return to top page FOURTH WORLD NEWS
For Small Nations, Small Communities & The Human Spirit
Vol. 1 No. 18. February 1983 Price 25pEdited by Nicholas Albery Frestonia Smallest Nation in Europe
IntroductionI am 'Minister of State for the Environment' for a small country called 'Frestonia'. I used to be its 'Minister of State for Industry' and, before that, 'British Ambassador'. On October 31st, 1982, the 'Free and Independent Republic of Frestonia' celebrated its fifth anniversary of independence.
'Frestonia' is situated to the north of the Shepherds Bush roundabout, London W11, and consists of 32 semi-derelict houses on 1.8 acres, a triangle of three roads enclosing a long thin communal garden, the whole inhabited by 97 ex-squatters, including half a dozen children, and surrounded by tower block estates.
The terraced houses used to be owned by the 'Greater London Council' and were first squatted eight years ago when the 'GLC' plan was to demolish the whole area and build a giant industrial estate. There was a great deal of local opposition to the plan, as the nearby estates feared it would result in increased heavy traffic. A council 'consultation' meeting attended by 200 locals resulted in a unanimous vote against the plan. But the council pressed on regardless.
Independence
So in October 1977, stimulated by a visit to 'Christiania', the 'free city' squatted army camp in Copenhagen, I suggested we declare independence from Great Britain.
We issued a referendum and there was a 94% vote in favour...with 73% in favour of applying to join the 'EEC'
Richard Adams of 'Open Head Press', designed a fine coat of arms...the motto was 'Nos Sumus Una Familia' - we are all one family... and we sent our declaration of independence to the British queen and we applied to join the 'United Nations', whilst warning them we might need a 'UN peacekeeping force', to keep the imperialistic 'GLC' from invading our country.
It turned out to be a tactic worth recommending to any neighbourhood threatened by bureaucracy.
The 'GLC' suddenly started to sit up and take notice. Their spokesman told the press they had a lot of sympathy for us - which was certainly news to us - and that they would talk to us 'in the United Nations or wherever'. The 'GLC' leader, Sir Horace Cutler, wrote a typically quirky letter ending 'if you didn't exist it would be necessary to invent you' ...to which we replied 'since we do exist, why is it necessary to destroy us?'.
And even Sir Geoffrey Howe got in on the act, writing that G.K. Chesterton's 'Napoleon of Notting Hill' had inspired him as a child, and that he would follow up our cause with the 'GLC'.
Media
The media went mad, with 'our foreign correspondent in Frestonia' reporting in British newspapers, an editorial in the 'Daily Mail' and 'CBS Television' filming, 'Australian Television' filming, 'Japanese Television' trying to get into one of our houses.
The first year of independence was quite enjoyable.
We founded the 'Frestonian National Theatre' which ran the London premiere of Heathcote William's 'The Immortalist') and the 'Frestonian National Film Institute' (the first performance was the unlikely combination of 'Passport to Pimlico' and the 'Sex Pistols').
We issued postage stamps, which worked worldwide, using one stamp for foreign mail to Britain and two for overseas (only once did the 'British GPO' bring back a sack-full of undelivered Frestonian mail, which got through on second posting).
We also had a very posh visa stamp, to deal with the increasing tourism - particularly coach-loads of schoolchildren from Denmark who came for a five minute tour round the borders.
By Christmas 1978, the 'GLC' must have thought that all was reasonably quiet again and they sent us eviction notices. We lobbied every councillor at home and the decision was reversed. We also forced a public enquiry into the 'Hammersnuth Council' structure plan for the industrial estate, proposing instead our own plan for a 'craft village' of houses with workshops attached. The inspector recommended our plan.
Respectability
We became respectable, forming a limited company, the 'Bramleys Housing Co-operative Ltd.', but gradually the spirit of 'Frestonia' has somewhat faded - the 'National Theatre and Film Institute' were evicted, 'Independence Day' is longer such a glittering occasion, and a new crop of leaders has arisen, doing great work in the name, not of 'Frestonia', but of 'Bramleys Housing Co-op' - building a sauna bath, establishing a Law Centre - and now, five years after independence, the end is in sight.
The 'Greater London Council' have sold the land to the 'Hammersmith Council', and the 'British Housing Corporation' have recently announced that they will be allocating millions of pounds for 1983/1984 to knock down our lovely terrace of houses to build again from scratch, since our architect's plans for 'gradual renewal' were long ago defeated.
There will still be a craft village of sorts, with a row of pricey new workshops facing a row of pricey new houses, into which surviving Frestonians will be rehoused, but It won't be 'Frestonia' any more.
Gone will be the enclosed communal gardens where people wander naked in summer, gone will be a great deal of control over our own destinies, since the 'Housing Corporation' are giving the money to the 'Notting Hill Housing Trust', who were supposedly acting on our behalf, but seem more and more to be running the show, themselves.
Victory
It smacks to me of the sort of thing that happens to third world countries, when they are overwhelmed with inappropriate third world aid, but nevertheless it will represent a tremendous advance over the original plans for an industrial wasteland, and a small victory for David versus Goliath - 97 ex-squatters working in unison with the local estates will have defeated the giantist 'GLC' and 'Hammersmith Council', and saved a small part of Shepherds Bush from a bleak future.
Readers tempted to declare their neighbourhood an independent state and wanting copies of our documentation, please send U.K. £0.50p to:
The Minister of State for the Environment, 108 Freston Road, Frestonia, (via London W11, U.K.).Policing The Police
I have had more help than hindrance from the police in the past, but I do think that Ken Livingstone takes the Fourth World line when he calls for more community control of the police.
You would imagine, for instance, that the police would have learnt their lesson from the harm to their image caused by raiding squats in Buxton and recklessly damaging property there. Not so.
At 7.30am on December 11th 1982, I was in bed downstairs in my house, about to get up to make breakfast for my child before taking him to school and going to college myself. A law student was in bed upstairs. None of us has any criminal record nor has even ever been arrested.
Suddenly there were two tremendous crashes and my front door was smashed in, and about eight police officers with two police dogs rushed into the house. They had not knocked, and no search warrant was produced. My child was upset, so after a while I read him a 'Tintin' comic and left them to get on with their searching.
Within half an hour they evidently realized they had made a mistake, and left, without apologizing. I asked why they had raided my house, and one officer replied:
"We like to turn over squats occasionally".
In fact my house is not a squat. It is a housing co-op house for which I pay rates and a license fee, and where I have lived for the past six and a half years. I have tried to bring up my child with a positive attitude towards the police, but such Orwellian behaviour does not make my task any easier.
Rights
Even if my house were a squat, I do feel that those treated as second-class citizens, such as blacks and squatters, should have their legal rights punctiliously observed. I intend to sue Sir Kenneth Newman, the 'Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police', in the county court, for negligence, nuisance and trespass, and to subpœna him to appear to account publicly for his policies in such cases.
My experience is that the county court system is a human scale form of justice, where one can do without the expensive paraphernalia of solicitors and barristers, and yet where one can call to account even the most high and mighty.
copies of this document may be obtained from 26 The High Street, Purton, Wiltshire SN5 4AE, UK
Tel: 01793 77 22 14 Fax: 01793 77 25 21
e-mail: john.papworth@btinternet.com
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