RANK-AND-FILE police are calling on the government to place a blanket ban on protests during the pandemic after two weekends of mass demonstrations. 

The Police Federation of England & Wales asked Home Secretary Priti Patel today to take action after dozens of officers were injured by football hooligans and far-right activists on Saturday. 

A number were also injured in anti-racist protests prompted by the police killing of George Floyd in the US the previous weekend. 

Federation chairman John Apter said: “In normal times the principle of having the right to peaceful protests is an important one.

“However, we are not in normal times, we are tackling a deadly virus which is indiscriminate in who it can affect.”

But the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said that ministers do not have the powers to “initiate a ban on marches themselves, it’s an operational matter for police.”

On Saturday, thousands of football hooligans, among them far-right groups descended on the capital to “protect statues” from anti-racist protesters; others assembled in Glasgow on Sunday.

Groups were seen making nazi salutes, hurling bottles at police and attempting to kick and punch officers. 

Some sought to attack a small Black Lives Matter protest. A photo of a black man carrying a counterprotester in Trafalgar Square to safety has since made global headlines. 

Grandad Patrick Hutchinson, a personal trainer, decided to attend the protest with four friends to protect young Black Lives Matter protesters from getting caught up in the violence. 

The group spotted a lone white man being dragged by young black protesters through a crowd. 

“His life was under threat so I just went and scooped him up, put him over my shoulder, and started marching towards the police with him,” Mr Hutchinson told Channel 4 News.

The cenotaph at Westminster and statues of Winston Churchill and Nelson Mandela were bordered up during the protest after graffiti was scrawled on them by anti-racist protesters the previous week. 

In the Lords today, Equality Minister Baroness Williams claimed that the “boxed-up” Churchill was a “sorry sight to see,” adding that “the sooner Churchill is freed and commemorated once again as one of the greatest people who ever lived the better.” 

Her comments were made despite recent criticism of the former Tory PM that includes his role in establishing concentration camps in Kenya and the Bengal famine, during which at least three million people are believed to have died.