Who are Youth Demand? The protest group plotting to 'shut down' London

Transcript

00:00They've been arrested, fined and sent to prison.

00:02The young people protesting with Youth Demand have two big messages for the government

00:07and are willing to risk their futures to be heard.

00:09So what does the group stand for and who are the protesters behind it?

00:13Youth Demand is a resistance campaign run by the same organization as Just Stop Oil.

00:17The group was established in 2024 and it aims to expose the Labour government's

00:22complicity in genocide.

00:23It's calling on Downing Street to end all trade with Israel

00:26and raise £1 trillion from the super-rich to pay damages for the effects of fossil fuel burning.

00:32The group's protests began last summer with early action including spray-painting both

00:36the Labour Party HQ and Ministry of Defence, blocking Waterloo Bridge and plastering a

00:41photo of a Gazan mother and child over Picasso's painting at the National Gallery.

00:46So who are some of the group's key members?

00:4825-year-old Cambridge PhD student Kiara Sarti is the spokesperson for Youth Demand.

00:53They're also a member of Just Stop Oil and have staged multiple stunts with the group,

00:57including spraying King's College Cambridge with orange paint in October 2023.

01:02Leonora Ward, Zosia Lewis and Daniel Formentin are also members.

01:06They were given suspended prison sentences after staging a pro-Palestine protest

01:10outside Keir Starmer's Kentish Town home last year.

01:13And University of Manchester undergrad Oliver Clegg was responsible for one of Youth Demand's

01:18most divisive stunts, defecating in Rishi Sunak's duck pond while he was PM.

01:23Youth Demand has vowed to take its protest action to a whole new level in April,

01:27claiming it will block roads day after day in its plan to shut down London.