Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Clive Lewis Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading - Day 2
Tuesday 16th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab) [V]]

How often have we heard the notion that somehow liberty is an integral part of the English character, and that we fortunate few in this country are somehow different from the rest of humanity? Not for us authoritarianism, autocracy or, God forbid, the dark slide into fascism. No, no, no—that is for other people and other countries, not us. Yet here we stand, yet again with yet another Bill from this Government stripping the people of this country of yet more liberty and more of their democratic rights.

English exceptionalism is a dangerous fallacy, none more so than when it comes to the constant vigilance required of any democracy. It is hubris of the first order—one I fear has infected those on the Government Benches. The potential for the slide into authoritarianism and worse is, as history has clearly demonstrated, part of the human condition. That is the painful and bloody lesson from the 20th century. Yet here we are, with this Bill before us. It is the tip of an authoritarian iceberg—one that is on a collision course with public defiance.

Democracy is being swept away in a calculated programme to leave the public muted and powerless. We have the demonisation of the Gypsy, Traveller and Roma community, a planned voter suppression Bill to strip the right to vote from black and other disadvantaged communities, and the limiting of judicial review to stop the public challenging the Government’s decisions in court and shifting yet more power to the Executive. We have the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill, which creates a two-tier, “them and us” system of human rights. Now, having passed that, the Government are coming for our rights with a review of UK human rights legislation.

Those on the Government Benches are fast moving from becoming a Government to becoming a regime. They want to stifle dissent, so that they are not accountable to the public. Our country—our economy, our politics and our media—is controlled by a small clique of individuals. Over the past 40 years, they have taken more power for themselves at the expense of our democracy. Now they are not even happy with us clinging on to the scraps we currently have.

I have directed this speech at Government Members, but to those on my own Front Bench who have finally been brought to the right position of opposition, I say this: it should not have taken the police assault on people gathered peacefully in memory of Sarah Everard to see the assault on democracy that this Bill is. It is writ large, so let this be a wake-up call. We have never seen anything like this Government before.

If the Bill goes through, anyone who values their democratic rights must get organised and fight back. I will stand with protesters, irrelevant of the laws passed by this place. I say to anyone in this place and outside who values democracy that we must create a democracy that is fit for purpose for the challenges we face—climate and ecological breakdown, the epidemic of inequality—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. We are moving on.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Clive Lewis Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 28th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

When people complain to me about the noise at Prime Minister’s questions, I always tell them that they can tune into any of the two-hour hearings of the Select Committees that I sit on and listen to some calm forensic questioning, but they do not, because shouting—the impassioned barrage of noise—is a fundamental of PMQs and of democracy. Democracy is noisy. Democracy is irritating, but that is democracy.

It will come as no surprise to hon. Members that I have attended a good number of protests and never once—never once—have I attended a protest without the intention to disrupt or to make a noise. Quite frankly, what would be the point? When our constituents feel that they cannot be heard through other means, they stand outside and they shout. Even if they are fox hunting supporters or Brexiteers, I smile when I walk past them as they are performing that basic level of democracy—from the agora to Parliament Square. The idea that we would criminalise those people is frankly disgusting.

[Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making some excellent points. Does he see the irony that as we watch Putin’s tanks roll into Ukraine and protesters having their peaceful protests broken up by the police, we in this place are debating a Bill that would take away the right to protest?

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

I do. The expansion of police powers is highly disproportionate. In the words of a former police chief and senior officers who have written to the Government, it will place an “onerous burden” on and apply “greater political pressure” to frontline police. Ultimately, it will be up to the police to determine whether the low threshold has been met.

Ruth Walshe, a volunteer from Green and Black Cross, detailed her experiences of the police during the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020. She heard the police say to her:

“‘who does that b**** think she is’, ‘can’t we lock them and put them in a cell’, ‘what do those f****** want’”.

Reports of that type of behaviour are corroborated by the Charing Cross report, which found that officers present at those protests had made horrific homophobic, sexist and racist remarks. There are very many good police officers, but collectively, there is a problem in the police. Rather than trying to deal with those systemic problems, the Government are saying, “Make racist, sexist or homophobic abuses and you get more powers to control woman, people of colour and queer people.” It is outrageous.

I also rise to speak in support of Lords amendment 87, which would remove clause 61, which should really be called the “Get Steve Bray” clause. I have found Steve bloody irritating at times, but creating an unprecedented and disproportionate law to go after a man who interrupts the Minister’s Sky News interviews is quite frankly pathetic. Some hon. Members may remember Brian Haw, the peace campaigner who lived opposite. It was wrong then for the Labour Government to try to get rid of him from Parliament Square and it was right that Conservative Members stood up for him to stop the law being changed. They should be doing it now.

I will end with this observation. The Government did not like the Black Lives Matter protests when tens of thousands of young people went on to the streets for racial equality, they were embarrassed by the anti-Trump demonstrations during his state visit and they despised the 1 million people who marched to try to stop Brexit, so we are here with a Bill that tries to make the snowflakes opposite feel better. That, frankly, is what they are: the Secretary of State is a snowflake, and the Minister’s Back Benchers are snowflakes. They cannot cope with a bit of robust debate. They cry into their port in the evening when people say things they do not like or they are too noisy. Rather than debate them back or viscerally argue back, what they do is shut them down and make them illegal. It is nasty, it is wrong and it should go.