Police are appealing for witnesses after a Just Stop Oil protester’s foot appeared to have been run over by a driver amid a slow march in north London on Tuesday morning.
The group marched through Parliament Square and several other locations including Borough and Islington, in a second week of consecutive demonstrations that have blocked traffic.
Just Stop Oil posted a video online showing a grey Renault Megane seemingly being driven through a group of demonstrators on Holloway Road in Islington around 10am.
One person appeared to be pushed to the side and another thrown to the ground as a car made its way through a small group of activists wearing high-vis jackets and holding a banner.
It appeared the car had travelled over an activist’s foot.
“It has gone over her foot,” one person was heard saying in the video, while consoling the injured protester.
Just Stop Oil wrote on Twitter: “After weeks of inflammatory language from politicians and right-wing media personalities, a car has finally rammed into a peaceful protest.”
Metropolitan Police said they were alerted to the incident after seeing the video circulate online.
The force is appealing for witnesses and dash cam footage after the person “was involved in a collision” while “engaged in a protest”.
Just Stop Oil has vowed to march from Parliament Square, by the Palace of Westminster, every weekday and Saturday until the Government “abandons its dangerous attempt to licence over 100 new fossil fuel projects”.
The series of demonstrations began on Monday April 24.
Home Secretary Suella Braverman has introduced new legislation allowing police to inervene and stop the slow walking tactic adopted by Just Stop Oil.
The Government said this will give police the clarity they have asked for on when they can use existing powers to break up the “selfish, guerrilla” slow-marching tactics used to halt traffic across the UK.
The Public Order Bill creates a new criminal offence of interfering with key national infrastructure such as roads, airports and railways, with perpetrators facing 12 months behind bars.
Just Stop Oil said if the bill passes in the House of Lords on Wednesday, it “will grant police the power to stop people from exercising their legimitate right to protest”.
A number of supporters have been issued with Public Order Act (S12) notices by the Met in order to move them off roads and onto pavements.
