shonky,

For someone who knows nothing, you claim to know everything. The days of police verbals, and planting of evidence are gone. No more going before the beak with "I charged him with assault sir, he kept ramming his face into my fist, sir". I seen Chief Constable Clod from the NSW coppers on TV carrying on about these people, the fact is the coppers were unlawfully on the property, End of story.

p/s Do you make it up as you go, or is it written by the Murdoch gutter press for you?

I've been thinking about this:

I don't know if the police had a specifically obtained warrant to be doing surveillance as part of an official operation;
- But what I am fairly sure of is that the protesters, whist having a right to protest, don't have a right to glue themselves to roads or park on train tracks to stop coal trains as shown on their website.

And so, given that they were convening in a group working out their plans to prepare for events in which they PLANNED to break laws,
- Then cops may have had reasonable cause to put them under surveillance, based on their own history of breaking laws in their protests.

- Also keep in mind what our govt has done to others in the same kind of category say for example bikies anti association laws and bail conditions preventing association with other co-offenders.

Point being you have a right to protest, but you don't have a right to break laws in conducting your protest, and gathering for the purposes of planning when you intend to break laws is a reasonable cause for being put under surveillance.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-30/queensland-reworks-anti-bikie-laws-toughest-crime-laws/8077572

"They replace existing anti-association provisions with a new consorting offence, making it illegal for a person to consort with two or more convicted offenders after being warned by police not to do so.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said the new laws would give Queensland the toughest organised crime laws in the country."

If protesters are gathering or associating with other like-minded people specifically for the purposes of breaking laws, then is there any reason why they shouldn't be held to the same standards?

Point being I believe it's perfectly fine to gather and protest, that's a part of democracy and free society;
But is it not a completely different issue if they gather with an intended purpose of breaking laws whilst protesting?

Hi AC,

I believe this to be a clear case of over reach by the coppers. At times Blockade Australia engage in protest that I for one, may agree with the motive, but not the action. This is not what this is about, its not about the actions of the people of BA, but rather the actions of the coppers. Civil liberties is something we must guard closely, even if at times it means sticking up for someone you may not agree with. Its easy to extrapolate all sorts of things from an event, its easy to turn a blind eye to those you don't agree with, its easy for the coppers to put a story across in justification. It may be radical environmental protesters today, but tomorrow it could be peaceful church goers, be very careful in supporting this kind of police action, you don't know where it can end up.

Pauliar,

Another bunch of lies from you. You keep claiming without any evidence that the police were unlawfully on the property or that the blockade thugs were lawfully on the property, and that the thugs were arrested when no crime had been committed. In any country vandalising a police vehicle and assaulting police is a crime.

Hi Paul1405,
I've been vocal enough about my feelings towards climate change agendas in that I'm not against doing things that are better for the environment but I don't support being dictated to by foreigners.
That's my position there.

As far as protests are concerned, I support the right to protest;
- even if I personally think the things people are protesting against are silly.

I may not agree with what they say or do, but I do support free expression and the right to dissent.

That said there's protesting the right way, and then there's protesting in a way that deliberately sets out to break laws and harm others including our national interest.

If you organise a group of people to park cars on train tracks or glue themselves to roads in order to get attention to your cause, then that's breaking the law, and gathering on mass for the specific purposes of doing so.

They shouldn't have any more protections than anyone else.

Take this for example:
Furious drivers physically drag activists off a busy highway
http://youtu.be/fUG-mjZV46A

Is this guy in the wrong for removing people from the road.
He might end up in court himself for doing so, yet there may have been people who were on the way to hospital with a pregnant woman or a sick elderly person who needed medical attention, or even an ambulance blocked from getting to others in an emergency.
- Yet when police arrive they will arrest those people themselves, right?

What about when they park on train tracks?
http://www.muswellbrookchronicle.com.au/story/7504066/reinforced-car-used-to-block-coal-trains-near-newcastle-police/
Isn't this against the law?