Rally Against Debt? It was more of a long queue

Lisa Hamilton, who observed the pro-cuts demonstration, was not impressed.

On 26 March nearly half a million people descended on the capital to oppose the government’s cuts agenda and demand an alternative. Six weeks later 200 people (I’m being generous) stood on a pavement outside parliament to give a big “thumbs-up” to the same policies.

To say turnout at the Rally Against Debt was low is to be very polite. It was abysmal. Don’t think protest. Think long queue.

In an attempt to gloss over the low turnout, one attendee has described the event as “not bad for a Facebook flashmob stunt“. (Presumably the usual, good old Tory “blame it on the weather” excuse was rejected due to the unfortunately good weather.)

Hmm. A flashmob is, at least according to Wikipedia, a group of people who assemble to perform a seemingly pointless act often for the purpose of satire. A flash mob is not a publicised event with a shiny website.

The site (which hasn’t been updated since a “we’re trending on Twitter” post on Friday afternoon) promised a “great networking opportunity”, a number of “high-profile guests” and “plenty to do” during the rally.

Unfortunately, the low turnout (Guido Fawkes claimed 500, but it looked less than half that to me) meant that most of the attendees already seemed to know each other and while Ukip’s Nigel Farage had indeed flown in for the event, “plenty to do” seemed to involve standing increasingly closer together in order to make the crowd look bigger. There were also a couple of short-lived chants and EU flag-burning for those who like that sort of thing.

Toby Young, one of the most high-profile supporters of the rally, came in for mockery when he missed it – because he took his children to an exhibition about pirates at a (publicly funded) museum.

If the March for the Alternative suggested that a cross-section of society strongly opposed the cuts being made by the Tory government, then the Rally Against Debt suggested that white, middle-class, middle-aged men are opposed to taxation, don’t like Europe or public services, but do like chinos, rugby shirts, looking after their own interests, and causing minor obstructions outside parliament.

The Rally Against Debt taught us nothing new. However, it did leave one big question: Why did this failure of an event generate so much news coverage?

Perhaps the snappers enjoyed the novelty of outnumbering the crowd.

You can find Lisa on Twitter: @lefty_lisa