Reject rioting revisionism

On Friday 3rd July 1981 an unmarked police car chased down a young black man on a motorbike, under suspicion of either committing traffic offences or stealing the motorbike. The chase continued until the man lost his balance and fell off his bike on the corner of Granby Street and Selborne Street, a popular area for people to pass the time. 

Importantly, there was an audience for what was to happen next. The police officers tried to arrest the individual but were quickly surrounded by locals. Soon, stones were being thrown, and then bricks. The motorcyclist fled the scene, but local man Leroy Cooper was arrested for assaulting officers.

That the incident escalated this far gives a sense of animosity between police and the largely black locals of Toxteth, many of whom had undoubtedly suffered from years of racially-motivated police victimisation. But this minor skirmish was nothing compared to what came next.

The 1981 Toxteth Riots began with groups of youths — around 40 — throwing stones at any police vehicles they could see. Then, obviously, the police responded by significantly increasing their presence in the area. At the same time, word was spreading about Cooper’s arrest, inflaming tensions.

What followed is widely documented: full-scale rioting, involving pitched battles between police and youths, with petrol bombs, bricks, and stones being used as weapons. The violence lasted a weekend, only subsiding after the police used CS gas grenades on the crowds, its first — and last — use on the British mainland. Another, smaller series of rioting took place later in July, with police targeted and cars set alight.

This was met with actions by politicians: Michael Heseltine wrote a report — It Took A Riot — which noted that relations “between black and white in the area seem tolerable. But there is undoubtedly a serious breakdown of confidence between a great part of the population in the area and the police”. The limited change prompted by Heseltine in Liverpool — the regeneration of the Albert Docks and the International Garden Festival — was enough to earn him the Freedom of the City and to become the only respectable face of the Conservative Party among locals. However, the policies enacted during Heseltine’s stint as Minister for Merseyside did little to address the economic plight of working-class people, white or black, across the city. 

There was, however, no sense of articulated demands from the rioters about what a new Liverpool should look like. As Heseltine himself noted: “We must get the strengths of the community pulling in the same direction… This will not happen on its own or without leadership”.

But why care about the nature of the violence in a riot from over 30 years ago? Why is it important? 

Because, courtesy of the BBC, the city’s unimpressive politicians, and a broader ecosystem of left-wing cultural elites, these events are being relabelled as the Toxteth “Uprisings”. This represents an insidious attempt to change the language of how we talk about these events — and therefore how we understand the violence which took place there. 

The difference is clear: riot suggests mindless violence, whereas uprising gives a sense of legitimacy to violence. Indeed, Leroy Cooper, whose arrest sparked the riots, says: “it was an anti-police reaction, not a race riot as some tried to twist it. The people were not fighting each other, black and white youth joined forces to battle them.”

Was the burning of businesses on nearby Lodge Lane a response to police behaviour, or just mindless violence against the property of neighbours?

This is, obviously, not the full story. It is undeniable the black population of Toxteth were treated terribly by the police — as indeed many white populations were, including football fans and gay people — and it is undeniable that the police’s behaviour could be motivated by racism. It is also undeniable that economic opportunities were not evenly spread across the city, but this was an issue that affected white and black too. 

And yet, are we really supposed to see the violence in Toxteth as justified, which using the language of “uprising” requires us to do? If it truly were just an anti-police reaction, as Cooper claims, then why was £11 million of damage caused, including a significant amount of torched cars and shops? Was the burning of businesses on nearby Lodge Lane a response to police behaviour, or just mindless violence against the property of neighbours? Where were the political demands from the rioters? To describe the riots as an “uprising” is to bogusly imply that legitimate grievances were being acted on legitimately rather than being drowned in misdirected anger and violent opportunism.

The reframing of the Toxteth Riots as a political uprising is risible. It is yet another example of a progressive elite — aided and abetted by the BBC — attempting to subtly change the language used to shape how we see these events in the future and to justify the use of violence and destruction instead of the democratic political process. It is incumbent on us all to push back against this doublespeak.