Protest at King’s Cross station is so crafty

KING’S Cross station was the scene of a new breed of arts and craft-themed protest, called a stitch-in, on Sunday.

Staff and commuters at the station looked on as the “craftivists” set up camp on Sunday as part of a nationwide campaign against government plans to raise fares by 31 per cent over the next four years.

The group, known as the Craftivist Collective, spent the day handing out jam sandwiches and cup cakes and creating fabric trains, which they plan to stitch together and wrap round transport secretary Philip Hammond’s house.

Sarah Corbett, 27, founder of the Craftivist Collective, said: “We are trying to protest in a nice, but thought-provoking way. We have people joining us would that never call themselves activists and that would be too scared to join a demonstration.

“If trains keep getting more and more expensive, commuters and people with less money will stop using them, and that is bad for the environment.

“We were inside the station for about an hour, then we were asked us to leave – we got a round of applause.” from the people watching.

“We spent the day making fabric trains with facts about the transport policy on. When they’re finished, we will go to Philip Hammond’s house, have a picnic outside and wrap the bunting round his house as a fun way of showing how passionate we are about social justice and climate issues.

If its cheaper to get a short haul flight than get a train, then it makes the government’s claim to be green sound a bit hypocritical.

“The day went really well for us, lots of people cam and joined us and appreciated what we were doing, because they know how expensive the trains are.

“Then we sat outside for about four hours, it was a really nice day in the sun.”