Medway Councillor defends £11,000 of public money to remove national flags
A council has defended the use of more than £11,000 of public money to remove national flags as “money well spent”
A council has defended the use of more than £11,000 of public money to remove national flags as “money well spent”.
Medway Cllr Alex Paterson (Lab) says that the Union and St George’s flags were put up by “far right agitators” and were intended to spread “intimidation and division”.
However, the move has been slated as “trying to get into a culture war which you’re going to lose” by opponents.
Starting this summer, St George’s Crosses and Union Flags were hung from lampposts around Kent and the rest of the country in a movement dubbed ‘Operation Raise the Colours’.
The phenomenon began shortly after Hadush Kebatu, an illegal immigrant and asylum seeker living in a hotel in Epping, sexually assaulted a teenage girl and a woman.
Kebatu has since been found guilty of and deported for this crime, though not until after his accidental release from prison some weeks ago made headlines around the country.
His actions also sparked a reinvigorated wave of anti-immigration protests around the country, particularly focused on asylum accommodation.
Such demonstrations were held in Faversham and Canterbury in in recent months.
Medway has also received its fair share of flags, with hundreds hung up throughout the towns – and now tens of thousands have been spent to take them down.
Alex Paterson, the council’s portfolio holder for community safety, highways and enforcement, said it was “money well spent”.
“It cost us £11,592.50 to take down 727 flags all across Medway, ” he told BBC Radio Kent today (November 7).
“To make the community feel safe again, that is money well spent.”
The authority announced its plans to remove them earlier this week.
Cllr Paterson added that the movement to put up the flags was the work of “far-right agitators” and intended to spread “intimidation and division,” and suggested those who claimed otherwise are “pretending they don’t know why they were put up.”
In a Facebook video, Cllr Paterson also said that the removal of flags means “we haven’t had to cancel Christmas as has happened in certain other parts of Kent this week.”
He was referring to a recent case in Harrietsham, where the village was told it must remove the flags if it is to host Christmas lights.
Cllr Paterson continued: “These have not been taken down for health and safety reasons, they have been taken down because they were put up to try to divide our community.
“I’m not going to allow people to try to intimidate sections of the community.”
He also stressed that he plans to have the flags given to a “community group here in Medway to turn them into something positive – a community artwork which celebrates the diversity of our community.”
The flags have been a source of culture war controversy around the county, with Reform-led Kent County Council (KCC) saying they would not be removing the signs unless they risked public safety.
In leafy Faversham, however, there has been open conflict between ‘flaggers’ and ‘deflaggers’ – with local activists from groups such as Faversham Against Racism coordinating to remove the flags while their opponents were largely away at a Canterbury protest.
Cllr Andrew Lawrence (Con), shadow opposition member of Medway Council, was highly critical of the position adopted by Cllr Paterson and the Labour administration.
“We do accept that the letter of the law is that those flags have been raised in places that aren’t appropriate,” he said.
“We reject in part the claims that this is done to divide – Cllr Paterson’s own words are extremely divisive.
“I’m happy to accept the fact that some people may be intimidated – undoubtedly there are some idiots running around wrapped in the flag causing division in the community.”
But he called for the Labour councillor to be “very careful” in his use of language to avoid “inflaming” the situation.
“By responding in the way he has he thinks he’s taken a principled stand and some may agree, but he’s playing into Reform’s hands by doing what he’s’ doing,” he added.
“Get on and run the council, you’ve got enough going on there without trying to get into a culture war which you’re going to lose at the end of the day.”