On 6 March, a 5,000-strong demonstration in Bristol escalated into clashes, leading to mounted police charging the crowd and arresting 26 demonstrators, with injuries being sustained by both sides. The following day, police baton charged demonstrators in Hackney, escalating the demonstration into a riot, during which 50 high street shop windows were smashed and 56 rioters were arrested. Demonstrations were routinely called in places where councils discussed the poll tax, some resolving peacefully and others escalating into riots, with numerous cases of protestors storming council chambers and forcing meetings to be called off - although none prevented the tax from being implemented. Both Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and opposition leader Neil Kinnock responded by blaming the demonstrations on outside agitators, respectively calling them "rent a mob extremists" and "Toy Town revolutionaries". As coaches bound for London were booked all around the country, it soon became clear that the planned demonstration was going to be larger than the 20,000 expected by Militant, who were more focused on the non-payment campaign than political demonstrations. When campaigners met with Metropolitan Police and gave them an expected number of 30,000, the chief police officer responded with laughter, as their own intelligence indicated far fewer numbers. In acknowledgement of the square's capacity, the organisers asked to divert the march to Hyde Park but were denied. Protest in Trafalgar Square On 31 March 1990, people began gathering in Kennington Park from noon. Between 180,000 and 250,000 arrived. The police report, a year after the riot, estimated the crowd at 200,000. An abandoned rally by the Labour Party may have contributed to the number of protesters. The march began at Kennington Park at 1:30pm, moving faster than planned because some of the crowd had forced open the gates of the park, presumably in order to avoid being forced through smaller gates. This split the march over both sides of the road, and protesters continued in much the same way for the rest of the route. By 2:30pm, Trafalgar Square was nearing its capacity. Unable to continue moving easily into Trafalgar Square, at about 3pm the march stopped in Whitehall. The police, worried about a surge towards the new security gates of Downing Street, blocked the top and bottom of Whitehall, and lined the pavement refusing to let people leave the road. Additional police units were dispatched to reinforce the officers manning the barrier blocking the Downing Street