One evening last week, Catherine Usiskin set off as usual to take her two dogs out for a night-time walk on Primrose Hill, a park in north London she has lived beside for 40 years. But she found the park closed. Instead, she had to walk around its perimeter. “We weren’t told, there were no notices, all of a sudden I’m locked out of the park with no idea,” says the 70-year-old
Temporary barriers of the sort seen at festivals were installed on Friday to stop a rise in crime and antisocial behaviour, following complaints to Starmer’s office that lockdown restrictions had resulted in a rowdy, violent, drug-taking and drug-dealing crowd coming to the park.
McKeown and more than 500 signatories are furious with Starmer’s intervention, which they consider to be undemocratic – and unexpectedly in line with the agenda of Conservative councillors who have been leafleting the area campaigning for gates.
“Closing and gating Primrose Hill is a nuclear and disproportionate solution for a temporary problem that could be managed by more effective policing,” says McKeown.