Taking back power or taking the mickey? The activists ‘liberating’ food from big stores

A new UK civil resistance group has called for ‘mass shoplifting’ to focus attention on inequality, but recent stunts have led to arrests Eve Middleton was sitting on a picnic blanket in a park, sharing out vegan biscuits with six fellow activists, when she saw a squad of police bearing down on them. About 30 officers, she said, surrounded the seven young people, and one officer told them: “Don’t run or you’ll be cuffed.” Another officer focused on gathering evidence. “Whose Oreos are these?” they asked, seizing the biscuits. “It was pretty farcical, but it’s still frightening when you see that amount of officers running towards you. It’s pretty scary,” said student Bridie Leggatt, another of the seven. The seven activists had gathered for a “nonviolence training event” – meeting in the park to enjoy the sunny weather. Leggatt, 22, and Middleton, 25, were among 13 people arrested last weekend in Salford and London as part of a national police crackdown on a new civil resistance group called Take Back Power. A further 15 arrests had been made in March when police raided a “nonviolence training” event, this time at the Grade II-listed Quaker House in