Two Arrested As Army Of Cops Evicts Rough Sleepers From Flinders St

By

James Hennessy

Published

Dozens of cops have descended on a homeless encampment on Flinders Street in Melbourne with the intention of breaking it up, facing opposition from protesters. Two people have been arrested after the special operations police arrived at around 1pm.

At approximately 1:50pm, according to The Age, a man on a mobility scooter and a woman were arrested as protesters yelled “let them go’ and “fuck the police”.
The visual of the cops moving in on the camp is pretty shocking:

The pretence for moving the rough sleepers on is a $100 million project to restore Flinders Street Station and the area around it. Melbourne Lord Mayor Robert Doyle made a number of inflammatory (and ultimately unsubstantiated) comments over the past few weeks suggesting the people were “pretending” to be homeless in order to “shake down” money from tourists.
Warnings were issued that homeless were going to be moved on by police, and many of the rough sleepers had voluntarily vacated the area – often due to harassment and the constant presence of media.

The people from the encampment has been offered temporary accommodation at the Coburg Motor Inn, which The Age said “does not enjoy a good reputation“. Housing Minister Martin Foley said Tuesday that 15 people from the camp had been “successfully housed” while four others had been placed in drug and alcohol residential rehabilitation facilities.
Foley had said the people needed to accept a “path out of homelessness” or be evicted.
Video was captured by the ABC of police using force on protesters as they were moved on:

Source: ABC.
Photo: Twitter.

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