Standing in the middle Mare Street in Hackney, I am face to face with a line of riot police. Behind them, a billboard with a picture of a large red eye looks over all of us. "Biggest Brother Ever", it reads - only the Channel 5 icon in the lower right corner ruins an otherwise Orwellian scene.
In response to a wave of looting, and an attack on a stationary police car earlier in the day, riot police have shut down a small section of the road. To their credit, they seem to have calmed an angry crowd. During a tense but peaceful stand off, I ask one of the officers what their plan is. He lifts the cotton balaclava from his mouth: "all I know is that we're shutting this area down, and keeping it sterile". 'Sterile' an interesting choice of word. It's six o'clock, and many Hackney residents who have returned from work are eager to pass through the cordon. "It's not fair, just let us past" an elderly woman says, "I'll tell you what's not fair", the officer replies "people rioting in the street and injuring police officers".
Another hour of tension and inadvisedly terse words proceeds until, at about 6.50pm, the police withdraw. "Where are you going", I ask one of the officers, "We don't know yet - once an area is calm we move on somewhere else". But is Hackney calm, or will the looting continue as soon as the police move on? "It's a tough situation", he tells me "we all have our own views". "Do you think this could spread to other parts of the country", I ask, "after all there are many northern towns in precisely the same situations?" He nods solemnly: "I know - I just don't know what will happen".
Crowds in Hackney seem to be dispersing, so we decide to travel to Stratford on the now re-opened overground. The shopping centre has been pre-emptively closed since 4pm, and is guarded by many officers, but nothing happens. Travel is by now very restricted, with many buses and underground stations closed, we have to head home. But later in Hackney, Croydon, Enfield, Peckham, and all over the poor inner city, riots do break out. In Croydon a furniture shop burns furiously, billowing smoke into the air. By the early ours of the morning, a huge Sony distribution centre in Enfield is ablaze, and with these buildings the sympathy of onlookers for a disenfranchised, deprived, and ignored population also goes up in flames.
Roads closed by policemen arrayed in praetorian uniform, shops looted, flames visible for miles, how did it come to this?
On the way home, we witness something telling. A group of 8 police officers, who had evidently realised that they weren't needed at Stratford shopping centre, surround a small group of children. All but two are black, one of those is Asian. "Why are you searching these children?", I ask an officer, "stop taking photographs - this is nothing to do with you" he snaps back. "It's perfectly legal to record this, and we will continue" my photographer responds. "Why are you searching these children", I repeat, "they're being searched lawfully under Section 60" he says. "And do you have reasonable grounds for suspecting that they are in possession of weapons?", I ask. The conversations repeats itself. Eventually he stumbles, "why aren't you searching me?", my photographer asks him, "You have to look at them" he replies, "this conversation is over".
There is no "excuse" for rioting and destruction, especially if it endangers people. Yet the complaints of the predominantly black communities in Tottenham that began this series of riots are important, and should not be lost. In London, you are seven times more likely to be stopped and searched by police officers if you are black. There have been 333 deaths in police custody since 1998, and not a single conviction of any officer.
There is a strong feeling of injustice and inequality all over poor London, and like the elderly woman in Hackney, people are tired of the police, and politicians, saying "I'll tell you what's fair". Though it is tempting to forget the protest against unjust policing in Tottenham while the flames surround us, we must not. For many Londoners, the image of an intimidating police force with a Big Brother eye behind them is real, and this must be addressed, or we are condemned to repeat this.