Dartford Bridge protest: 125,000 sign anti-deportation petition

Holly Cullen-Davies said she found the idea of Decker and the other protester on the bridge in hammocks "difficult... with people apparently shooting fireworks at them"

The partner of a climate activist jailed for climbing the Dartford Crossing bridge has started a petition to try to prevent him being deported.

German national Marcus Decker was jailed for two years and seven months for the Just Stop Oil action last October.

Holly Cullen-Davies said she only found out about the bridge protest on TV.

The Home Office said foreign nationals who commit crimes "face the full force of the law, including deportation".

Ms Cullen Davies, 39, who lives in Haringey in north London, has spoken about her partner's actions and said she hoped to prevent his possible deportation back to Germany.

She has started an online petition calling for Decker, who was described in court as having no fixed address, to remain in the UK.

It has been signed by more than 125,000 people.

Decker, 34, spoke to Ms Cullen-Davies from the top of the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge where he was suspended for 37 hours on cables.

He climbed up with Morgan Trowland, 40, and the pair unfurled a Just Stop Oil-branded banner and "rigged up hammocks" during their protest which caused major traffic delays after Essex Police decided to close the road below.

The bridge, which takes traffic southbound over the River Thames on the A282 connecting the M25 motorway between Essex and Kent, was reopened about 41 hours after the demonstration began at about 04:00 BST on 17 October.

While the pair failed in their appeal against the length of their sentences for what they called a peaceful protest, there was also criticism of the disruption to the public and emergency services, and there were reports of people shooting fireworks at the two protesters from the Kent side of the river.

Essex Police said the people affected by the disruption included a heavily pregnant woman who needed urgent medical help, and a person who missed their best friend's funeral, and a business which lost more than £160,000 in earnings.

Talking about how she learnt of the protest, Ms Cullen-Davies said: "We agreed that I would let him [Decker] do something that might give him a few months in prison and we'd make that work.

"The first time I found out was when I watched the news."

She also revealed her worries for Decker and fellow protestor Trowland as they bedded down at the top of the bridge.

"I found it difficult at night imagining him hanging in a hammock that high in the wind with the dark and with people apparently shooting fireworks at them," she said

Marcus Decker (left) and Morgan Trowland were told they would spend half of their sentences in prison

She told BBC Essex that Decker was making the most of his time in prison and was trying to help others by setting up a choir, teaching fellow inmates how to play chess, and tending to the prison's garden.

While not commenting specifically on Decker, the Home Office said it only returned people to their own country if they had no legal right to remain in the UK, including foreign national offenders and only where they were being returned to a safe country.

A spokesperson for the Home Office said: "Foreign nationals who commit crimes here in the UK will face the full force of the law, including deportation, at the earliest opportunity for those eligible."