Deployment of police spy Mark Kennedy criticised by former undercover officer The BBC is broadcasting a programme tonight on police spy Mark Kennedy and the environmental campaigners who attempted to shut down a major power station. We have not seen the programme in advance but there is a taster on the BBC website here . The programme-makers appear to have got access to police footage of the raid in which more than 100 activists were pre-emptively arrested hours before the planned break-in at the Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station in Nottinghamshire. As we now know, police were acting on a tip-off from Kennedy who infiltrated the environmental movement for seven years. The BBC says the footage includes the moment Kennedy himself was arrested in the raid by fellow police officers. The concealment of surveillance tapes recorded by Kennedy later led to the quashing of the convictions of the campaigners by three court of appeal judges. Nottingham police are due to appear on the film justifying their actions. Kennedy's deployment is criticised on the programme by Peter Bleksley, a former undercover police officer who infiltrated drug gangs, who says : "Undercover police officers should be highly trained, rare resources, and in my opinion, they should only be used against the most serious of criminality, not against climate campaigners who even a judge described as being decent people ". The BBC says the programme will air as an Inside Out Special in the East Midlands region at 7.30 on BBC1. Mark Kennedy Surveillance Crime Activism Rob Evans guardian.co.uk © 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds