UK Elections: Abuse and Intimidation

Nusrat Ghani Excerpts

Wednesday 12th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Simon Hart]

The hon. Lady is psychic, among many other things. What she said was going to be my next comment. I absolutely agree with her. There is another element with the existing laws, which is how few people know that they exist. Indeed, some law enforcement agencies do not know that they exist. The questions I will be putting to the Minister in a few minutes are partly intended to get a greater understanding of what legislation is there, where the gaps are and what we can do to fill them.

[Ms Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con)]

My hon. Friend might be aware of the Home Affairs Committee’s report from last year that looked at the online abuse MPs have to suffer. There was an issue about the threshold we have to endure as Members of Parliament, which is different from that of members of the public. If abuse is persistent and falls over into real-life activities, surely social media companies have to be held accountable, too.

[Simon Hart]

I am sure that a number of colleagues would agree with that contribution; I certainly do. I will be coming to some proposals and thoughts on social media in just a moment.

I want to take a moment to describe the example of our former colleague Byron Davies, who until recently was the MP for Gower. During the election campaign he was subjected to a sustained attack on Twitter that contained absolutely unfounded allegations about a criminal investigation for electoral fraud. That was not an embellishment or exaggeration of a story; it was simply made up. Whether Members supported him or not, he was a colleague defending a majority of 27, and he had to do that against a constant drip-feed on social media of people simply making things up as they went along. Could it have contributed to the loss of his seat? I do not know. It was certainly blatant defamation—that much we do know. The Electoral Commission could not help, social media platforms would not help, and the police investigation, like all police investigations, will take time. It is grinding slowly on, but our former colleague Mr Davies is having to do all that himself, and he is bearing the cost. When that inquiry eventually reaches its conclusion, what remedy will he really have?

I could mention my hon. Friends the Members for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), for Ribble Valley (Mr Evans), for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer), for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach), and for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) and the many others who have suffered similar or vaguely intimidatory experiences during the election campaign. Almost more worrying than that is the number of colleagues I have spoken to in the past few days who do not even want to come to this Chamber to make a contribution, lest it compound the intimidation and abuse they have been receiving in recent weeks. I hope that we are all in a sense making our contributions not to ease our bruised egos, but on behalf of colleagues who have put up with a lot of this nonsense over quite a long time, and are looking, as the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) said, for a lead from the Government.

Having said all that, I want to make the point that this debate is not about thin-skinned politicians having had a bit of a bruising time and feeling rather sorry for ourselves. Nor is it, as the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff) mentioned, about left versus right or right versus left, or whatever it might be—the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) made an interesting contribution on that particular score in her speech to the Fabian Society at the weekend. It is actually about families, staff, helpers and volunteers. For those of us who have teenage children who might follow us on Twitter and Facebook, it is about being able to say to them, “Don’t worry about the death threat; don’t worry about the abuse and the false accusations.” It is also for them that we speak.

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Hart]

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. Of course, print media is governed by a rather different and more visible level of regulation. There is a line between robust challenge, the cut and thrust of politics and the sort of stuff that we know we are letting ourselves in for when we take on this job—some papers would argue that they are on the right side of that line—which is a mile away from the stuff we are talking about. People being made to feel a little shamefaced or guilty because they have cocked up—if I can use that expression—their particular contribution to politics is one thing. If there is an example of a newspaper inciting racial hatred, anti-Semitism and that sort of thing, the regulators ought to be looking at that, without impinging on the free press.

[Ms Ghani]

My hon. Friend is making a strong case. I am a little concerned that this debate might blur the lines between criticism of the performance of a Member of Parliament or a stance they take and actual abuse. My concern is that the abuse particularly stops women entering politics. I will give the example of a candidate who stood in Ealing and was unfortunately not elected. Candidates have to declare their addresses when they stand for Parliament. She said that she started becoming nervous during the election campaign when opponents started standing outside her door, spitting in her face and following her. That is the threatening behaviour that she wants to highlight. This is not about criticism in the press.

[Simon Hart]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that contribution. Legislation of course already exists to deal with such incidents but, as we touched on before, it is not always easily accessible. It is not always entirely advantageous to be distracted by that during an election campaign.