROUND TO AN ACTIVIST

Barricade on Cable Street, 4 October 1936 [Pic: Bishopsgate Institute]

Her father was a committed anti-fascist, at the Battle of Cable Street in 1936 when an alliance of antifascists stopped the British Union of Fascists marching through the Jewish area of London’s East End. He then served in the International Brigades fighting fascists in the Spanish Civil War, and after he returned he joined the British Army simply to fight the Nazis.

Madeleine was about 15 when she joined the International Socialists (IS), which later became the Socialist Workers Party (SWP).

She had a break from activism when she was a student, but rejoined the IS Walthamstow branch in about 1973, and became an active trade unionist. This is the branch spied on by Miller throughout his deployment.

REVOLUTION, VIOLENCE & PLAIN OLD PAPER SELLING

Like with other non-state witnesses, the Inquiry are keen to find out just what was meant by the politics of the SWP, revolutionary politics and talk of violence. And again, like other such witnesses, she calmly dismantled the many (deliberate) misconceptions the police held of the group.

The SWP wanted an end to the constant class conflict of capitalism, seeking a fair and just socialist society, she explained. She rejected the Inquiry’s characterisation of the SWP as trying to overthrow parliamentary democracy:

‘We basically believed that extra-parliamentary activity was essential because we wanted to increase democracy, we felt that people should be active at all levels, not just voting once every five years. Our belief was in broadening participation in democracy…

‘We were not a terrorist group, we were not a violent group, we basically wanted to build a mass movement.’

Madeleine took issue with another mischaracterisation, disputing the implication that SWP members ‘infiltrated’ trade unions, rather they were trade unionists themselves and sought to support others.

They sold their Socialist Worker newspaper, held public meetings, and went on demonstrations:

‘Perfectly legal and legitimate methods.’

In the 1970s the far right were in the ascent with neo-fascists openly attacking minority communities and murdering Black and Asian men. Though the SWP, Madeleine was involved in the movement opposing fascism.

She said the SWP were opposed to active violence as counter-productive, and even expelled Red Action from the party.

WALTHAMSTOW SWP

With a membership of more than 40 people, the Walthamstow branch of the SWP was comparatively large, so split in two in 1977 – one covering Walthamstow & one covering Leyton/ Leystonstone.

This was the period when Miller was infiltrating. He became Walthamstow branch treasurer, and later district treasurer and social committee organiser for the Outer East London District Branch. This latter role would have entailedorganisingfundraising gigs and other socials.

The branches held regular meetings, as well as moresocial events. As people dedicated to the same ideals, their lives were very enmeshed:

‘We had a message to spread; we had a world to build’

All members were involved in selling papers, every week. They had regular pitches in the markets on Saturdays, and on weekdays would often sell papers outside factories, door to door on estates, and of course at any demos.

There were lots of demonstrations, about all sorts of issues, taking place most weekends.

The group were also active fly-posting and leafleting, to let people know about the speaker meetings they organised.

Madeleine lived in a large flat-share, with a huge living room and kitchen, four bedrooms. It was close to two popular pubs, so it was common for friends to come back after the pub closed.

Miller referred to it as ‘a drop in centre for SWP activity’ which Madeleine dismissed as sounding formal and functional, rather than domestic and sociable

BRANCH ACTIVITY – ‘A LITTLE BIT OF EMBROIDERY’

The Inquiry showed some reports on the branch’s activity. At one branch meeting in June 1977, 25 people listened to a talk on revolutionary feminism by a speaker from the SWP’s Newham Teachers Branch [UCPI0000017456].

Madeleine noted the women’s liberation movement was having a big impact on people’s thinking at the time. Women were not just oppressed as workers, but as women too. In essence they had two jobs – one at work to make ends meet and the other domestically:

‘We saw that the personal was very much political.‘

June 1977 saw the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, marked with a one-off Bank holiday. Not enamoured of the deference and imperial overtones of the occasion, Walthamstow SWP organised a family anti-Jubilee picnic in Epping Forest. The Inquiry asked if the picnic was likely to involve any public disorder:

‘Absolutely not, no. It was just a picnic. With children, I might add.’

The branch was also involved in protests at Sainsbury’s, with the Inquiry focusing on a report where mention was made of ‘occupying’ its supermarkets:

‘We felt supermarket prices were kept artificially high to extract profit for shareholders.’

Madeleine’s motivations andher politics shone through, as she spoke of the ongoing need to campaign about povertyin this country, illustrated by the existence of food banks, the estimated four million children living in poverty right now, and the recent campaigning of Marcus Rashford around school meals:

‘And now I’m thinking to myself, we were so right.’

Once again, she had to correct the Inquiry’s exaggerated ideas of their activity, explaining that they didn’t ‘occupy Sainsbury’s at all:what they probably did was stand outside with banners, handing out leaflets and talking to shoppers.

‘I believe that food, like clean water, fresh air, shelter, etc, are basic human rights.’

A July 1977 report [UCPI0000017571] of a meeting of 30 people describes their intention to produce bulletins for particular workplaces. Asked if this was done with the ultimate aim of recruiting, she once again rejected the suggestion of a hidden agenda, saying the aim was to get workers to:

‘build the movement, not necessarily get them to join SWP… we weren’t a secret sect – we were very much community based.’

Other reports showed cooperation with other groups – for instance, Women’s Voice involved a lot of SWP members, but also women who were not.

The July 1977 report claimed that the branch:

‘Restated its support for the Provisional IRA but remained critical of that organisation’s policy of random bombing of working class people.’

Again, Madeleine contradicted the characterisation:

‘We did not support bombing at all. Absolutely not. We supported a united Ireland, and we felt that Irish people had a right to self determination, and we saw British army as basically an occupying force’

Her witness statement refers to support for self-defence against the British Army and the Royal Ulster Constabulary. She explained that attacks by those institutions are well documented, and defence doesn’t mean physical violence, but non-cooperation in the form of things like rent strikes, workplace strikes.

She highlighted a practice familiar from spycop reports seen earlier in the hearings, of taking the most extreme or hyperbolic statement at a meeting and portraying it as the whole group’s real basis:

‘There’s a little bit of embroidery going on in many of the reports. There would have been people there who would have expressed opinions that we wouldn’t necessarily agree with, but we would discuss and debate and argue with them.’

REFUGEES FROM TORTURE

An August 1977 report [UCPI0000011129] describes a branch meeting addressed by a refugee from the Chilean dictatorship that had overthrown the democratically elected socialist government in 1973.

He told the meeting that he felt that if the Allende government had armed those prepared to defend it, they may have stood a chance. The report says there was a great deal of discussion about the need to arm the workers in the UK, which Madeleine dismissed out of hand:

‘That’s absolute nonsense. Absolute nonsense.’

But could the SWP envisage a situation where they’d like workers to be armed?

‘We foresaw, as I’ve said, a new society where the vast majority basically organised themselves, took action, and decided things would change…. We weren’t the Red Brigades, or anything like that; we didn’t support that type of activity. We basically believed… the working class would bring about this change, not us.’

Not content with this, the Inquiry highlighted the Chilean speaker’s observation that no people’s militia could directly oppose a trained army, so the only way to defeat it would be infiltration. So, the Inquiry asked, did this mean that the SWP considered infiltrating the Army?

Madeleine scoffed at the suggestion. Walthamstow SWP was selling newspapers and not even occupying Sainsbury’s.

The Inquiry failed to note that the whole issue was about the fascist overthrow of the democratically elected Allende government by the murderous General Pinochet. The refugee was actually speaking about counter-subversion, which was supposedly the SDS’s remit.

The report concluded with a mocking description of a branch member crying, and:

‘Someone threw an epileptic fit which ended my observations.’

Madeleine explained that they knew Chilean refugees who had been tortured in Chile, electrocuted and threatened with death. As compassionate people, they found that emotionally moving. That the spycop found it funny beggars belief.

FASCISTS ON THE RISE

John Tyndall (holding record), National Socialist Movement HQ

Calling the National Front fascist is no exaggeration. Madeleine supplied a photograph [UCPI0000034395] of future NF leader John Tyndall in Nazi uniform in front of a framed portrait of Hitler.

Madeleine described how her generation was dealing with parents traumatised from the Second World War, and yet these avowedly Nazi groups were allowed to organise and demonstrate, seemingly with the approval of the State and the protection of the police. The SDS was not monitoring them at all.

August 1977 saw a key moment in the fight against fascism in Britain. The National Front were organising a march in Lewisham, and there was a huge counter-demonstration. The collision of the two became known as the ‘Battle of Lewisham‘.

Spycop Vince Miller says Walthamstow SWP members went to check out the route of the march the night before, and deposited piles of bricks that could be used the next day. He also claimed they took weapons with them in bags on the day.

Madeleine utterly denies all of this. There is no evidence that anybody ever planted any bricks at all.

Madeleine attended the demonstration of 13 August with comrades from her branch.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

The Inquiry asked Madeleine about the All Lewisham Campaign Against Racism And Fascism (ALCARAF), which it described as a coalition of the SWP, International Marxist Group and Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist).

