Knitting protest at Tesco
raymond.brown@cambridge-news.co.uk
TESCO bosses have been given the needle in a bizarre “knitting” attack on their planned store in Cambridge’s Mill Road.
The demonstration comes as the battle against the supermarket giant hots up just 15 days before the store is due to open.
Legal action against Tesco has been threatened over onstreet deliveries to the Express store and Cambridgeshire police have objected to an alcohol licence application.
Protesters twice stitched the word ‘Arrogant’ on to a barrier surrounding the shop over the weekend.
A group called ‘Get Knitted’ has claimed responsibility for the stitch-up and are following a campaigners’ craze sweeping the USA, where statues have been draped in scarves by ‘knit graffiti’ artists aiming to ‘beautify’ public spaces.
The demonstration in Cambridge was inspired by the children’s story Charlotte’s W eb,in which a spider uses a web to spell out words.
One member of the group, Cambridge co-ordinator for Friends of the Earth, Lulu Agate, 44, who lives off Mill Road, told the News: “I’m not a bomb-throwing revolutionary and I don’t want to damage property. I feel very lucky to live in a country where I can express how I feel.
“It just makes my blood boil that these companies can trample the rest of us.
“I did the stitching on Friday night and the builders took it off the next day. Then other members of the group went back on Sunday and did it again.”
Meanwhile, No Mill Road Tesco campaigners organised a two-hour protest outside the store on Saturday.
The campaigners are threatening to take legal action against Cambridge City Council if it fails to apply for an injunction to prevent the firm making on-street deliveries to the new store.
They claim the move would be in breach of its planning conditions.
Tesco has said it intends to carry out deliveries at the front of the shop.
Rich Rippin, who plans legal action, said: “Tesco have said that they are going to do something which they are specifically banned from doing at this site, and which every expert has said poses a risk to public safety.
“It would make a mockery of the planning process, and the role of councillors and local people in that process, if the council did not take action to stop this happening.”
A Tesco spokeswoman said: “We always said we wanted to be part of a close-knit community. We are looking forward to opening the store on August 26 as planned.”
