When I was a reporter, I had many occasions to interact with Legislative Council staff. Its security personnel were and still are the most courteous and helpful people around. Indeed, they are more like caretakers than security officers. Journalists have always had a good rapport with them. They have a ready smile and greet the more familiar among us by name. We joke and chit-chat while waiting for important people to show up and give sound bites. That is also why they are ill-equipped to handle people like Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang of the separatist group Youngspiration and their thuggish friends. As a result, six security guards were injured in the mayhem on Wednesday. At least two of the guards are long-serving and I recognise them. Anticipating trouble, the Legco president moved the meeting from the main chamber to a conference room. Yau and Leung promised in front of cameras not to gatecrash the meeting, then promptly tried to force their way in with the help of hooligans the pair identified as their Legco assistants. They pushed and shouted obscenities at the female security staff. The six guards were injured in the confrontation. Courting controversy in Hong Kong over the Legislative Council oath-taking controversy Given the level of violence they faced, those who were injured should seek compensation. Also there will be no end to such disturbances unless Legco steps up security and brings in the police to deal with those localist thugs. What has happened is the logical outcome of the antics of radicals like “Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung and Raymond Wong Yuk-man with the screaming and throwing of objects in the Legco chamber. Baggio Leung and Yau are taking such disturbances and chaos to the next level. All the while, pan-democratic politicians like those from the Civic Party have been encouraging them to do their worst. Well, their actions reached a new low on Wednesday. Now, some pan-dems are trying to distance themselves from the pair, saying the incident and injuries were “regrettable”, but they have yet to criticise them. If those thugs are really assistants of the two, it means we taxpayers have been paying them. We have seen their faces on television. Police should arrest those responsible for causing public disorder. It’s not separatism we have to worry about; that will always be a non-starter. Rather, it’s localist-inspired hooliganism in the heart of our legislature.