Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill (Ninth sitting)

Lee Anderson Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 8th June 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Bambos Charalambous]

I am not aware of the situation that the right hon. Gentleman is talking about or the circumstances that brought it about. Clearly, people need to be respectful of the people around them when they protest, and they must do so in a lawful way.

Taken together, clauses 54 to 56 and clause 60 make amendments to the 1986 Act that will significantly expand the types of protest on which the police could impose conditions.

[Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)]

Can the hon. Gentleman cast his mind back about 12 or 13 months to the Black Lives Matter demonstrations on Whitehall, when several of his colleagues—Labour MPs—were out there with the rioters? Is that an acceptable level of protest?

--- Later in debate ---

[Bambos Charalambous]

Again, my hon. Friend makes an excellent point. This measure puts more power in the hands of the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary may have different views in the future and use the powers in an authoritarian way, which may have a further impact on people’s rights.

[Lee Anderson]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the best way to protest is through the ballot box?

[Bambos Charalambous]

That is one way to protest, but elections only come every three or four years. In the intervening period, people have no way to exercise their right to protest via the ballot box and so have other means. The ballot box is also a vote on a whole range of things, while a protest might be for an individual issue not covered by an election.

A few weeks ago, we debated a petition signed by more than 250,000 people. The right to protest is a fundamental freedom and a hard-won democratic tradition that we are deeply proud of. Throughout our history, protests have led to significant changes for the better in this country. Suffragette protests put an end to the discrimination against women in our democracy. Historic trade union protests led to outlawing exploitative employment practices in factories, lifting health and safety standards for workers. Such protests have forced Governments to make the significant changes that we now recognise as fundamental parts of a civilised society.

If the public order provisions in the Bill had been in place when the suffragettes marched for the right to vote, would the women who shouted and screamed noisily for their future have been arrested? Does the Minister think that the marchers for the right to work or those on the anti-apartheid protests should have been stopped for causing annoyance or being too noisy? Do the Government want to stop the children who are shouting loudly for action on climate change or to prevent people across the country from marching to remind people in the establishment that black lives matter?

I support the police 100%; we in the Opposition listen every day to what they tell us. This is a most serious issue, but it is not quite as cut and dried as the Government would have us believe. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services reported on public order measures in its inspection report, “Getting the balance right?” On public order legislation, the inspectorate called for

“a modest reset of the scales”.

By any measure, this is not a modest reset.

The support for new powers on public order was qualified support for the five Government proposals the inspectorate was asked to respond to. What Matt Parr’s report actually said was that the vast majority of police forces were happy with the existing legislation. It was mainly the Met that wanted new powers to deal with very specific events—mainly large-scale, peaceful, Extinction Rebellion protests. What the police have asked for, they have not been given.

In the evidence session, Matt Parr said:

“We were very clear in what we said that any reset should be modest. We also said that, because of article 10 and article 11 rights, some degree of disruption is not just an inevitable by-product, it is sometimes the whole point of the exercise of protest, and on that basis, it has to be encouraged.”

He went on to say that the proposal—these clauses—

“clearly aims to set a lower bar. Personally, when I reviewed it, I did not think the bar was necessarily the problem. There is just as much of a problem with educating and training the police officers and making sure they understand how article 10 and 11 rights can be properly tempered. It was a question of training and understanding as much as it was of where the bar was for disruption.”––[Official Report, Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Public Bill Committee, 18 May 2021; c. 52-53, Q77.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Bambos Charalambous]

I do not know whether that would be captured by the legislation, but if it would be captured, that would be wrong. I mentioned the Let Music Live protest. Even if such a protest were deemed permissible, it would still cause many problems of interpretation for the police, who would have to use the Bill to define whether the protest had “significant” or “relevant impact.”

