Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Brendan Clarke-Smith Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 28th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Recent days have indeed underlined the importance of peaceful protest and freedom of expression. Only this weekend I helped to organise, alongside my hon. Friend the Member for Arfon (Hywel Williams), a rally for solidarity in Caernarfon for the people of Ukraine against the illegal invasion of their country. We joined, of course, a wave of demonstrations that have been sweeping across Europe. Meanwhile, the whole world is witnessing the bravery of protestors in Russia, who are defying Putin’s authoritarian regime to take to the streets against the illegal invasion of Ukraine. Thousands of Russians have been arrested, some simply for holding up anti-war signs—a clear violation of people’s right to peacefully protest. Yet what do we find ourselves discussing here?

While the UK Government are quick to denounce the authoritarianism of Putin’s Russia, they are set on implementing part 3 of the Bill, which is a direct threat to people’s right to protest in Wales—a right that is integral to the history of Wales as a nation. From protests against the enclosure of land in Gwynedd in the 1810s, the Chartist uprising in Newport in the 1830s, the Rebecca riots by tenant farmers against the payment of tolls in the 1840s, language rights—the very essence of noise—protests in the 1960s, and the miners’ strikes in the 1980s, to recent protests on racial injustice and the cost-of-living crisis, it is clear that the act of protest is woven through the past and present of Wales.

I welcome the changes to part 3 in the other place to remove the limits on our protest rights, such as Lords amendment 30, which removes new restrictions from public assemblies, but the Government have made it clear that they have no intention whatsoever of listening to the overwhelming cross-party opposition on these issues. Not content with clamping down on our right to protest, the UK Government have launched a new attack on Welsh Gypsies, Romas and Travellers through part 4 of the Bill. Despite already being marginalised by society, it will criminalise their way of life and allow for the confiscation of their homes. Importantly, it will directly undermine existing devolved Welsh legislation.

The criminalisation of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller adults will have a knock-on effect for their children, who are at greater risk of being taken into care, directly undermining the Rights of Children and Young Persons (Wales) Measure 2011, which places a duty on Welsh Ministers to have due regard for the rights of children as set out under the United Nations convention on the rights of the child. Criminalisation contravenes part 3 of the Housing (Wales) Act 2014, which places a legal obligation on local authorities in Wales to both assess and provide for residential and transit provision for Gypsies and Travellers. Our Senedd rightly refused to grant consent for the changes to part 4. It would therefore be wrong to apply it in Wales. That is just one example of the creeping effect of this place on devolved legislation. We must stand firm against it; otherwise, our Senedd in Wales will be being ignored.

[Brendan Clarke-Smith (Bassetlaw) (Con)]

I will always defend the right to protest. Members could say that it is part of the glue that binds us together, which I will come on to a little later. Recently, Unite the union decided to picket a jobs fair that I organised in Worksop, which I thought was quite a bizarre thing to protest against. It was well attended by people from outside the constituency.

We had people from Broxtowe Labour and Socialist Worker, and people bussed in from Nottingham and Chesterfield, but nevertheless I defend their right to do that, not least because it helps to support my pledge to increase footfall in Worksop town centre. While it was unpleasant for some of the more vulnerable job seekers, it did not put people off. Hundreds attended and many secured jobs there and then.

What I will certainly not defend is mindless hooliganism, breaching the rights of others, putting livelihoods at risk and indeed putting lives at risk. Some of the worst episodes I have witnessed involved so-called protesters gluing themselves to trains and buses. Aside from the mindless damage caused by those protesters—be they from groups such as Extinction Rebellion or others—we witnessed first-hand these people preventing ambulances getting to hospitals, which happened right here on Westminster Bridge. We also saw them blocking motorways such as the M25 and preventing people from getting to work. And this coming at a time when people were desperate to protect their livelihoods in the face of the huge challenges of the covid-19 pandemic. Our children have been prevented from getting to school at a time when their education has already been affected by disruption on numerous occasions. I asked those people, “How are you helping to protect the environment when you are stopping people from using public transport?”

I have sadly succumbed to the parliamentary stone since entering this place. I have been told many times that I look nothing like my official photograph on the website or my roller banner and a little more worse for wear. Yet as bad as it is getting, I still do not quite feel the need to glue my face to the floor as an Insulate Britain protester decided would be a good idea, although I gather that was to disrupt traffic rather than for aesthetic reasons.

It is not just about roads. We have also seen disruption around schools and vaccination centres, but it would be a mistake to limit legislation to those areas. We must make sure we protect our critical national infrastructure and we need to make sure that happens all over the country and in constituencies like mine. Whether it is dealing with harmful acts by legislating to stop them being reprobates in Retford, hoodlums in Harworth or—I am going to stop with the alliteration before I get back to Worksop—the Bill will make action that is tough but fair a reality. That is why we should not accept amendments that water down this excellent Bill.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)]

I want to refer to two parts of the Bill: on protests and on Travelling communities.

I was one of the organisers of the huge 2003 demonstration against the war in Iraq. It was obvious that whatever restrictions the police or the Government wanted to put on that demonstration, they could not because the numbers—1 million in Hyde Park and hundreds of thousands more in the streets—were so huge. That demonstration was historic for its size and effect. What we have before us now is far too much discretion being given to the police to decide whether a demonstration should go ahead or not, or whether it is appropriately noisy or not. I do not think that many police even want that discretion. The Minister was very vague on when there would be any review of the legislation, should it go through tonight. He conceded that it should be reviewed, but did not say when that would happen.

If a demonstration is to mean anything, it must be effective, it must be loud and it must cause some degree of disruption. What I see coming ahead is the police trying to arrest samba bands and taking away PA equipment and so on. That will send a message all around the world that this country is closing down on demonstrations at the very time we are saying we support demonstrations in other parts of the world. Every single one of the rights we have was won by people being brave enough to protest. The Chartists and many others put themselves at enormous risk to get a message across and bring about a change in society. Protest is an essential part of a decent, free and democratic society. We should not be voting for restrictions and we should not be giving the police the powers to prevent protests in our society. That is a very bad move.

The other side of the Bill that I will refer to in the little time that I have left is the attitude towards Travelling communities. They are abused and discriminated against all over this continent of Europe, and they are treated abominably. They get a very bad press and are treated like pariahs by much of the media, yet we claim to support the European convention on human rights and, through our Human Rights Act 1998, we claim to support the right to lead that nomadic life, the right to be Travellers and the right to access appropriate sites.

What we are doing is bowing down before some unpleasant anti-Gypsy, Roma and Traveller community pressures to restrict that right. We should not be doing it, because if we restrict that right and go against Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, we go after many, many other communities as well. In my view, it is discrimination, pure and simple, against an historic tradition of the right to roam in our society.