National Front ‘Stop the Muggers’ banner, 1977

She explained it was much wider than that, bringing in trade unions, faith groups and church leaders. It’s extraordinary that churches has noticed fascist violence on the streets and took action, yet the SDS officers say there was no problem they were aware of.

Madeleine explained ALCARAF been formed in January 1977 in response to National Front violence and open police racism. This is vital context to understand the Lewisham protests.

Instead of doing anything about the NF’s ongoing street violence in the area (the Sikh Gurdwara had been attacked, as had shops and individuals in the area), police launched an ‘anti-mugging’ crackdown – ‘muggers’ being a racist trope at the time, as evidenced by the NF’s ‘Stop The Muggers’ banner.

In one large operation local police had conducted house raids, smashing in doors, arresting mostly Black people. Madeleine recounted how a white woman arrested in a raid was strip searched by police and subjected to vile comments about how she was catching diseases from living with Black people.

60 people were arrested, 21 were charged. The Lewisham 21 Defence Committee was set up to support them. They held a march that was attacked by the NF. Acid was thrown on a young girl, one person’s jaw was broken, another knocked unconscious. This alone is more public disorder than the SDS has managed to pin on the SWP, and yet nothing was done.

Just before the Lewisham demonstration, the NF’s National Activities Organiser, Martin Webster, held a press conference and announced:

‘We intend to destroy race relations here in Lewisham.’

As an aside, Madeleine noted that Durham Police had invited Martin Webster to give a talk on law and order in December 1977.

She asked the Inquiry to show a photograph of the NF on the day [UCPI0000034396], in which one of them could be seen armed with a stick. Madeleine said:

‘We could see where their philosophy ends. My husband Is Jewish, his family have the yellow star of his great grandfather…. Part of the family tree ends in the 1940s at Auschwitz.’

THE BATTLE OF LEWISHAM

The Bishop of Southwark leads the ALCARAF banner, 13 August 1977

Against this backdrop of racism from both police and the NF, the August 1977 Lewisham counter-demonstration was always going to be full of outrage.

Police allowed the fascist march to go ahead, while changing the route of the anti-fascist one at short notice. Madeleine found herself trapped in a ‘kettle’ by Clifton Rise in New Cross. People climbed up the corrugated iron hoardings to escape the crush. There was a line of police blocking one end of the street.

People from the overlooking houses told them that the fascists were frightened by the sheer size of the crowd. The next thing she recounted was police horses charging down the street, right through the crowd of demonstrators.

The police led out the NF’s flag-waving contingent, but the rest of the fascists behind had almost no police protection even though many officers were available. ‘All hell broke loose,’ Madeleine remembered, describing missiles coming overhead from behind her.

She and her comrades wanted to get out of the situation. They were not involved in throwing things. She noted that the majority of people on marches were usually white, but this day saw a large proportion of Black people on the streets, and the police responded with aggression.

She felt that the police ‘just lost control and went wild’ in an outburst of rage vented against the local community. She recalled police vehicles driven into the crowd, indiscriminate arrests, and severe police violence, as they escaped and walked to a train station some distance away in an attempt to make it home safely.

MORE MEETINGS

The Inquiry showed some more reports on the SWP meetings. One from November 1977 [UCPI0000011513] held at a public library, was on the life and works of William Morris, a Victorian son of Walthamstow, known for both his wallpaper/ textile pattern designs and socialist beliefs.

The meeting was addressed by a speaker who ‘delivered a well prepared speech which he illustrated with photographs and slides’. The meeting was apparently that told Morris was a ‘pioneer of English socialism,’ even if his ideas were not entirely consistent with the SWP.’

Morris was pretty mainstream in thought and indeed in wallpaper design. Once again, the SDS was reporting on things that were in no way subversive or a threat to public order, and the documents were copied to MI5 where they are still held nearly 50 years later.

A report of a meeting in July 1978 [UCPI0000011337] shows Miller was involved in the branch’s Industrial Group, which organised sales of Socialist Worker at factories, picket lines and similar settings.

A January 1979 report [UCPI0000013063] says sales of Socialist Worker are going well on a local industrial estate, though they must avoid places with a predominantly Asian workforce as workers say they would be subjected to violence or the sack if they showed support.

Madeleine wonders if Miller had contact information for sympathetic workers at these factories, and if their details were passed on to industrial blacklists.

The report also mentioned School Kids Against the Nazis (SKAN) and says it ‘can, with short notice, get large numbers of school students on to the streets, should the need arise’. The Inquiry asked Madeleine if SKAN were able to suddenly create a mob ready for street violence.

Yet again, she had to deflate suggestions of insurrection. She explained that SKAN had been formed when the NF held a demo outside a school in multicultural East London. About 200 pupils had opposed it, with 15 arrests – all but one of them Black kids.

SKAN was a self-organising group of kids responding to the upsurge of racism around them:

‘The idea that we would have somehow had to have planted these ideas in their heads is a bit ludicrous really. It was their own experience.’

SELF DEFENCE IS NO OFFENCE

In her statement, Madeleine notes other reports are deliberately facetious, and often selectively quote a few individuals’ opinions rather than the general view, even just picking up on comments made by members of the public – such as arming themselves with catapults [UCPI0000011196].

Madeleine said this suggestion was more likely made by a member of the public, and would have been ineffective given that a young woman selling the Socialist Worker had her pelvis broken by NF thugs with a sledgehammer. Rather:

‘the collective focus was was on how to stay safe by remaining in groups and avoiding situations where we might come under attack.’

The Inquiry did not address the above in the live evidence, but it did turn to another instance of SWP members protecting themselves against vicious racist violence.

A November 1978 report [UCPI0000012924] of an SWP meeting (of 22 people) details the compiling of a rota of members who would stay at the house of a Black woman with a Jewish boyfriend who needed protection from attacks by the National Front.

The report said that Dagenham police confirmed that bricks had been thrown through the windows at the house, one with an extreme right wing leaflet around it, the other bearing the letters DAK. The report said DAK stood for ‘Dagenham Axe Clan’.

The transliteration of ‘K’ standing for ‘Clan’ is unsettling. It seems like the police were attempting to deflect from the use of the word Klan, and the direct violent racism implied by it.

Again, these attacks are each worse than anything Miller has managed to conclusively attribute to the SWP. It disproves the claims that the SDS didn’t know about any threats from right-wing groups. And yet, there appears to be no record of the DAK being of interest to the SDS.

DISBAND THE POLITICAL POLICE

After SWP member and anti-fascist Blair Peach was killed by police at a demonstration against the NF in April 1979, there was a wave of outrage across the country. There were calls for a public inquiry into his killing, and for the notorious unit responsible, the Special Patrol Group (SPG), to be disbanded.

A July 1979 SDS report [UCPI0000021044] describes a Waltham forest District SWP meeting entitled ‘Police are the Murderers: Disband the Special Patrol Group’.

Madeleine reminded us of the unauthorised weapons and Nazi regalia found in the lockers and homes of SPG officers after they had killed Peach.

The report quotes a speaker as saying dissolution of the SPG is a necessary step on the path to socialist revolution. Madeleine broadly agreed – the SPG were effectively a repressive, paramilitary political unit, the opposite of policing in response to actual community need.

Although the meeting had not been advertised, two strangers arrived, separately, and were presumed to be police. The manner of their dress, their reluctance to divulge any details about themselves, and their leaving early gave them away.

The Inquiry asked if the meeting was private because it was doing something sinister. However, Madeleine explained that, as SWP meetings were being subject to fascist attacks, the party had simply become more security conscious.

PERSONAL DETAILS

The Inquiry then showed a report from November 1977 [UCPI0000011550] detailing Madeleine’s employment at a school, including her salary, start date, and a physical description of her. Another report from 1979 [UCPI0000021299] records her new job working on buses. Why did the spycops record this kind of personal info about her (and others)?

‘I’m outraged really. I find that a gross invasion of my privacy… Why did they need a detailed physical description of me? To what end? What was that used for?… I got a job in a school because I loved kids… and liked working with children very much.’

Even more disturbing was a report on Madeleine’s wedding [UCPI000011289]. She noted that, from her Special Branch Registry File number in the report, her file was opened in 1970, when she was only 16. Part of the details with that report are redacted:

‘I find that really, really sinister’

She demanded that the Inquiry reveal what’s been blacked out, and explain why they don’t want her to see information about herself from 50 years ago.

WELCOMING THE SPYCOP

It appears that Miller joined the Walthamstow branch of the SWP in early 1977. He made contact via a Socialist Worker seller at Walthamstow Market.

The branch was always keen to welcome new members. Madeleine recalls him seeming an ordinary working class guy, in contrast with the largely white-collar membership.

