Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Polak Excerpts

Wednesday 18th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I am pleased to support the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Foster, to which I have added my name. As I understand it, the purpose of the amendment is pretty straightforward: it seeks to remove the current requirement in Section 1 of the Terrorism Act 2006 that, for a statement glorifying terrorism to be criminal, prosecutors must prove that the speaker intended to encourage others to emulate the act. In practice, this current requirement creates a significant evidential barrier.

Under the current law, it is not enough that someone praises terrorist violence, celebrates terrorist attacks or glorifies terrorist organisations; prosecutors must go further and demonstrate that the individual intended their words to encourage others to copy those acts. As a result, individuals can glorify terrorism while carefully avoiding an explicit call for imitation, and so remain technically within the law.

We know that extremist propagandists are acutely aware of these legal boundaries. They deliberately operate at the margins of the law. Rather than issuing explicit instructions, they rely on suggestion, admiration and narrative. They glorify past attacks, elevate perpetrators as heroes or martyrs, and celebrate organisations that Parliament has already determined must be proscribed because of the threat that they pose. Such messaging may not always contain an explicit instruction to copy the act, but it none the less plays a powerful role in the radicalisation process. It legitimises terrorism, fuels extremist ideology and contributes to an environment in which violent extremism becomes normalised.

In many cases, Parliament has already taken steps to proscribe certain organisations as terror groups. The decision reflects a clear judgment that those organisations pose such a grave threat that supporting them must be prohibited. It therefore follows that publicly praising or glorifying the acts of such organisations should also fall into the scope of criminal law, even where, as I said, the speaker avoids explicit calls for imitation. This amendment would simply align the legislation with that principle.

It is important to be clear on what the amendment would not do. It would not criminalise legitimate debate, historical discussion or academic analysis of terrorism, nor would it undermine the fundamental protections of freedom of expression that are central to our democratic society. Instead, it would target the deliberate glorification of terrorist organisations and their acts of violence, which extremist actors use to spread propaganda and to influence vulnerable audiences.

Extremist propaganda has evolved significantly since the original legislation was drafted. Today, radicalisation often occurs through narratives that glorify past attacks and portray terrorists as heroes, rather than through direct instructions to commit violence. If the law is to remain effective, it must reflect that reality. Removing the emulation requirement would close a loophole in the law, align our legislation with the realities of modern extremist propaganda and strengthen the ability of prosecutors to act against those who glorify terrorism while hiding behind technicalities. It would send an unequivocal message that the celebration of terrorist violence has no place in our society. This amendment represents a sensible, proportionate and necessary improvement to the existing legislation, and I hope that colleagues will support it.

[Lord Anderson of Ipswich (CB)]

My Lords, I have sympathy, as I usually do, with the concerns of the noble Baroness, Lady Foster, but I will make two short points.

First, by removing the emulation requirement, inserted very deliberately in 2006, this amendment would criminalise the utterance of unpleasant viewpoints without regard to whether they have an effect. It would become a police matter to say that the IRA did what it had to do in 1918 or that the Tamil Tigers, currently a proscribed group, fought bravely in defence of their homeland. It seems to me that this would restrict the scope of legitimate comment and be a departure from the principle that we normally criminalise behaviour only when it is liable to cause harm to others.

Secondly, I heard what the noble Baroness said about Hamas and the St Patrick’s Day parade, but I wonder whether the purpose of this amendment is not better served by Section 12(1A) of the Terrorism Act 2000, inserted as recently as 2019. This already makes it a crime to express

“an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation”,

being reckless as to whether that will encourage someone to support it. If police or prosecutors are being unduly cautious in this area—I heard what the noble Lord said about that—they might usefully be directed to that provision of the existing law.

--- Later in debate ---

The risk of harm that we should be concerned about when it comes to this amendment is not the risk posed by AI chatbots, but the risks to the citizens of this country imposed by granting the Secretary of State these sweeping, open-ended, extraordinarily broad Henry VIII powers.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I rise again to support the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, as I did the other day. It says on her Wikipedia page that she is

“an advocate for children’s rights in the digital world”.

She is right, and I hope that all Members across the House who have actually heard the debate will support her in the Lobby.

[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)]

My Lords, many noble Lords who have spoken today also spoke quite vehemently about the dangers of the theft of copyright in AI. We were asking to shut the stable door before the horse bolted. Today we heard from the Government, and it is very welcome news that they are looking again at the theft of copyright and seeing if they can protect artists, musicians and writers still further. I say once again, let us move with my noble friend’s amendment before the horse bolts and let us shut the stable door now.