Public Order Bill

Stella Creasy Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 18th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Quin]

I thank hon. Members who have joined us for this important debate today and I look forward to the lively discussion that we are bound to have over the course of the afternoon. Although there will inevitably be differences of opinion, which I will come on to, I hope we can all agree on the fundamental point that should be underpinning this discussion—namely, that it is completely unacceptable for a selfish minority to wreak havoc on the lives of people going about their daily business. I would like to open the debate by speaking to the amendments in the Government’s name, and I will respond to other amendments in my closing remarks.

I will also touch on new clause 11, which covers abortion clinic buffer zones. We totally endorse the sentiment behind the new clause, but I look forward to setting out in my summing up why measures in existing legislation combined with the growing use of public space protection orders—PSPOs—can be used and are effective.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Jeremy Quin]

I think the hon. Lady will want to hear me out.

We recognise that this is a matter closely associated with issue of abortion, on which people have very strong views across the House. Therefore, as far as we are concerned, there will be a free vote on new clause 11. Members will hear the debate, and I will set out why the current legislation is proportionate and how PSPOs are increasingly being used and are increasingly effective, but this is a matter on which hon. Members will make their own judgment.

Before going further into the debate, it might be helpful if I briefly recap what the Bill does and does not do. This Bill does not criminalise the right to protest, as some hon. Members have said. The right to protest is a fundamental principle of our democracy, and that will never change. Any suggestion that we are intent on interfering with or watering down the right to protest peacefully is simply wrong.

What the Bill does is target acts that cause serious disruption, such as those that wreak havoc on our roads, disrupt thousands of journeys, cost the taxpayer millions and put lives in danger. It does this by giving the police the enhanced powers they need to respond to such disruption and better balance the rights of protesters with the right of the public to go about their daily lives.

I will now speak to Government new clauses 7 and 8, Government new schedule 1 and Government amendment 50. Some of the protest tactics we have seen in recent months have had significant consequences for the public. Protests such as those by Insulate Britain and Just Stop Oil have targeted fuel supply chains and created blockades. Indeed, hon. Members will be familiar with recent images of ambulances, fire services and cars carrying babies to hospital being blocked by the selfish actions of protesters in the name of Just Stop Oil. These tactics are not only seriously disruptive but dangerous.

We have heard the Opposition’s calls to ensure that injunctions are in place to prevent serious disruption, including through new clause 4 tabled by the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones). It is a pleasure to see her in her place, and I look forward to working with her across this Dispatch Box.

We have seen how effective injunctions can be, and we believe we can build on the current position in which only private persons and local authorities can pursue this legal remedy through the courts. That is why the Government tabled new clauses 7 and 8, new schedule 1 and amendment 50 to provide the Secretary of State with a specific mechanism to apply for an injunction where it is in the public interest to do so because the activity causes serious disruption to key national infrastructure, prevents access to essential goods or services, or has a serious adverse impact on the public. This will be accompanied by a power of arrest to support swifter enforcement action. This does not affect the right of local authorities or private landowners to apply for an injunction, but it gives the Secretary of State an additional way to act in the public interest where the potential impact is serious and widespread.

These measures will support better co-ordination between the Government, law enforcement, local authorities and private landowners in responding to serious disruptive behaviour. We know injunctions can play a major role in helping to constrain some of the tactics deployed and, as a result, can limit serious disruption. Although I understand the sentiment behind new clause 4, tabled by the hon. Member for Croydon Central, I do not think it achieves the change she seeks, as the law already enables private persons and local authorities to pursue an injunction where they can evidence harm to their rights or interests in civil law. The police already have a range of powers and avenues to manage protest and to act on criminal or antisocial behaviour.

I therefore encourage the hon. Lady not to press her new clause and to support Government new clauses 7 and 8, new schedule 1 and amendment 50.

[Stella Creasy]

I rise to support all the amendments in the name of the Labour Front Bench, and to speak to new clauses 11, 13 and 14.

I put on record my gratitude to the Minister for respecting the convention that issues around abortion are matters of conscience, and new clause 11 is about abortion because, let us be honest, nobody is praying outside the places where people go to have a hip operation. Nobody offers rosary beads or dead foetuses outside the places people go when they have an ankle injury. This is about women accessing a very specific form of healthcare.