He became very active in the group, selling newspapers papers, fly-posting, joining pickets at the Grunwick strike. In all these things, his ownership of a van made him invaluable. Being the one with the reliable vehicle had rapidly became standard tradecraft for spycops since the early 1970s. It meant they were told of any action that needed transport, they got to chat to people while driving, and drop them home which provided opportunity to get their addresses.

Madeleine remembers Miller as a sociable person, always first to the bar after a meeting, well liked by all:

‘He was very enmeshed in the group, socially and politically.’

An old flatmate of Madeleine’s has located diaries from that time. They show that Miller visited their home as early as May or June 1977.

When Madeleine first knew Miller, she was married, and thinks she was probably less socially active and less friendly with him then, but increasingly regarded him as a friend after her marriage broke up in the autumn of 1978.

ROMANTIC DECEIT

In the summer of 1979 Madeleine was 25 and newly single. She was not actively seeking a relationship after the end of her marriage. She described how shy and quiet she used to be; her husband had been extremely possessive and abusive so it was only after she left him that she felt more confident socialising and talking to other men. She was still feeling vulnerable when she got together with Vince but believed she could trust him:

‘I thought he was lovely. A really nice guy. I thought he was a genuine, lovely, easy going person, I thought he was sensitive, he had this story of heartbreak and all the rest of it. I felt he was looking for genuine relationships with people.’

Madeleine was asked for her account of the house party in Ilford where they became romantically involved. She recalled 40 or 50 people, mostly young people connected with the SWP, there, drinking and dancing.

Miller turned up late and sat down. Madeleine went to try to get him to come and dance, but:

‘He pulled me onto his lap and that’s where I stayed for the rest of the night.’

He said how hard it had been to get to know her, which surprised her as he hadn’t indicated any romantic interest before. She trusted him and was happy to stay there, chatting and flirting.

Some friends came to get her to dance, but Miller put his arms around her and said ‘ ‘no, she’s quite happy here’. She found this funny and laughed.

Later, when the friends were leaving, Miller assured them he would get Madeleine home. He took her back to her flat and they began a sexual relationship. He stayed the night.

‘I was very keen on him. I thought he was lovely, a really attractive guy. I was very keen for it to continue, I was never looking for a one night stand or casual sex with anyone.’

Madeleine says that they saw each other about once a week for a couple of months. They always met at her house, she never visited his.

CYNICAL SYMPATHY

He told her a backstory, of having been in a long-term committed relationship that went toxic in some way, and how he’d had to leave all his possessions behind. The loss of this alleged relationship with someone he’d thought would be a life partner left him devastated and heartbroken, and he said he was too wary of get close to anyone as a result.

He also spoke of a troubled childhood that had damaged his ability to trust, and how he’d always had to rely on himself.

His cynical tale of woe is another piece of spycop tradecraft, one that other women deceived by spycops will recognise all too readily. By telling a story of a damaged upbringing, the officers gave themselves cover for not wanting to tell a full life story. More than that, it made the listener feel that they had been trusted, and so would be likely to reciprocate that trust.

Miller never stayed over after that first night. At some point in the early hours he would suddenly say he had to go home, saying ‘I have to wake up in my own bed because that’s where I feel safe’.

Madeleine accepted that explanation, and hoped it would change. She didn’t consider herself as part of a couple, but she hoped it would become that, and she didn’t see anyone else:

‘He was the focus of my affections, as it were.’

Her feelings for him grew, as he surely knew:

‘I think in the beginning he seemed very keen on me. He became increasingly distant, and I began to become disappointed that it didn’t seem to be going the way I wanted it to go. And, yeah, I kind of became a bit upset about it.’

Her flatmates knew about her relationship. She has a very strong recollection of one asking in the morning ‘is Vince still in bed?’ and commenting on his bad manners in not staying all night.

THE LAST TIME

The last time she saw ‘Vince Miller’ was at a friend’s house. She hadn’t seen him for about a week and saw him sitting on the other side of the room. He was with another woman, and she sensed from their body language that there was something between the two of them. She now thinks this is the other SWP woman he has admitted deceiving into a relationship.

He ignored Madeleine and, when he left, she followed him into the street to ask him why he was being so distant. He said that he’d already told her that he couldn’t get too involved and that he didn’t want to get hurt again.

He said he was going to go to California to ‘find himself’. This is yet another early example of what became standard practice – spycops would cover the end of their deployment by feigning emotional distress and say they were going abroad to sort themselves out.

The depth of emotional turmoil conveyed by some of the later officers had huge impacts on those who loved them. More than one desperately woman deceived into a relationship went searching in the country where her partner was supposedly living, not knowing he was actually back at a desk job in Scotland Yard.

Madeleine and Miller hugged for a long time and parted ways.

THAT’S NOT WHAT HE SAYS

Madeleine’s relationship with Miller described in a friend’s diary, January 1980

In his statement to the Inquiry, Miller describes his relationship with Madeleine as a ‘one night stand’ with no hard feelings and said that the pair remained on good terms thereafter.

In his version, he uses being drunk as an excuse for starting the relationship with her, and for his other ‘one night stands’.

She says that, on the night they got together, he didn’t seem drunk and she certainly wasn’t.

Madeleine then cited a close friend’s diary entry dated 9 January 1980 [UCPI00000034310]

The friend describes Miller as Madeleine’s ‘ex-lover’ and, noting his persistent leaving before dawn, suggests that he may be some kind of vampire who needs to be back in his coffin before sunrise.

Madeleine remembers Miller’s departure damaging her self-esteem, leaving her feeling upset, disappointed and rejected. She saw it as part of a pattern with her marriage and thought:

‘God, have I made another mistake?’

IF SHE KNEW THEN

The Inquiry said that despite everything, the whole affair would have had little impact on her life if she hadn’t latterly found out the truth about spycops.

Asked how she would have felt to discover Miller’s true identity at the time, she said it would have been devastating. She was young and naïve, and would have been profoundly shocked and distraught:

‘I’d made myself very vulnerable to him and I trusted him, and to me it would have been an absolute betrayal… I would have regarded it, as I do regard it now, as rape.’

As it is, she had some fond memories of him, and used to sometimes think about him, hoping he’d come to terms with his troubles and had a happy life. But now:

‘To discover that I didn’t know him at all and that he was a fiction, that’s been quite difficult to get my head around. He doesn’t actually exist, it was all an act, wearing a mask… it’s really chilling and sinister… I just don’t know how people can behave like that.’

Despite promises by the Inquiry to reveal the real names of undercovers to the women deceived into relationships, it has not provided Madeleine his name though she has requested it. The Inquiry are effectively providing cover for a serial sexual abuser – who has admitted to deceiving four women.

‘Like the other officers who deceived women into relationships during their deployments, Vince Miller has lost the right to have his identity protected on privacy grounds. And, like the other women who were deceived into relationships, I should be entitled to know his real name.’

Full written statement of ‘Madeleine’

<<Previous UCPI Daily Report (7 May 2021)<<

>>Next UCPI Daily Report (11 May 2021, part 1)>>

Tranche 1, Phase 2, Day 2

22 April 2021

Opening Statements from:

Diane Langford
‘Madeleine’
Phillippa Kaufmann QC, representing Core Participants who had relationships with undercover officers
Matthew Ryder QC, representing three anti apartheid activists (Ernest Rodker, Professor Jonathan Rosenhead & Lord Peter Hain) & Celia Stubbs

The second day of Tranche 1 Phase 2 of the Undercover Policing Inquiry, being the 28th anniversary of the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence, began with the Chair, Sir John Mitting, reading out a statement from Neville & Doreen Lawrence about their son.

He spoke of the police failings, of the suspects not being charged, and that the Macpherson report from the public inquiry was a landmark in showing the police’s racist faults. But Stephen’s legacy is ultimately one of hope, reminding us change is much needed, but also possible.

There was a minute’s silence for Stephen.

Diane Langford

The first speaker today was Diane Langford, an activist in groups who were infiltrated by undercover officers in the era that the current hearings are examining (1973-82). She will also give evidence on the afternoon of Monday 26 April.

The contrast between the opening statements of yesterday’s legal representatives of the police, spycops and the establishment compared to the emotional, direct and articulate submission of Diane Langford could not be more marked.

Her statement cut to the heart of everything that is wrong with the Undercover Policing Inquiry. This summary hardly does justice to her powerful speech, which is worth reading in full, or watch on YouTube.

POOR TREATMENT BY THE INQUIRY

Diane Langford has only recently become a Core Participant at the Inquiry. In 2018, the Undercover Research Group (URG) found her story of the exposure of spycop ‘Dave Robertson’ (HN45). Later, URG discovered that the group she had set up, the Women’s Liberation Front, was infiltrated by ‘Sandra Davies’ (HN348), and had let her know.

Her name appeared unredacted in many reports of the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) disclosed at the previous Inquiry hearings last November, but it turned out the Inquiry had only reached out to her just beforehand.

‘When I was given copies they ironically came with a legal warning not to show them to anyone else.’

The Inquiry failed to ask her to give evidence, or tell her that she could seek legal representation.

