07 March 2009

Peter Mandelson custard attack: Custard throwing climate protester Leila Deen


  1. Politics

Peter Mandelson custard attack: Custard throwing climate protester Leila Deen

Leila Deen is a veteran of G8, Parliament Square and Heathrow demonstrations.

A campaigner against expansion at Heathrow Airport threw green custard over Business Secretary Lord Mandelson ahead of a low-carbon summit. ; http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1488655367/bctid14954670001 http://www.brightcove.com/channel.jsp?channel=1139053637

The charity worker, 29, originally from Brighton, has become increasingly politically active since her first brush with controversy when she voted for her university shop to stop selling The Sun newspaper.

Since finishing her degree in international studies and politics at Leeds the daughter of a primary schoolteacher has gone on to work for a string of campaigns.

Most notable have been her protests against extensions at Heathrow Airport and the World Development Movement, focusing on alleged attempts by Western governments to force developing countries to privatise their water supplies.

She has been an activist with Plane Stupid for 2 years, and was arrested in 2007 for supergluing herself to government buildings during the Climate Camp protest against the proposed third runway.

At the time she called herself Leila Harris: 27 and said she worked was an administrative assistant from Kennington, south London.

Acting as a spokesman at the camp, Miss Deen said the protest did not just involve the stereotypical "eco-hippies''.

"I have been networking with the local residents,'' she said. "We don't want the usual activists' ghetto of eco-hippies. We want all sorts of people on board from all walks of life.

"I am a normal, everyday person.

"I am not violent. These people are not violent.

"We just want to make a difference.''

Yesterday Gordon Taylor, who lives next door to her family home in Brighton, said: "I think her mother would be proud.

"Nothing surprises me these days. We rarely see Leila since she left home to attend university in her teens but I am aware that she has fought for a number of causes over the years."

Miss Deen was also one of three Plane Stupid protesters who sounded horns during a speech at an environmental conference in London by Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon earlier this week.

She and the other demonstrators left after being warned they would be thrown out if they interrupted the speech again.

At one point they sounded horns when Mr Hoon reached the part of his speech when he said that proper debate rather than "stupid stunts" was the way to address the aviation-and-the-environment issue.

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