Aside from music, what about singing? Singing songs and chanting have been a feature of every protest or demonstration that I have ever been on. Would singing be captured by the clause? The hymn “We Shall Overcome” was adopted as an anthem and sung as a protest song. In 1963, the folk singer Joan Baez led 300,000 protestors in song as they sang “We Shall Overcome” at the Lincoln Memorial as part of the civil rights movement march on Washington. Some 300,000 people singing “We Shall Overcome” must have made a fair bit of noise. Imagine a crowd of 300,000 outside the Houses of Parliament singing “We Shall Overcome.” Who would determine whether that constituted noise having a “significant” or “relevant” impact on “persons in the vicinity”?

[Lee Anderson]

There is another chant, “What a load of rubbish,” and that is pretty much what I am hearing today. Does the hon. Gentleman realistically expect that the police could stop 300,000 people singing a song?

[Bambos Charalambous]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, and ask, well, why not? Does he not think that is a noise? If it is not a noise, why is that not set out in the legislation? Where is the guidance on it? The legislation is badly worded and wrong, and its vagueness will cause confusion. The hon. Gentleman has demonstrated the point I am making; he says it is a load of rubbish, but in my view that would be captured under the legislation. Are songs and music exempt? Perhaps the Minister will tell us.

Some protests and processions are loud, colourful and joyful. I am sure the Minister is aware of the explosion of colour and sound that is the Pride parade, which takes place in towns and cities across the country. Pride in London is a wonderful event, and the procession is a joy to watch. It is also very noisy. There are drums, whistles, sound systems and cheering crowds; it is quite something. Will the London Pride parade, which passes down the top part of Whitehall, constitute noise and have a significant and relevant impact on persons in the vicinity? Part of the point of Pride is to be noisy. Could Pride be outlawed for being noisy? If not, why not? Let me put on record my support and solidarity of the LGBT+ community during this Pride month.

Even if the Minister brushes off music, song and noise made by the Pride parade as not constituting noise for the purposes of the Bill, does she concede that noise can be an integral part of protest? Earlier this year, we watched in horror as the military staged a coup against the democratically elected Government of Myanmar. There was outrage among people as the military clamped down on protest and imposed curfews. Faced with the prospect of curfews and armed brutality against street protests, protestors found other ways to make their protest heard. In February, in the city of Yangon, ordinary citizens staged a noisy protest, by banging pots and pans and anything they could lay their hands on from their balconies and homes, to create an almighty din and show civil disobedience and anger against the coup. Those same protestors in the UK, banging their pots and pans, would fall foul of clause 54. Noise is part of protests; whoever drew up the proposals clearly has not thought through the dilemma that the police will face, putting them in an invidious position as they try to enforce these sloppily drafted clauses.

I am surprised that the Government, who pride themselves so much on their libertarian values, are so prescriptive and authoritarian in trying to pass the legislation. The right to protest is a fundamental freedom, as is freedom of speech. The former Prime Minister and Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), was right when she said on Second Reading that the legislation is concerning and risks going against the right of freedom of speech. On the power of the Home Secretary to make regulations on the meaning of serious disruption to the activities of an organisation or the life of the community, the right hon. Member made another important point, saying:

“It is tempting when Home Secretary to think that giving powers to the Home Secretary is very reasonable, because we all think we are reasonable, but future Home Secretaries may not be so reasonable.”—[Official Report, 15 March 2021; Vol. 691, c. 78.]

If there were a peaceful protest outside the Home Office that the Home Secretary did not like, everyone could be criminalised for shouting too loud, so that people working were not disturbed. Does the Minister have a cause that she cares deeply about and may want to protest about? The Home Secretary would have the ultimate say on whether what she was saying was right or wrong. I know that I would not want the Home Secretary to have that power.

Michael Barton, the former chief constable of Durham police, compared the measures in the Bill to those of a paramilitary-style police force, and asked if the Government are

“happy to be linked to the repressive regimes currently flexing their muscles via their police forces?”

I reiterate his question to the Minister, and I hope she will answer it. The very same Home Office that is offering Hong Kongers British national overseas visas to escape the oppressive regime that last week banned the annual vigil to commemorate the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989 would criminalise those Hong Kongers for demonstrating loudly outside the Houses of Parliament. Once again, the Government are on the wrong side of the argument; instead, they find themselves on the same side as those who curtail the right to protest and silence the voices of the people.