Just Stop Oil woman's family moan they'll 'miss her childcare' (2024)

The family and friends of a Just Stop Oilcampaigner jailed for 20 months for bringing the M25 to a standstill and causing 50,000 hours of disruption has complained they will 'miss her childcare'.

Gaie Delap, 77, from Bristol, is one of five environmental activists who took part in peaceful direct action over four days in November 2022 which saw supporters from Just Stop Oil climb multiple gantries over the M25.

The protest caused long delays for motorists and even prevented one man from missing his father's funeral.

The grandmother, whose children and grandchildren live in Falmouth, was sentenced last week to 20 months in prison at Basildon Crown Court.

But her daughter has now complained the sentence came as a shock, saying she will 'miss the childcare' and saying Dalep's granddaughters, both under one, will have to miss seeing her.

Fellow Just Stop Oil protestors George Simonson and Theresa Higginson were sentenced to two years each, Paul Bell was sentenced to 22 months while Paul Sousek, from Bude, was also sentenced to 20 months.

A sixth defendant, Daniel Johnson, was given a 21-month sentence suspended for two years and ordered to complete 200 hours of community service. All six had pleaded guilty to causing a public nuisance.

The judge told Delap: 'Age, I regret, has not brought wisdom.'

At the time of her sentencing Delap said: 'I've had to read the evidence of people who were stuck in our traffic, it hurts me. I'm sorry I had to do this.

'But we really have no other option. They didn't listen to the scientists, they didn't listen to their constituents, so we had to cause disruption in order to communicate the seriousness of humanity's predicament.'

Ahead of the hearing Mr Sousek added: 'No New Oil' was the demand from Just Stop Oil right from the start. Now most political parties agree and it has become government policy.

'How come we are being jailed for pushing for, what is now, government policy? Kafka couldn't make it up.'

Delap's family and friends have since slammed the courts for what they call undue severity of sentence.

Lily Pridie, her daughter, said the sentencing has come as a real shock to her family.

She said: 'We are all very shocked and worried about her wellbeing in this situation. On August 1 my mother was sentenced to 20 months in prison for her part in a peaceful climate protest action that blocked the M25 in November 2022.

'She is so concerned about the climate crisis that she made the extraordinary decision at the age of 75 to join a small group of people who each climbed a gantry on the M25.

'While they understood their actions would cause disruption, they felt that the current Government was ignoring clear evidence about the impending crisis and they demanded that there should be 'No New Oil'.

'This idea has ostensibly now become government policy and yet Gaie and her fellow protestors have been jailed for demanding that change.

'Mum is a Quaker. She is passionately against any sort of violence and has dedicated her life to volunteering to help others in need both in her local community and across the world.'

Ms Pridie added: 'We will all greatly miss her childcare and looking after elderly relatives in Bristol.

'The youngest two grandchildren have only just turned one and will now not see their much-loved grandmother for a very long time because she was trying to push for a better future for them.

'The past 18 months have been a time of enormous stress for Gaie - a tagging/curfew order restricting her movements, endless court appearances and worry has taken a huge toll on her health, last week she had a mini stroke. This seems like punishment enough for a peaceful, non-violent climate activist.'

Among those affected by the M25 blockade was Tony Bambury, who was travelling with his family from his home in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, to his father's funeral just off the A13 near Pitsea in Essex.

He was forced to divert off the motorway towards St Albans in Hertfordshire to find an alternative route to Essex, but got caught up in long queues of traffic.

He was forced to call his mother to say he would not be able to reach the funeral on time.

He told ITV Meridien in November 2022: 'I called my Mum, who's 79, and was very upset as you can imagine. My brother and his family were there, I wanted to be there, and I had a eulogy that I was going to say about my father.

'These people have forced me not to go to my own father's funeral by their actions and it's not like I can get a second chance at this. I'll never forget what they've done and I'll never forgive what they have done.'

Another man missed the birth of his child, saying: 'My wife gave birth yesterday afternoon, she was alone whilst I was stuck on the M25 desperately trying to reach the hospital.'

The M25 protests, which saw a total of 45 people climb up gantries, led to an economic cost of at least £765,000, while the cost to the Metropolitan Police was more than £1.1million.

They also allegedly caused more than 50,000 hours of vehicle delay, affecting more than 700,000 vehicles, and left the M25 'compromised' for more than 120 hours.

A police outrider was knocked off his bike and two lorries crashed when one Just Stop Oil demonstrators tried to climb one of the motorway's gantries.

Judge Shane Collery told the defendants as he handed down the sentences that their behaviour was 'disproportionate to your aims' - a fortnight after JSO co-founder Roger Hallam was given a five-year prison term.

Mr Collery said it was 'easy to be blase when it's not your life that's disrupted.'

Dozens of supporters have held protests in London in recent weeks in solidarity with the more than 20 Just Stop Oil activists currently in prison.

But Lesley Chandler, a fellow Quaker with the Falmouth Quaker Church of which Delap is a member, said she does not understand the logic behind what she says is a 'very harsh and inappropriate sentence'.

She told CornwallLive: 'Gaie is committed to telling the truth and to spreading peace wherever she is. This action was about telling the truth about oil drilling in the North Sea. It was about forcing the Government to listen. This Government has begun to listen so maybe there is hope.

'But what's going in the courts is inappropriate and harsh. It must be confusing for people to make a difference between protests and riots. A protester is not a rioter. Rioters are determined to unsettle stability in our society.

'Gaie wanted stability for her grandchildren. She said she had to take action not for herself but for the sake of her grandchildren and all our grandchildren or she wouldn't be able to look them in the eye. She didn't do this for any personal reason but for the future. For all our future.'

Mat Osmond, a lecturer at Falmouth University who has been involved in silent Defend Our Juries protests outside Truro Crown Court, was among hundreds of Just Stop Oil supporters who were arrested for blocking traffic in Central London in 2022.

He said those sentenced are 'upstanding members of society who have found that the only way for society to listen is to carry out non-violent disruptive action'.

He said: 'This is a travesty. We can't leave Gaie and Paul and the others standing in prison. We have to find a way to bear witness to what there are doing and stand by them. As far I'm concerned they're heroes.'

He added: 'Some judges are acting with excess and making a moral judgment, and looking at this as some sort of high-level antisocial behaviour. The unravelling of our world because of fossil fuel is not opinion. It's a reality.

'What all these people have done is cause a traffic jam. I am sure some of those caught in this traffic jam were frustrated or materially affected by it. I do not doubt that. But this very punitive to create a deterrent. This is a political sentence.'