Packham ‘selectively’ backs Just Stop Oil

CHRIS PACKHAM only “selectively” supports Just Stop Oil (JSO), a court has heard.

The BBC Springwatch presenter appeared at Isleworth Crown Court yesterday to testify at the trial of a protester who climbed a gantry on the M25 motorway in 2022.

Cressie Gethin, a 22-year-old music student at Cambridge University, caused hours of traffic chaos during a 40C heatwave on July 20, when police closed a section of the motorway near Heathrow airport after she tied herself to the gantry in a protest for JSO.

Mr Packham, 62, was among the hundreds of road users stuck in his car for more than four hours that afternoon, and ended up late to film for the BBC programme Inside Our Autistic Minds.

Under cross-examination by Neil

Griffin, the prosecutor, he insisted his support for JSO was selective and conditional.

The prosecutor asked: “You are not an independent witness, you support Just Stop Oil.” Mr Packham responded: “I support some of their actions, selectively.”

Asked if JSO “loved” having his support as a public figure, Mr Packham said: “I selectively support things that they do. What they make of my support is up to them. I probably don’t support them in the way that they want.”

Explaining that he understood why Ms Gethin and two other protesters who caused disruption on the M25 that day had done so, he said: “I reflected on the fact that I was sweating quite profusely.

“It was the day after the UK had recorded its highest-ever temperature and two days previously the Government’s net zero plan had been declared illegal. Rather than sit and fret and sweat, I thought I would run through a process that would make the experience positive.”

Ms Gethin is being charged with causing public nuisance for the protest in 2022. She denies the charge.