By the time she knew Sandra Davies was giving evidence to the Inquiry it was too late to book a place at the limited screening venue.

Despite the poor treatment she has received from the Inquiry, Diane Langford is grateful to the Chair for, belatedly, granting her Core Participant status. She was perplexed however that, despite her 50 year history of activism, in his ruling, the Inquiry chair, Sir John Mitting, introduced her as ‘the widow of the late Abhimanyu Manchanda’ as if she was merely an appendage. Yet another example of the institutionalised sexism being present in the Inquiry as it was in the spycops.

Langford identified six undercover officers who spied on her:

• ‘Sandra Davies’ (HN348)
• ‘Dave Robertson‘ (HN45)
• ‘Dick Epps‘ (HN336)
• Mike Ferguson (HN135)
• ‘Peter Fredericks‘ (HN345)
• Jill Mosdell (HN346)

Langford expressed solidarity with others targeted by spycops, especially those no longer here to tell their story and push for justice, asking:

‘how many others who were spied on are completely unaware that their names appear in these files?’

‘I’ll never know what career opportunities were denied to me, or what other barriers have been placed in front of me during my life, as a result of the machinations of the Special Demonstration Squad. I’ll never know whether unpleasant incidents – for example, being denied credit or visas, or break-ins at my home – were connected to the surveillance I was being subjected to.’

WITNESS OF INJUSTICE

As a young person Langford saw injustice in Aotearoa/New Zealand where she grew up, including racism, sexism and class discrimination. Her brothers got an education, but she left school at the age of 15. Coming to London at 22, ironically to support her brother who had won a scholarship at the Royal Academy of Music, opened her eyes. Going to movies, and reading De Beauvoir and Sartre, Barthes, Kristeva, and the Autobiography of Malcolm X after he was killed, opened the way into political activism. She was very much influenced by the events of 1968.

Talking about being part of the women’s liberation movement, Diane Langford said that, as with many others, her commitment was based on personal experience, recognised as political. She gave the example of how, when she was in her early twenties, her flatmate died of an illegal back street abortion, aged nineteen.

‘The memory of her death remains vivid for me still, at the age of 79.’

That the basic goals of the movement remain unachieved and resisted confirms their profound nature.

Langford began her involvement in the Women’s Liberation Front, which believed that patriarchal, racialised capitalism cannot, and will not, meet those goals.

She listed three dramatic events that spring to mind when recalling the period under scrutiny:

– Dave Robertson threatened my friend with violence when she outed him as an undercover.
– Banner Books was burned down by fascists while undercover officers had surveilled and had access, and I believe a man died. This needs investigating.
– Robertson ignored an allegation of attempted rape at a meeting, instead focusing on my domestic arrangements and ridiculing my partner.

WHAT IS THE POINT OF THE INQUIRY NOW?

Langford then connected the spying in the past to the new Covert Human Intelligence Sources Bill rushed through Parliament just before the November hearings in 2020, which allows police to self-authorise to commit all crime, which undermines much of the point of the spycops Inquiry.

In January 2020 the current counter-terrorism spycops unit listed peace protesters as extremists. One of them was the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign seeking to uphold international law and to promote peace, yet it is targeted as a problem to be undermined.

In Langford’s activist life, women’s liberation has always been entwined with the Palestinian struggle – there is no liberation for women under the apartheid regime in Palestine. She asked:

‘If I was under surveillance in 1970 as a member of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, am I still under surveillance now? I became a busier activist in the 2000s, more than in the 1970s that police have admitted. Where are the files?’

INCAPABLE OF UNDERSTANDING

‘Sandra Davies’ (HN348) spied on 77 meetings, of which 55 were related to the women’s liberation movement.

‘Sounds like more than I did! Why is the women’s movement not a focus of the Inquiry? The Inquiry is colluding with the state to limit the search for evidence…

‘To read these reports is to see some of the greatest ideas of our time crushed into the narrow confines of a mentality absolutely lacking in the capacity to comprehend them…

‘We see the callous use of women’s bodies by misogynous male officers who see such abuse as a perk of the job, and, a confluence of the sexist behaviour and patriarchal attitudes of so-called left wing men in socialist groups and that of those spying on them.’

THE REFUGE OF POOR MEMORY

‘This Inquiry reiterates the intrusive processes of surveillance, requiring the victims of spying to explain and justify themselves, when it is the perpetrators of surveillance who should be interrogated and held accountable.

‘Remarkably we witnesses are again being subjected to intrusion into our personal and political lives, as if some retroactive justification could be thereby found for utterly dishonourable and indefensible police actions, whereas the perpetrators of abuse are granted impunity, anonymity or the refuge of poor memory.’

The SDS reports of the 1970s show sexist and racist ideas were endemic.

This was illustrated time and again by HN45 and HN348. For example, a report from August 1, 1972:

‘so-and-so is a member of the Revolutionary Women’s Union. She lives in a council flat at ADDRESS GIVEN with her two children aged 6-and-a-half years and three years and her mother so-and-so. She is a divorced woman and is in receipt of £8.50 per week Social Security. She attends Revolutionary Women’s Union meetings regularly and is particularly interested in agitating for 24-hour nurseries. This woman is on very friendly terms with so-and-so. Her description is: Aged about 23 years, very thin build, medium length fair hair, blue eyes, very pale complexion, poorly clothed but neat and tidy, wears black rimmed glasses, cockney accent.’

The internationally celebrated artist David Medalla, who passed away in January, is described by HN348 like this:

‘Asian features and colouring, dirty appearance, very poorly clad. He is very opposed to the current Government in the Philippines.’

That government was the notorious Marcos dictatorship – just to provide historical context.

Browsing the disclosure provided by the Inquiry, Langford found other disgusting examples of racism and sexism: On 1 June 1978, a report about the Federation of London Anarchist Groups informs the Special Branch that a subject had cut his beard off ‘to reveal that he has a long face, large Jewish nose and full lips.’

A report signed off by Angus McIntosh, about the Women’s Organiser of the International Socialists, dated 22 October 1976, states she has :

‘typically Jewish lilt to her … and rather prominent nose, always scruffily dressed in blue jeans and T-shirt (without a bra).’

‘A negress was in the audience’ according to a July 1976 report of a meeting of Hackney International Socialists that discussed self-defence strategies for victims of physical attacks by the National Front.

What did 1970s undercover officers do to stop the National Front attacking people of colour? They were spying on anti-fascists.

‘These patronising violations of people’s personal space, of suppressing a child’s right to demonstrate against state-sanctioned physical abuse, the racist, anti-Semitic, sexist and judgemental descriptions of people’s personal appearance that filled the notebooks of the secret police may not amount to much in the eyes of the Inquiry. It’s the accretion of them that are the stuff of authoritarian regimes, hence the expression “petty apartheid”.’

ABHIMANYU MANCHANDA

Diane Langford was also very critical of the portrayal of her late former partner, Abhimanyu Manchanda (‘Manu’):

‘HN45 displays a vindictive hatred of Manu and a peculiar obsession with our personal relationship and child-care arrangements. He sent detailed reports to the Special Branch about what he apparently saw as transgressive behaviour – a man looking after his own child – and expressing horror that I was “sent out to work.” He informs his superiors of Manu’s “insufferable anecdotes” about our baby.’

In her Witness Statement, she dealt with the Inquiry’s inappropriate Rule 9 written questions about my personal relationship with Manu – in fact repeating this behaviour.

There is nothing in the reports about them overthrowing the state. Nevertheless, HN45 portrayed Manu as a danger, saying he only went on demos to cause violence. Which is rubbish, he knew you can’t tackle the state head on.

Why is Manu referred to in reports by his surname while others get their full names? That too smacks of imperialism.

FROM NAPALM TO BUNNY GIRLS

‘What did the Inquiry have in mind when they asked me about Dow Chemicals? Is the implication that Dow Chemicals, whose inhuman war crimes have never been accounted for, was under the protection of the British State? It may help the Inquiry to know that Dow Chemicals was the manufacturer of Napalm, a firebomb fuel/gel mixture used by the American military against Vietnamese civilians…

‘The continuum I spoke of earlier, can be perceived in UK state protection being accorded to Israeli arms manufacturers, in particular Elbit, who boast that their equipment is “battle tested” on Palestinians, despite widespread public disgust at the brutal treatment meted out to Palestinian civilians.’

What was behind the Inquiry’s question about picketing the Playboy Club? Does the Inquiry regard The Playboy Club, whose employees are referred to as ‘Bunny Girls,’ as an institution worthy of special protection by the secret police?

HN348 referred to the 1970 Miss World protest as an event that was organised by the Women’s Liberation Front, prior to her deployment. They actually didn’t organise it, but Langford did attended the demonstration.

‘It was a magnificent disruption of an exploitative commercial event degrading to women. It was not a threat to public order or security.’

THERE’S NEVER JUST ONE COCKROACH

Inquiries since the Macpherson Inquiry into the death of Stephen Lawrence have been devalued by the manner in which they’ve determinedly obstructed genuine ‘inquiry.’