This goes to the heart of the Bill. Whatever the Bill’s merits, it is about protest. At the point at which women are accessing an abortion, they have made a decision and they are not opening themselves up for a debate or further discussion. These women are often in a very vulnerable state, and they want to be able to access basic healthcare.

New clause 11 would not stop free speech on abortion, and it would not stop people protesting. I have regularly been subjected to protests, and new clause 11 would do nothing to stop the protests I have experienced from many of the people involved in this subject. New clause 11 simply says that people should not have a right to protest in another person’s face, and very often these protesters are right up in front of people, at a point when they have made a decision.

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[Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

I pay tribute to the hon. Lady for what she has done to bring us to this position. I am grateful that the Minister has confirmed that this will be a free vote, as it should be.

I support the Public Order Bill because it is about stopping people interfering with the right of others to go about their business. Does the hon. Lady agree that this is at the heart of new clause 11, which is about protecting women who want to go about their lawful business from being harassed? They are emotionally vulnerable, and the decision is hard enough as it is, let alone with what they have to go through outside the clinic. Does she agree that it is a Conservative principle of the Bill to ensure women have the right to go about their lawful business?

[Stella Creasy]

I would not deign to comment on or set out Conservative principles, although I have the free speech to do so, but I share the hon. Gentleman’s recognition that this is about balancing rights. This is an omission from the Bill because it is such a specific issue. Let me be clear: PSPOs are not working and new clause 11 is very tightly drawn about abortion clinics themselves. At 28 weeks pregnant. I was subject to sustained campaigns in my town centre. People put up pictures of my head next to dead babies. They told my constituents to stop me and they incited anger and intimidation. This would not be covered by the new clause. That is the free speech debate that we might want to have another day. Perhaps if those protesters had thrown a can of tomato soup at me, the police might not have seen it as a “both sides now” conversation. This is something different. These women have not put themselves up for debate and I understand that. As a public figure, I have put myself up for debate. Obviously, I had not put my unborn child up for debate, which is what those protesters felt that they could do.

This is about when a woman wants to access an abortion. The new clause specifies abortion clinics. It is no more broad than that, because this is a very specific problem. The challenge in this place is that we can dance on the head of a pin having theoretical debates, but it is our constituents who see the reality. They see the people shouting at these women. They see the women who are frightened, scared and vulnerable, who just want to make a decision in peace—who just want to go about their business.

That is why this amendment has such support from across the House, from among the royal colleges, and from among those who work with women and campaigners, particularly organisations such as the British Medical Association and the Fawcett Society. It is also why there have been so many emails pouring into our inbox. A person does not have to be a supporter of abortion to think that, at that point, we probably need to protect that person. A person does need to be a supporter of abortion to think that, if something is stopping women or is designed to deter them at a point when they have made a decision to have an abortion, we need to step in and not leave it to local authorities to find the money to cover the court costs, or even for that to be part of the decision they are making.

I understand that the Minister will talk against this measure. He needs to explain why, when 50 clinics have been targeted, only five have managed to get PSPOs. The current legislation is not satisfactory in dealing with that balance. It leaves it to chance and creates a postcode lottery of the protection that people recognise is required—whether or not they support abortion and whether or not they think about free speech.

I ask the Minister to listen to women. Women in their droves are asking for this protection for their sisters who are making this decision. They should not be shouted at when they are accessing it. Let them make that decision in privacy. If we consider abortion to be a human right, do not ask them to run a gauntlet to get one, which is what is happening now. I hope that colleagues across the House will recognise the thought, care and attention that has gone into this new clause, the widespread support across the House for acting and for not leaving it to local authorities to have to deal with these issues, and the fact that the abortion debate must continue, but that there is a time and a place for it.

