Well, let's return now to our top story
today and more protests across the
country are happening over the weekend
and it's all around the use of hotels
housing asylum seekers. This comes as
reform UK leader Nigel Farage has
promised mass deportations of illegal
immigrants if he wins the next general
election. Well, let's go to our north of
England correspondent that Shingi Malik
who joins us from Liverpool where one of
the protests is due to take place.
Tensions rising across the country.
Shingi, what's it like in Liverpool?
>> Well, Leah, you just spoke about the
political picture. This is the picture
here on the ground in Liverpool. There
are hundreds of people in the center of
the city, those anti-immigration
protesters, but also counterprotesters
gathering in the city amidst what I can
describe as the police doing their best
to try and get a handle on the
situation. We know Merai police have put
in place a number of enforcement powers,
powers to stop and search people as well
as powers to disperse them. But this is
what you can see. So there's a few
police officers in and amongst the
crowd. You can see that sea of flags.
That is a demonstration by UKIP, the UK
Independence Party, one of the
right-wing groups who are against
immigration, against those people being
placed in asylum hotels. And it's a sea
of noise. And those Great Britain flags
are also in and amongst dotted amongst
those is a group of counterprotesters.
And what is different about this versus
some of the protests we've seen centered
around hotels is that there isn't a
focal point. They are spilling out into
the city center, meaning that we've seen
quite a few skirmishes and tussles
between the different groups. And we've
seen the police having to be quite
mobile and quite active. At one point
the right-wing group tried to head into
the city center one way. They are now
trying to head into the city center the
other way. But then in and amongst them
you have got the left-wing groups as
well who are trying to make their voices
heard. And I think you can see all of
that on our camera. But if I refer back
to the right you can also see the effort
that the police are putting in. So here
you can see those police vehicles, those
vans, those riot vans coming in to help
offer support to the police here.
Merryside police doing their best to
continue to keep a handle on the
situation which is very much spilling
into the city center, taking hold here
in the city center. And like you were
saying there earlier, this has been off
the back of a week in which the rhetoric
feels like it's ramped up. And there's
also been movement in the courts with
that decision, that interim order to
stop uh asylum seekers being placed in
the hotel and Eping. Perhaps these
groups here, these white-wing groups
feel emboldened by that and they've come
out on a march that they say is against
it's a a march for mass deportations and
they are here. But then the left groups
are trying to preempt them. And in the
middle of it are those officers from
Murzy side police trying to keep a
handle on a situation which we have seen
tussles and we have seen some arrests.
And for now they are just about
managing. But what this is is a picture
of some of the tension we're seeing
across the country right now in one of
the busiest biggest cities in the
country.
>> Ashing just clear up for our viewers who
are watching this. So the protesters are
there but the counterprotesters are
mixed in between. So the police are not
are not keeping them separate.
I'd say that they are trying their best
to do that. But what is happening is at
points over the course of the last few
minutes and over the last hour or so is
that the groups have tried to move away
from one another and move away from the
pen that the police had put in place. So
when I got here, there was a kind of
very obvious police marking in the
middle. Now you've got the group sort of
dispersing and trying to approach one
another, trying to in some places we've
seen get in one another's faces. So I
think that's it's a bit of a complex and
increasingly messy situation, if I can
use those words. But the police have put
in place other powers. So they've got
the power to ask people to remove their
face coverings. That's a section 60
alpha alpha. They've also put in place
dispersal orders. I think they'll be
trying to use those powers, but there's
policing in practice and there's
policing in reality. And I think it's
getting a lot more difficult as you can
see behind me that sea of flags. There's
a sea of Union jacks which we we will
always often associate with the right
groups as well as you can see St.
George's flags there. But then amongst
that are also Palestine flags and the
flags of various unions and anti-racism
marches. So they are in close proximity
and that's proving quite difficult for
the police.