Laws have been passed allowing police to clear the City of London square targeted by anti-capitalist protesters without a court order.
Occupy London campaigners targeted Paternoster Square in their 2011 protest against “corporate greed”.
But the square’s owners secured a High Court injunction shutting it to the public and leaving thousands of protesters spending months camped outside St Paul’s Cathedral, next to the square.
Now the City of London Corporation has granted the square, which is home to the London Stock Exchange, the status of “City walkway”.
It means police can close Paternoster Square, and six adjoining lanes and alleys, immediately in the case of “imminent threat” or “force majeure”, the civil law term for unforeseen events.
The move is part of a deal between the City, the square’s freeholders, and Canadian-owned Oxford Properties Group, which owns most of the buildings on the site.
Oxford Properties Group requested extra powers that included “the ability ... to restrict access to the estate in the case of demonstration or terrorist threat”.
The by-laws will be enacted once they are signed off by the town clerk.
Matthew Varnham, Occupy’s legal advisor, said the change could be challenged if it was seen to be incompatible with human rights law. He said: “It’s one step further in encroaching on people’s ancient rights.”
A City of London Corporation spokesman said: “The City Corporation is committed to improving the pedestrian environment and public access to key locations in the Square Mile.”
He added: “The City will always facilitate lawful protest.”
A spokeswoman for Oxford Properties Group, on behalf of Paternoster Square Management, said: “There will be no impact to the public access to or experience of Paternoster Square.”