Let me turn now to new clauses 13 and 14, which, again, I hope will have cross-party support. They reflect a concern that we need to tackle the experience of women on our streets, and, in particular, the fact that 24,000 women a day experience street harassment in this country. For too long that has become normalised. For too long, we have taught young girls ways to minimise their exposure rather than challenging those people who do it. For too long, we have asked the questions, “Did you have your headphones on?” “Were you wearing a short skirt?” What did you say when that person said that?” We do that rather than recognising this as a form of harassment.

I welcomed the words of the Prime Minister when she said that violence against women and girls does not have to be inevitable. She said:

“Women should be able to walk the streets without fear of harm, and perpetrators must expect to be punished.”

She also said:

“It is the responsibility of all political leaders, including us in Westminster and the Mayor of London, to do more.”

I know that the Mayor of London wants to do more because I have been working with him for many years on the campaign to learn from our police forces who treat misogyny as a form of hate crime and use that to identify the perpetrators of these crimes. I know, too, that there is support across the House for doing that. There is no other crime that happens on such a scale on a daily basis where we have not made progress. I welcome the fact that there is agreement in this place that we need to tackle street harassment. As ever, when it comes to upholding a woman’s rights and freedoms and basic ability to go about her daily business, the challenge today is that it goes on the backburner when something else turns up. It is something that we will get round to eventually. It is something that is terribly complicated, when shouting at statues is not.

I ask the Minister today to commit to joining all of us in saying, “Enough is enough, and we will legislate and legislate promptly.” We should not be at a point in 2022 going into 2023 where thousands of women are still experiencing street harassment. Over their lifetime, seven in 10 women will experience sexual harassment in public. It is clear that those who engage in these behaviours often escalate to further and more serious crimes. Recognising sexual harassment and tackling it, which is what the police forces who are treating misogyny as a form of hate crime have been able to do, offers us valuable lessons about how we can move forward.

I recognise what the Law Commission said, and I recognise that the debate has moved on, but having a standalone offence, which identifies where women are being targeted for street harassment, would help us to gather the data and send that very powerful message that no woman should have to look behind her or carry her keys in her hand just because she wants to go out and buy a pint of milk. That is a daily experience.

[Fay Jones (Brecon and Radnorshire) (Con)]

My concern about street harassment is that it could be too broad. I am particularly concerned about the rising prevalence of cyber flashing, and I very much urge the Government to pursue their intention to make that a criminal offence through the Online Safety Bill. Does the hon. Lady agree that we are at risk of going too broad and too shallow and not focusing on individual crimes such as cyber flashing?

[Stella Creasy]

I agree that cyber flashing is an issue that needs to be addressed, but I caution the hon. Lady to understand the importance of recognising where harassment is targeted at women; it does not have to be sexual to be harassment. There is a risk here that we deny the experience of women from minority communities of the multiple ways in which they are harassed. A couple of years ago, a gentleman was going around my community targeting Muslim women, pulling off their hijabs. That was both Islamophobic and misogynistic—he was not targeting Muslim men. Yet, under our current hate crime framework, we ask the victims to pick a particular box to tick to identify a crime. The evidence from the areas of the country where they are using this approach shows that where we have that understanding of how misogyny motivates crime, we see the victim as a whole and victims themselves have much more confidence to come forward. I recognise the hon. Lady’s concern about being specific in law, but there is a really important issue for all of us not to focus purely on sexual behaviour, but to recognise what is driving these crimes: it is power, entitlement and privilege that some men have—it is mainly men who do this—to target women for crimes.

New clause 13 looks at intentional harassment. New clause 14, which I hope the Minister will address in his comments, looks at foreseeable harassment. That is a really critical issue and why it is so important to get these new clauses accepted to help change the culture. If the harassment is foreseeable, it is recognising that there should be no defence, such as, “I thought she would enjoy being groped by me.” “I thought she would like it if I followed her down the road.” “I thought that she would find it flattering.” In 2022, we should not be breeding a generation of men who think that that is acceptable. I promise the Minister that I will stop campaigning on these issues when I go to a wedding and the bride gets up and says, “He tried to get me in the back of a van. I thought that it was the most fantastic thing ever and I immediately had to get to know this man.” That does not happen, but that is often an everyday experience for many women in this country—to be followed, to be targeted and to be hassled.