For example, Priti Patel set up an inquiry into the atrocious police violence against women at Clapham Common, an incident that she herself set in train.

‘While the Inquiry is heavily weighted in favour of the State, how are we going to find out when the abuse started? I hope the Inquiry will not be deflected by the myth of “a few rotten apples.”

‘The cynical attitudes of the UCOs as evidenced by their misogynist reporting in the past and current lack of remorse makes it inevitable that any opportunity to take advantage of women would have been taken. There’s never just one cockroach.’

‘Where are these files kept? Who has access to them? Dozens of people, whose names recur in the files I’ve had sight of, have absolutely no idea that the secret police came into their homes under false pretences and spied on them. At the bare minimum anyone whose private space was violated, resulting in them being named in these files, should be informed and invited to be part of the inquiry.’

We need to see the faces of undercover officers, if only to stop suspecting our innocent old comrades of being cops. Why are the officers not compelled to supply contemporaneous photos themselves?

A request for a contemporaneous photograph of HN348 was declined by the Inquiry as they were not holding one in their files. Why not ask HN348 to supply one, as Langford’s legal representative suggested?

‘it bears out the idea that, as Audre Lorde put it, “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house”. It is clear that women, People of Colour and others working for a better world will need to continue with our grassroots campaigning on behalf of ourselves and one another.

‘However, my hope is that this Inquiry will, in fact, prove useful to us in such struggles for justice, human rights and freedom.’

For more, see Diana Langford’s blog and her political memoirs

Full opening statement from Diane Langford

‘Madeleine’

‘Madeleine’ was deceived into a relationship by ‘Vince Miller‘ (HN354) towards the end of his infiltration of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) while undercover from 1976 to 1979.

She had known him for three years by the time the relationship began. The relationship lasted for a short period of time over the summer and early autumn of 1979 until he suddenly disappeared.

Miller has admitted to a total of four sexual relationships during his deployment but insists they were all one-night stands. Despite him admitting that, the Inquiry had previously referred to his deployment as ‘unremarkable’ and granted him anonymity.

Madeleine not only describes a relationship lasting several months, as verified by her diaries, she also emphatically condemns Miller’s account of how they initiated their relationship.

‘the implications of some of the disclosures made by Vince Miller are also deeply offensive and revelatory. Describing the night we first got together he has stated that I “unexpectedly invited him to my bedroom” after we had both been drinking.

‘What exactly is he trying to say? That I was drunk and looking for a random man to have sex with? This is a deliberately untrue misrepresentation of the events of that evening.’

Since Madeleine has come forward to challenge such claims, Mitting has now agreed to release Miller’s real name to Madeleine. But she asserted:

‘HN354 shouldn’t have had his identity protected in the first place. HN354 lost the right to privacy due to his abusive acts and no legitimate reasons have been given for withholding his real name’.

POLITICAL ORIGINS

Madeleine described how her politics stemmed from her family background. She grew up in a large poor working-class family. Her father was a lifelong socialist and an active trade unionist, and both her parents were anti-racists.

Her father was part of the anti-fascist protests at Olympia in 1934 and at Cable Street in 1936 where he joined thousands of East Enders who fought to stop Oswald Mosley and the British Union of Fascists marching into a largely Jewish area to intimidate and attack the community.

Madeleine’s dad went on to join the International Brigades fighting fascists in the Spanish Civil War. He was at Guernica when the Nazis destroyed the city. He came back to the UK and volunteered to join the British Army at the start of the Second World War to continue his fight against fascism.

Madeleine wonders whether her father, a double war hero, would also have been considered a ‘subversive’ and a ‘dangerous extremist’.

The spycops reports just released by the UCPI and branding political activists as ‘subversives’, ‘dangerous extremists’, and ‘troublemakers’ paint a picture of people unrecognisable to Madeleine’s experience as an activist. To find out that the words were written by Miller, someone she trusted and cared about, is doubly painful.

She described the bigger picture, with the stilll-unfolding spycops scandal needing ‘to be understood and framed as the logical expression of the actions of a state and security apparatus wedded to the interests of the ruling class.’

TEENAGE ACTIVISM

Madeleine moved on to her youthful activism with the Socialist Workers Party. She recalled organising branch and public meetings, and endless discussion and debate. The SWP was open and welcoming, and had nothing to hide. It was public, selling the weekly Socialist Worker newspaper and leafleting on the High Street, on housing estates, pickets and demonstrations.

Madeleine said that Miller embedded himself deeply into the life of the SWP branch for three years. He described the branch as a ‘social and inclusive bunch’ – a fact that which he took full advantage of. He became treasurer (which seems to have been a common role for spycops taking office in groups), and was also on the social committee and in the industrial group.

She has found out that:

‘17 spycops were embedded in our party and yet in truth, the biggest threat to democracy in the UK at this time was not from the left but from the reinvigoration of fascism which once more began to emerge from the shadows and reveal its ugly face.’

THE GROWING THREAT OF FASCISM IN THE 1970S

Madeleine spoke about the political and economic backdrop in the UK during this period, which would prove a fertile breeding ground for fascism. Fascists attacked the left with increasing violence, attacking paper sellers, and committing arson against bookshops. In May 1978 a young Asian man, Altab Ali, was stabbed to death in Whitechapel. So where was the monitoring of the far-right by our security services?

The area around The Bladebone pub at the top of Brick Lane in London’s East End was a well-known haunt of the National Front (NF). After repeated attacks on the diverse community, protection was organised and the SWP were part of it. Miller describes the area as ‘heavily policed’ but Madeleine says she only saw that happen when there was active left wing presence. The protection that the community received was from activists like herself, not the police. Miller depicted the confrontations as a mere territorial dispute between the Swp and NF.

Miller’s analysis in his witness statement, describing the SWP and the NF as similar is very telling. Madeleine mentioned that a police report on a speech given by fascist John Tyndall at the NF ‘Battle of Lewisham’ march, describing him speaking in his ‘usual forceful manner’, but his exhortations to violence went unrecorded by spycops.

Madeleine gave another more personal example of police bias towards the far right:

‘I recall one Saturday selling papers at Barking Station in the week following a violent sledgehammer attack on a young female SWP member by a fascist who broke her pelvis. Jeering NF members watched as a tall man who had previously approached us in a friendly manner to buy a paper came up behind me and snatched my papers calling me a ‘red bitch’ and telling me to go away. He then walked over to the police who had witnessed his act and proceeded to laugh and joke with them. When I asked the police if they had seen what he’d done they smirked and told me to go home’

THE BATTLE OF LEWISHAM

On 13 August 1977, 500 NF supporters planned to march from New Cross to Lewisham. There was a huge mobilisation against it. At an anti-racist rally beforehand, a crowd of thousands was addressed by those notorious subversives the Mayor of Lewisham and the Bishop of Southwark.

Police tired to guide the NF marchers but thousands of people blocked them, and there were extended disturbances on the streets. It quickly became known as the Battle of Lewisham.

Madeleine emphatically refutes a claim made by Miller – and repeated in the SDS Annual Report that year – that bricks were stockpiled at various locations by the SWP along the planned NF route and that members of the SWP carried weapons to the march in bags.

‘I was at the demo on the day and can state categorically that no one that I knew had weapons or would have done such a thing. It is an easy assertion for HN354 to make – where is his evidence? Where are the names? Or should this be seen as an attempt to blacken the name of the SWP?’

The police were in reality undermining the efforts to fight fascism and combat racism by the only forces mobilising to protect communities and defeat those evils.

Madeleine continued:

‘The Battle of Lewisham is now rightly considered a watershed moment like Cable Street in the fight against fascism in this country. Unable to control the streets, the NF went into decline and the event is now proudly remembered as the moment when the far right was again defeated. It is now commemorated by the local council and seen as a symbol of a community coming together to say yes to black and white unity and no to the forces of hate.’

A KNOCK AT THE DOOR

All that was over 40 years ago.

Early one Saturday morning at the end of February 2020 Madeleine received an unexpected visit. Like anyone door-stepped early on a Saturday morning by someone with a hand-delivered an official-looking letter, she felt a wave of anxiety and stress.

‘What was I about to be told? Was I about to be given some terrible and tragic news?’

It was a solicitor from the Undercover Policing Inquiry. Madeleine received the news that ‘Vince Miller’ was not a boyfriend and comrade.

She couldn’t think of the man she’d known as a devious abuser. She remembered him as someone who seemed emotionally vulnerable – as she was herself at the time, having just left an abusive partner. This targeting and use of trauma as a means of getting close to surveillance targets is emerging as one of the most common themes within SDS deployments.

‘I now know that the Vince Miller I thought I knew doesn’t actually exist. He is a wholly constructed fiction, a fake identity used as a tool for the purposes of political surveillance sanctioned by the state which infiltrated the most intimate parts of my body and my life…

‘The initial revelation of the true identity of a man with whom I had enjoyed an intimate sexual relationship and shared thoughts and feelings of a deeply private nature left me feeling nauseous and revolted. I felt degraded and abused and continue to feel a real sense of violation. I feel that both my trust and my values have been betrayed by an agent of the state.’

