Bishop Tells St Paul's Protesters To Leave

The Bishop of London has said it is time for anti-capitalist protesters camped outside St Paul's Cathedral to leave.

It is 11 days since the 'Occupy' campaigners set up their tents and forced the cathedral to shut, costing it thousands of pounds a day in lost revenue.

“The time has come for the protesters to leave, before the camp's presence threatens to eclipse entirely the issues that it was set up to address.”
The Rt. Rev'd Dr.Richard Chartres (pictured), the third most senior cleric in the Church of England, said in a statement: "This demonstration has undoubtedly raised a number of very important questions.

"The St Paul's Institute has itself focused on the issue of executive pay and I am involved in ongoing discussions with City leaders about improving shareholder influence on excessive remuneration.

"Nevertheless, the time has come for the protesters to leave, before the camp's presence threatens to eclipse entirely the issues that it was set up to address."

His comments came as the protest organisers denied suggestions that 90% of the tents are being left unoccupied overnight.

In a statement, Occupy London Stock Exchange said: "This is simply not the case. We try to keep vacancy to a minimum and operate a sign in/sign out system to help ensure this happens.

"When someone knows they will not be staying overnight, they offer their tent to someone else.

"We are ordinary people with jobs and families. We are occupying in order to register our objection to being shut out of the political process.

"The fact that we are camping out here shows how seriously we take our right to participate and be heard."

Police used infra-red imaging to establish how many of the tents were being slept in at night.

St Paul's is losing an estimated £20K a day after being forced to close over health and safety concerns about the camp on its doorstep.

Businesses in the area have also been suffering but the demonstrators say they have no intention of leaving for some time.

Article courtesy of ANANOVA and www.policeoracle.com