The Post-bag Emptied: Letters To Squall

Media Management

Squall 4, April/May 1993, pg. 27.

Squall,

I am writing to put straight a story that the press jumped upon last summer. It was at the Otterbourne Festival where someone set fire to a disused Council Incinerator plant which the paper reported caused £1 million worth of damage.

The only reason why there were people near the out-house was because police refused to to allow them on site and funneled them onto a field next to the building.

After the fire started, the fire brigade arrived but the police refused to allow them on site saying it wasn't safe for them. But they did allow the media in. It was half an hour before the police allowed the fire brigade on to the site; half an hour for the fire to bum and half an hour for the media to photograph it. When asked about the delay they said that they had needed time to gather together a police escort for the firemen. And this was despite the fact that there were van loads of police permanently situated near the festival waiting for trouble.

Travellers at the festival actually caught the people they reckoned had started the blaze and handed them over but none of this was reported in the press.

Yours,

Mike (traveller).