THE TRUTH IS SECRET

Madeleine was told that there were a substantial number of intelligence reports on her and her friends which she could only see if she signed a secrecy agreement not to even discuss the contents with anyone else apart from her lawyer.

‘The knowledge that the state holds secret files on me filled me with anxiety and a sense of paranoia. I wanted to know. What is in those files? What information is held? What details of a personal nature do they contain? And how personal and intrusive are those details?’

For Madeleine, not being able to share this with her husband was especially hard. It cuts off a source of support for both of them as they deal with the impact of the truth.

All the Inquiry’s core participants have been in this position, not being able to share it or discuss it with anyone – even others who’ve been given the same documents.

She condemned the cruelty of the police and Inquiry refusing to hand over documents until just before the Inquiry hearings will discuss them. There are women who have known their partner was a spycop for many years, and who are not due to receive the reports on them for many more years.

Later, at the end of Madeleine’s testimony, Mitting said that he would ask the Inquiry lawyers to see that her husband could see the documents. This is too little too late.

When another core participant had earlier asked whether she could share her disclosure with one other trusted person it was refused. Not being able to discuss these matters with anyone else other than your legal representative adds another layer of trauma and stress for those affected by the actions of the state.

‘The files that I have seen contain information of a very intrusive and personal nature. They reveal detailed physical descriptions of myself and my flatmates and information about my employment, my wages, my address, and the precise time, date, and registry office location of my first marriage which happened before Miller’s deployment but appears in a report written by him.’

CRADLE TO GRAVE SURVEILLANCE?

‘I have also discovered, to my horror, that MI5 has had files on me since 1970 when I was aged 16 more than 6 years before HN354s deployment. This is shameful. Most people would consider a 16-year-old little more than a child and the Inquiry now knows that other children have been spied on too. I was incredibly young when I first became politically active in left-wing groups. We know the SDS was formed in 1968 and that extensive spying was happening at that time. I therefore wonder if I was spied on as early as 13 when I was a schoolgirl?

‘Miller has even reported on the pregnancy of a woman in our branch and the name her baby was to be given. This went straight to MI5. Was this unborn baby given a security service’s file? Was my child given a registry file too? I find it outrageous and deeply offensive to realise that we have been treated as “targets” regarded as “subversive and dangerous extremists” and that relationships have been used as a tool for state surveillance via the invasion of our lives and bodies.’

WHAT’S CHANGED?

Madeleine questions how much has changed in police culture. Did Miller contribute to the prevailing culture within the Metropolitan Police at that time and since, as he later became a senior officer?

She asked for all reports on her to be removed from the archives and destroyed. The SDS has shown us that secret policing, by its unscrutinised nature, is liable to abuse citizens. There is no telling how the information on file may be used against its subjects in future.

We’ve already seen Miller downplay the harm he did to others, and he is far from alone among the spycops in this regard. Madeleine said spycops should be given no leeway for their behaviour because any allowances made to them because of their position or role in society will be exploited by them in order to cover themselves.

As well as today’s opening statement, Madeleine will giving evidence to the Inquiry on Monday 10th May.

Full opening statement from ‘Madeleine’.

Phillippa Kaufmann QC
representing Core Participants who had relationships with undercover officers

Phillippa Kaufmann QC

Kaufmann began by saying it is now clear that in the era being examined by the current UCPI hearings, 1973-82, numerous spycops had sexual relationships with women while using their undercover identities.

Some of these women were the targets of their spying operations, others came into contact with the spycops socially.

We were told in the past that these deceitful relationships only rarely occurred, but the evidence now being published provides a different picture.

It has now been confirmed that at least eight officers entered into such relationships over a five year period. Of these, ‘Jim Pickford‘ (HN300, 1974-76) and perhaps ‘Alan Bond‘ (HN67, 1981-86) had children with women they’d spied on.

The practices and culture established in this period led to what came later. It shows the long running sexism which infected the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS).

WHY WEREN’T WE TOLD?

It’s not just the SDS that’s at fault. The Inquiry only contacted Madeleine in February 2020, and got a lawyer late in the year, yet she was known about when the Inquiry first dealt with the spycop who abused her, ‘Vince Miller‘ (HN354, 1976-79), in 2017.

Why wasn’t she contacted earlier? Why were we assured a woman would be sent to tell her the awful truth, but instead a man went to her home?

Why wasn’t Madeleine put in touch with Police Spies Out of Lives – which represents and supports women deceived into relationships by spycops – as the Inquiry had promised?

In 2017, Miller gave the Inquiry the name of the other Socialist Workers Party member he had sex with. Why did the Inquiry also wait three years before starting to try to to find her?

The Inquiry accepted his version at face value, called his deployment ‘unremarkable’, and ruled that his real name would not be published because he deserved privacy.

The order to protect his name will now be revoked. Why has this changed, apart from the fact that Madeleine is now actively involved in the Inquiry? Why should that make the difference, given his acts remain unchanged? Why was he ever seen as deserving of anonymity?

NOT JUST ACTIVISTS

Miller also admitted to having sex with two other women (who he says he wasn’t sent to spy on) during his deployment. Why didn’t the Inquiry tell us about that straight away?

Those other two women were also deceived by a paid State character who was the opposite of what he claimed to be. This isn’t a private matter for the officer, it’s as relevant to the Inquiry and the public as a relationship with an activist. We have no idea how many other spycops the Inquiry knows about who have also already admitted they had sex with non-activist women while undercover.

The Inquiry must already be well aware that spycops are liable to lie about this subject. Jim Boyling told the Met that Rosa, with whom he ended up having two children, had nothing to do with his target group. It was a bare-faced complete lie. Any instance of a spycop using their identity to deceive women into sex is an abuse of power and a violation of the women. It always needs investigating.

The Counsel to the Inquiry told us yesterday they won’t investigate every relationship, which is one thing. But why isn’t it telling us about ones they know about, and whether it is trying to find the women involved?

Trust is a major issue for these deceived women. The lack of transparency from the inquiry generates gratuitous anxiety, distrust and fear.

Any spycop who deceives someone into sex forfeits their right to anonymity. It was not necessary to their deployment. This practice was gratuitous and a grossly intrusive invasion of private citizens’ lives.

HN21 also admitted, in 2019, that he had sex with 2 women while undercover, yet still has anonymity for both his real and cover names. Why?

SPYCOPS SEXUAL RELATIONSHIPS 1973-82

In the era 1973-82, which the Inquiry is currently examining, eight officers are known to have deceived women into sexual relationships.

HN302 (cover name restricted, 1970s), whose deployment began in 1973,admits one sexual encounter with a woman from another group rather than the one he spied on. He said ‘circumstances presented themselves’. He says it wasn’t necessary to his deployment and he didn’t think it important.

Richard Clark (‘Rick Gibson’ HN297, 1974-76) had relationships with ‘Mary‘ and her flatmate in 1975, and two women in Big Flame. He told his cover officer that this had caused his cover to be compromised, which implies that he told these women different stories and they realised.

Big Flame found the birth and death certificates of the child whose identity he’d stolen. Mary and Richard Chessum’s statement to the Inquiry on Friday will give more detail.

‘Jim Pickford‘ (HN300, 1974-76) fell in love and wanted to tell the woman the truth about himself. Another officer helped him tell the SDS managers. His wife found out and their marriage ended. He married the new woman and had a child with her, though that marriage didn’t last and she can’t be found today.

HN21 (cover name restricted, late 1970s-early 1980s) admits to occasional sexual encounters with women he knew from ‘an evening class’ (we don’t know what kind of class that was).

‘Barry Tompkins‘ (HN106, 1979-83) is mentioned in a security liaison note as having a relationship, though he denies it. The Inquiry hasn’t called him to give evidence, so we may never find out more about this.

‘Vince Miller‘ (HN354, 1976-79) deceived Madeleine and three other women into relationships. He’s blamed it on having been drunk every time. He lied to the Inquiry about it. He is adamant that his sexual relationship with Madeleine was a one-off event, but she is very clear that they had an ongoing relationship, for months. She still has a diary showing the dates they spent together, but it is notable that he never stayed overnight.

‘Phil Cooper‘ (HN155, 1979-83) told the Inquiry’s risk assessors he had several relationships, but now denies having said it. The officials he spoke to will be giving evidence.

‘Alan Bond‘ (HN67, 1981-86) lived with Vince Miller before Miller was deployed. He may have had a child while undercover. Despite this, he was promoted, and went on to be second in command of the SDS in the 1990s. This means that he oversaw many of the officers who we know also deceived women into relationships, including John Dines, Matt Rayner, Bobby Lewis and Andy Coles. His attitude to this issue must be explored.

