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Thatcher's Poll Tax

The Poll Tax had been a festering sore for what felt like an age and after a few earlier demos that had been crushed by police action the one in Trafalgar Square had really kicked off. The air was crackling with energy. Random truncheonings, police vans driven into the crowd and mass charges by riot police had only redoubled people's determination to force democracy down Thatcher's throat.

This was one of the best days I have ever spent taking pictures. I had been flattened a couple of times by angry brutal police but nonetheless I was still going well by mid-afternoon when Grand Buildings was torched by the anarchists. 

By the time I left I'd had the hair on one side of my head burnt off by an exploding motorbike, my knee mashed by a scaffold clamp hurled from the top of the burning offices and had been tumbled a dozen times by cops, horses, rioters and vans. I’d never been happier.


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30 YEARS ON. ANTI POLL TAX RIOT IN TRAFALGAR SQUARE, LONDON MARCH 31, 1990.
30 YEARS ON. ANTI POLL TAX RIOT IN TRAFALGAR SQUARE, LONDON MARCH 31, 1990.
Poll Tax protests Hackney, London 1990
Poll Tax protests Hackney, London 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax protests London 1990
Poll Tax protests London 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London 31 March '90
Poll Tax riots, London 31 March '90
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax protests Hackney, London 1990
Poll Tax protests Hackney, London 1990
YQ78-27 Poll Tax protests, Hackney, May/June 1990.
YQ78-27 Poll Tax protests, Hackney, May/June 1990.
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
YQ78-10 Poll Tax protests, Hackney, May/June 1990.
YQ78-10 Poll Tax protests, Hackney, May/June 1990.
YQ78-8 Poll Tax protests, Hackney, May/June 1990.
YQ78-8 Poll Tax protests, Hackney, May/June 1990.
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
Poll Tax riots, London March 1990
The day that finished Thatcherism. Poll Tax riot in Trafalgar Square, London '90. A series of small riots and protests swept ...
The day that finished Thatcherism. Poll Tax riot in Trafalgar Square, London '90. A series of small riots and protests swept the country culminating in a mass march on Downing Street. Pushed up to Trafalgar Square and repeatedly attacked by police on horseback & in vehicles the protesters dispersed through the West End shopping areas starting fires and causing tens of millions of pounds damage.
Anti Poll Tax riot in Trafalgar Square, London  1990.
Anti Poll Tax riot in Trafalgar Square, London 1990.
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