Exeter Just Stop Oil activist spared jail after Treasury paint protest

A climate activist from Exeter, who made headlines for disrupting the World Snooker Championship, has been spared jail following his sentencing for a separate protest targeting the UK Treasury.

Edred Whittingham, 27, is one of four Just Stop Oil supporters who sprayed red paint across the HM Treasury building in Whitehall in 2022, claiming the government had “blood on its hands” for continuing to approve new oil and gas projects during a cost-of-living crisis.

Whittingham, along with fellow protester Selma Heimedinger, received an 18-month suspended sentence at Southwark Crown Court on Friday 4 April. Two others, Alexia Hall and Piers Clifford, received 15-month suspended sentences. All four had been charged with causing criminal damage exceeding £5,000. Prosecutors said the paint damage cost more than £107,000 to repair.

The court heard that the protest involved spraying water-based red paint on the government building in June 2022, just weeks after the UK approved Shell’s controversial Jackdaw gas field - a decision that has since been ruled unlawful by a Scottish court.

Whittingham told the court: “I acted to prevent harm and save lives - to protect my family and my community, especially the most vulnerable. I refuse to be a bystander to the mass death that is inevitable on our current path.”

The former University of Exeter student made national headlines again in 2023 when he stormed the snooker table at the World Championship in Sheffield, releasing orange powder during a match while wearing a Just Stop Oil T-shirt.

He was also arrested later that year after a similar protest at his own graduation ceremony, which led to a ban from the university campus.

Despite the convictions, Whittingham and Just Stop Oil have pledged to continue their campaign against fossil fuel expansion. A spokesperson for the group said they “stand with those being prosecuted for peaceful resistance to fossil fuel expansion in the face of rapidly accelerating climate collapse.”