‘Paul Gray’ (HN126, 1977-82) was alleged to have had an affair with a fellow officer, in a letter received by his managers that is thought to be from his wife. His managers found allegations ‘were not totally accurate’. Does that mean the affair was with someone he was spying on, rather than a colleague? None of this is actually mentioned in HN126’s witness statement.

We now know that during those five years, a third of the officers in the unit engaged in sexual relationships while undercover. There may be more. But the Inquiry is only calling one, Vince Miller, for evidence.

The issue of sexual relationships is one of the main reasons for the inquiry’s existence and must be prioritised. At the November hearings, we were provided with extracts from each individual officer’s witness statement (with their cipher number attached).

However, it appears that this time, the Inquiry intends to only supply a short ‘gist’, blending the officers’ accounts together, rather than directly quoting any extracts, or identifying which officers are addressing which points. This makes it impossible to ask any meaningful questions of these officers, and makes the gist almost worthless. There’s no good reason why the inquiry cannot provide individually identifiable extracts like last time.

When these spycops give evidence in secret ‘closed hearings’ we will be demanding that as much of this evidence as possible is published afterwards and only the minimum details necessary are kept confidential..

NOT JUST ACTIVISTS

Sexism was endemic in the SDS – reports rate women’s attractiveness and comment on the size of breasts. No account was taken of the impact of the officers’ behaviour on their wives and families. When Paul Gray’s wife alleged an affair the managers’ only concern was protecting the unit’s secrecy; there was no concern for her welfare.

‘Sandra Davies’ (HN348, 1971-73) the first female SDS officer, had her welfare totally disregarded. She was just a tool, used to spy on women’s groups that were closed to men.

Spycops gave no thought to the dignity of women, to their right to choose who they had sex with, the risk of harm if they found out the truth, or what would happen if they got pregnant. Most officers involved readily admit there was no necessity for these relationships.

Numerous women’s organisations were spied on, despite posing no threat at all to public order. It was just a deep hostility to women’s equality.

With at least a third of officers having sex with women while undercover, management cannot claim ignorance. By 1971 they knew deployments were going to be long, about four years. It was clear spycops were becoming important activists and socialising. Deploying married officers clearly didn’t prevent them deceiving women into sexual relationships.

‘Graham Coates’ (HN304, 1976-79) reports officers making joke references to sexual relationships in front of managers, who were ‘deliberately blind’. Jim Pickford and Rick Gibson had reputations for chasing women.

Why would Coates be lying? We’ve confirmed the officers Coates names did in fact have such relationships. His account is clearly credible. If he is telling the truth, the other ‘amnesiac’ officers must be lying.

QUESTIONS FOR BOSSES

It appears Rick Gibson may have deliberately targeted women in order to reach an influential position in the group he was infiltrating. This is hugely significant for the management.

The SDS’ 1974 annual report say security is top priority, and the frequent meetings of all spycops keep close tabs on what officers are doing and feeling. Later reports reiterate that there is constant contact with supervisors and very close monitoring of every spycop.

There’s no question that supervisors would have listened carefully to what spycops reported. Officers must be hiding the truth from the Inquiry. We can’t take their word at face value.

We know Pickford and Gibson’s relationships were disclosed to managers, and that they suspected Tompkins of having one. They absolutely knew that this went on, and they did nothing. The message to the spycops was therefore that there’s nothing wrong with the practice Doing nothing to safeguard the women is the result of the police’s institutional sexism.

From the early days, the SDS had a culture of spycops using the bodies of women as a perk of their jobs. A state institution that exists to serve the public they’re abusive. It is deeply misogynistic. And it appears to have become part of the armoury of tactics.

If Alan Bond fathered a child while undercover, this has major implications. But he won’t give evidence to the Inquiry due to ill health. The Inquiry has known of his condition for three years yet has not taken a statement from him.

After all this misogyny in the 1970s, a 1981 Special Branch memo refers to an early spycop named Miss Pelling, who infiltrated the Communist Party of Great Britain in 1921. She remembers colleagues as gentlemen who never took liberties.

The memo says:

‘This, naturally, is as true of the present Branch’s treatment of the fairer sex as it was in Miss Pelling’s day’

WE NEED EACH OTHER’S KNOWLEDGE

The Inquiry needs the help of those who were spied on. They must not just be contacted but given full disclosure of documents relevant to them with plenty of time to read and respond so they can expose the lies.

‘Alison‘, deceived into a relationship by spycop Mark Jenner in the 1990s, has highlighted lies in the reports about her. Jenner’s reports don’t identify her even when she was at events. He appears to have deliberately written both himself and her out of reports. But Alison can shed light and show the lies, and the real impact Jenner had.

There are so many Alisons who could do the same for this phase of the Inquiry but who won’t get a chance to, because the Inquiry is keeping the facts secret.

Spycop Mark Kennedy told the Home Affairs Select Committee that the ‘two’ women he had sex with (real number: at least 11) ‘provided no intelligence at all’.

Yet at this moment, one of those women, Kate Wilson, is at the Investigatory Powers Tribunal abundantly proving she was a main target of Kennedy’s deployment.

Spycops lie, the women they abused can prove this and help to uncover the truth.

The new extra delays to the Inquiry are simply cruel to the people waiting for answers. Women deceived into relationships by spycops should be given their files, and any documents that mention them immediately. The Met have said they’re happy to do this, if the Inquiry decrees it.

The Inquiry Chair, Sir John Mitting, responded that delays are inevitable, and that ‘perhaps the request cannot be fulfilled’. He gave no reason at all as to why this might be.

Full opening statement from Category H Core Participants (Individuals in Relationships with Undercover Officers)

Matthew Ryder QC
representing three anti-apartheid activists (Ernest Rodker, Professor Jonathan Rosenhead & Lord Peter Hain), & Celia Stubbs

Matthew Ryder QC

Finally today, an opening statement from Matthew Ryder QC. He represents anti-apartheid activists Ernest Rodker, Professor Jonathan Rosenhead and Lord Peter Hain, as well as Blair Peach’s partner Celia Stubbs.

From the 1960s there was a large, global, anti-apartheid movement. They were right, and their opponents were wrong. The British government appeased and supported a regime it should have opposed.

Ryder stated that It should be a matter of deep regret that spycops targeted anti-apartheid campaigners. The real threat to democracy was the apartheid regime itself.

The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM) was formed in 1959 and was not affiliated with any political party. Peter Hain was part of the ‘Stop The Seventy Tour’ (STST) which campaigned against tours by South African sporting teams.

Dambusters Mobilising Committee leaflet

The Dambusters Mobilising Committee opposed the sanctions-busting Cahora Bassa Dam project in Mozambique, which would directly benefit South Africa’s apartheid system. DMC was also targeted by spycops.

The spycops were partisan; they spied on anti-apartheid groups well into the 1970s, long after the Stop The Seventy Tour, while ignoring the growth of far-right groups. The right-wing intimidation and violence suffered by anti-apartheid groups were seen as regrettable but understandable by the spycops. Those promoting racial equality were seen as the problem, rather than the racists.

The bias was so pronounced that the first spycops infiltration of the far-right National Front came about by accident when an officer infiltrating the Workers Revolutionary Party was asked by his unwitting targets to spy on the NF!

Spycops suffered from ‘mission creep’, spying on not just the ‘ultra-left’ but anyone on the broad left, irrespective of whether they had anything to do with disorder. Spying on any group could be excused as a stepping-stone to a group that was more of interest to the police. This was apparent in the deployment of Doug Edwards (HN326, 1968-70)who infiltrated the (law-abiding) Independent Labour Party.

MURDER IN LONDON

The South African State’s security service was active in London in the 1970s, targeting the African National Congress and Anti-Apartheid Movement. Peter Hain had a letter bomb delivered in 1972, opened by his 14-year-old sister. The incident remains uninvestigated.

Bombings and murders were committed against anti-apartheid campaigners. Military materials were used. Few charges were ever brought. Some of these attacks were later admitted to by South African agents.

The spycops seem to have been wholly uninterested in pro-apartheid violence. Instead, they obsessively collected information on a wide range of left-wing groups who opposed it.

The police lawyers told us yesterday that we needed historical context to understand the spycops. Well, here it is.

Yesterday the police told the Inquiry said they would have behaved identically if a racist campaign had opposed a black sports team touring England. But supporting racism is different from opposing it. Equivocation between the motivations and actions of the left and far-right was apparent in the witness testimony of Madeleine earlier.

This sounds a lot like the police 23 years ago, telling the Macpherson Inquiry into the murder of Stephen Lawrence that it had a colour-blind approach. It is as if they have learned nothing.

It is also a lie, given that there were active violent racist campaigners at the time and the undercovers left them alone. That now, today, they cannot see why this is wrong is highly regrettable.

The SDS officers recorded extraordinary and gross levels of detail. The birth of Ernest Rodker’s son and a note saying that Ernest himself had been admitted to hospital were reported and copied to MI5, as were reports about who was at Peter Hain’s family home including his younger siblings.

