The Wild Horses of Newbury

The statement in the heading of Chapter 10, “Civil disobedience on grounds of conscience is an honourable tradition in this country and those who take part in it may in the end be vindicated by history." was made by Lord Justice Hoffman in the Twyford Down case. The Twyford Down Road Protest was one of a series of relatively large-scale protests that arose out of the Thatcher government’s environmentally damaging public-private partnership programme, which encouraged public authorities to join with private companies in long-term contracts involving financing, building, and running infrastructure projects.

The A34 Newbury Bypass was Britain's most controversial road-building project and saw Britain's biggest ever anti-road protest, The Third Battle of Newbury, fought on the site of two Civil War battlefields (as well as various Sites of Special Scientific Interest). The Third Battle of Newbury’s Newbury Bypass Factfile is probably the most comprehensive archive of this, one of the most important events in modern British history, and much recommended for students, researchers, and others interested in the Newbury campaigns.

One of the many magical incidents that took place during the protest was recorded in the following Moksha Productions video