This is what a totalitarian regime would do with dissidents. Parents are now having the chilling experience of reading secret police reports on their children.

A 1975 report on Ernest Rodker names elected councillors and their choice of reading material. It was also copied to MI5. The Labour Party conference was reported on by spycops. Peter Hain asks if the Liberal and Conservative conferences were ever spied upon?

If, as is plausible, this information was passed by MI5 to their South African counterparts, it is the very opposite of protecting the public.

The Stop The Seventy Tour was not ‘subversive’. SDS officer Mike Ferguson (HN135) had a key organisational role in the group. He then went on to hold senior positions in the spycops unit, recruiting and advising new officers. It seems his work was perversely viewed as a good example.

WRONGFUL CONVICTIONS

The excuses for targeting anti-apartheid groups need debunking. Contrary to the police version, violence was never an aim or method. Contemporaneous documentation proves it. It was not secret or revolutionary, it simply opposed the cruel and racist South African regime. Mike Ferguson’s reports do not suggest any violence at any time. Officer Dick Epps says at one demo people were told to attack police. This was emphatically denied as a lie by all of the activists involved.

The arrest and prosecution of spycops officer ‘Michael Scott‘ (HN298, 1971-76) at the ‘Star and Garter demonstration’ is a powerful example of how spycops deliberately abused their power and eroded the judicial process.

On 12 May 1972, in the car park of the Star and Garter Pub in Richmond, activists blockaded a coach of rugby players on their way to the airport, about to embark on a tour of South Africa. One of those arrested and convicted was undercover officer ‘Mike Scott’.

As mentioned in yesterday’s hearing, Scott was using the stolen identity of a man who was still alive. Scott spied on privileged legal conversations between lawyers and defendants. He did not correct the police ‘s claim in court that the protesters were on the road, when in fact they were on private land: the car park. Senior officers endorsed his going to court to lie about this.

This is an early example of spycops creating miscarriages of justice.

Home Office guidance in 1969 is unequivocal – undercover agents should avoid misleading courts at all costs. The spycops unit simply ignored this .The SDS tradecraft manual of the 1990s specifically told spycops that they could disregard the usual rules about not lying to courts.

If we conservatively estimate that there was one wrongful conviction per officer per year of service, it means the spycops caused about 600 wrongful convictions. It is a huge scandal that is going relatively unremarked upon.

Another example was the prosecution of ‘Desmond/Barry Loader‘ (HN13, 1975-78) in 1977. He and others were tried for public order offences. Barry’s charges were dismissed while the others were convicted of public order offences. He was arrested again shortly after this, leading to a conviction. However he was only given a small fine and ‘bound over’. Neither the defence nor prosecution was told that he was an undercover officer. It appears that the only disclosure was to ‘a court official’ (name redacted so we have no idea who this was) who fixed the results.

The 2015 Ellison Review of Potential Miscarriages of Justice said that spycops must have withheld evidence from court, including evidence that would have exonerated the defendants.

In 1974, infiltrating the Troops Out Movement, spycop Mike Scott was accused of being a spycop officer by Gerry Lawless. Some spycops chose to accuse genuine activists of being spies to distract attention from themselves. Scott, however,chose a different tactic – of punching Lawless in the face, so hard that he broke a finger. These officers considered themselves to be above the law in many ways.

Mike Ferguson, who infiltrated the Anti-Apartheid Movement, is – uniquely – known by his real name, but his cover name is restricted. This means those he spied on cannot know he was a spy and cannot come forward. This has led to another Mike, a real campaigner called Mike Craft, being accused of being the spycop. Craft’s comrades here emphasise that he was wholly innocent. This is also a reminder to all activists to never accuse comrades of being a police spy without any hard evidence.

Even by the standards of the day, the SDS’ targeting anti-apartheid campaigners was an unjustified, disproportionate, and erroneous political choice. The Inquiry should confirm that as a matter of historical record.

CELIA STUBBS

Celia Stubbs, 2021

Ryder then moved on to talk about Celia Stubbs. She is a Core Participant because of her relationship with Blair Peach and led the campaign about his murder by police in 1979. Stubbs recently spoke movingly about it, and spycops, to Channel 4 News.

Peach and Stubbs were both members of the SWP as well as active anti-racist campaigners. Stubbs has campaigned all her life, always to strengthen civil society, and was targeted by the undercovers as a result. Both Stubbs and Peach had spycops files kept on them, opened in 1974 and 1978, long before Peach was killed. We have not seen any of the documents involved that pre-date Peach’s death.

On 23 April 1979, there was a plan to march and sit down at Southall Town Hall protesting at a National Front meeting. Special Patrol Group (SPG) officers piled out of a van and one struck Blair killing him.

All six SPG officers refused to cooperate with the investigation that followed.

Commander Cass’ report at the time confirmed a police officer had killed Peach and identified Inspector Alan Murray as the person most likely to be responsible. Illegal weapons and Nazi regalia were found in the lockers and homes of the SPG officers. Cass’ report was not published until more than 30 years later.

No officer was ever brought to justice for due to a major police cover-up. Officers refused to cooperate with investigations.

The Met told their lawyers to give a knowingly false version of events at Blair Peach’s inquest. They will have seen the Cass report that contained the truth, but still, they lied. The corruption extended beyond the police.

The killing of Blair Peach remains one of the most notorious events in British police history, a national disgrace, and a permanent stain on the Met.

An SDS annual report to the Home Office cites the death of Peach and the ensuing campaign for justice as a key focus for the unit. This is not about subversion or disorder. The Home Office’s response was to renew the SDS’s funding.

The SDS reported on the campaign for promoting actions like writing to MPs and local newspapers, and phoning in to radio shows. Again, this is not public disorder or subversive activity. A number of spycops even attended Blair’s funeral, while police evidence gatherers photographed the attendees for later identification by the SDS.

Combined with the cover-up, it is clear that the infiltration of the Blair Peach campaign was about preventing guilty police officers from being held to account.

THE SPYING HASN’T STOPPED

The spycops units have continued to take an active interest in the Blair Peach campaign ever since. A commemorative event was organised for the twentieth anniversary of his death in 1999, and this was targeted by spycops, with the excuse that such campaigns were ‘anti-police’. Justice campaigns were routinely portrayed as some sort of risk to public order even when they plainly weren’t.

Blair Peach

Campaigners for police accountability in cases where the police played a part were a major target for the SDS, and this continued for decades. Police admit undercover officers spied on at least 18 family and justice campaigns, and the true total is likely to be much higher. On our website we name thirteen examples that we are sure of and summarise these cases of police incompetence, arrogance and murder.

Police lawyers told the Inquiry last November that the SDS and NPIOU never directly targeted justice campaigns. But the documents we see in these hearings prove that is untrue. Officers were tasked to spy on the Peach campaign.

Why would the SDS highlight the Peach campaign to the Home Office if it were not a direct focus? Why are some reports only about the Peach campaign? Why were so many other campaigns targeted later? The denials of the police lawyers are simply not plausible. Their statement should be publicly corrected and withdrawn.

The 1979 SDS annual report describes the Peach campaign as a main focus, yet the Inquiry has disclosed suspiciously few documents relating to this.

It is striking that there is so little evidence relating to either the 1979 Southall demonstration where Peach was killed, not the 1974 Red Lion Square anti-racist protest at which Kevin Gately was killed. There is a real concern that reports may have been destroyed by the police in order to cover up the facts around both fatalities.

Earlier in this Inquiry, there were references made to a report about the Southall demonstration at which Peach was killed, This report – key evidence about an extremely important and relevant historical event – has still not been disclosed to us, and we are left wondering if it has been deliberately withheld from the Inquiry, or just not shared with us?

For Stubbs, this conspicuous lack of evidence is just one more obstruction to truth and accountability.

TRUTH, THE WHOLE TRUTH

Celia Stubbs was also involved in the Hackney Community Defence Campaign and Colin Roach Centre, both of which were targeted by spycops. She is extremely disturbed about the fact that her lawyers were put under police surveillance, and Special Branch files were opened on them.

This Inquiry has had police material for years, yet only passes it to witnesses shortly before the hearings, giving us little time to properly analyse and respond. The extremely limited opportunity for victims to question witnesses limits the Inquiry’s ability to get the truth.

Celia Stubbs and Blair Peach sought to bring people together and make a fairer world. They were spied upon. She wants answers and accountability. She does not have to prove her innocence; the state must show why it spied on her.

There is nothing in the police documents disclosed by the UCPI that justifies spying on Celia Stubbs.

Bringing the hearing to an end, Mitting reminded us that tomorrow is the 42nd anniversary of Blair Peach’s death. The Inquiry will resume at 10 am with Mitting speaking briefly about Blair Peach and then there will be a minute’s silence.

Full opening statement from Ernest Rodker, Professor Jonathan Rosenhead and Lord Peter Hain
Full opening statement from Celia Stubbs

<<Previous UCPI Daily Report (21 Apr 2021)<<

>>Next UCPI Daily Report (23 Apr 2021)>>