Finding ways to recognise that in law and not give someone the defence of saying, “I don’t know why she was upset by what I said” is what new clause 14 does. The Minister may tell me that he has better ideas. I know the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark) has an important Bill coming up. What all of us are looking for is a commitment to act promptly and not to leave this for another five or 10 years—the Law Commission review dates back to the heady days of 2016—and also to not give people a defence that women themselves are being difficult by wanting simply to go about their freedoms and not be hassled.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

The right hon. Gentleman cannot intervene because he was not here at the beginning of the hon. Lady’s speech. He can intervene later, but he cannot intervene halfway through a speech when he was not here at the beginning of it. I appreciate that the hon. Lady is proposing amendments that everybody wants to hear about, but she has held the Floor for 15 minutes. We have three hours for this debate and I have more than 20 people who wish to speak, so I have to appeal for brevity. I would rather not put on a time limit, because that curtails debate. I hope the hon. Lady will appreciate the position of everybody else in the Chamber who also has to have an opportunity to speak.

[Stella Creasy]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker; I promise I was just about to wind up. I hope the Minister will address the issue in new clause 14 about foreseeable harassment and that perhaps over the course of the debate he will rethink his opposition to new clause 11. I know many of us across the House would welcome that.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy).

--- Later in debate ---

[Fiona Bruce]

I have spoken against that principle on a number of occasions in this place and I will come on to explain why.

The wording of new clause 11 could even catch those who are quietly praying, but when did it become against the law in this country to pray? Unfortunately, five councils have now defined protest as including the word “prayer”. During court proceedings, that has even been confirmed to include silent prayer. That is a grave development that we in this House, more than anyone, must stand against. Staggeringly, it would effectively mean criminalising the affairs going on within the privacy of an individual’s mind. Yet freedom of thought is an absolute, unqualified right. As the Minister for the Americas and the Overseas Territories said earlier today in response to the urgent question, peaceful protest is a “fundamental part” of UK society.

Whatever our individual views on abortion, we must stand against new clause 11. Otherwise, we risk opening the door to discrimination even more widely. Why not have buffer zones around political conferences? A young Hongkonger told me yesterday that when she attended the recent Conservative party conference, she was “scared” of accessing the conference centre because of the aggressive behaviour of political opponents around it, yet there is no suggestion of having buffer zones there, and nor should there be. As MPs, we would be aghast if we risked a fine and imprisonment simply for handing out a campaign leaflet containing our political views on the street and seeking to influence others at election time. No: new clause 11 is specifically targeted at those with faith-based views and we should be equally aghast at it.

Of course, harassment or intimidation around abortion clinics—or anywhere—has to be addressed, although in more than a quarter of a century of people quietly gathering around abortion clinics, there have been relatively few, if any, reports of that and there are already several pieces of legislation that could tackle it if needed. The Offences against the Person Act 1861, the Public Order Act 1986, the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, the Criminal Justice Act 1988 and the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, and the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, which was passed only this year, all provide sufficient powers to tackle harassment and intimidation. This addresses the point of my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin): rather than creating new and unnecessary laws, the police’s and our efforts should be on ensuring that they and the prosecution use the powers that they already have.

This new clause goes further and potentially criminalises peaceable gatherings. Indeed, looking at the wording of the new clause, it is perfectly possible to see an argument being made that just one person standing alone quietly near a clinic could be guilty of the criminal offence proposed in it. Widely or poorly drafted legislation, as here, can have serious unintended consequences, as we have seen in recent years. During the pandemic, Rosa Lalor, a 76-year-old grandmother, was arrested, prosecuted and charged for nothing less than praying and walking outside an abortion centre. It took over a year before Merseyside police force dropped the charges, noting that her actions were completely within the law. For her, however, the punishment was the process, despite being completely innocent of any wrongdoing.

Too often, in recent years, the mere expression of unpopular viewpoints has been interpreted, or rather misinterpreted, as automatically being abusive or harassing under the Public Order Act 1986, due to the broad discretionary powers the police have. We must stand against this. We have seen numerous examples of street preachers and others arrested for nothing more than peacefully expressing traditional views in public. When arrested and prosecuted, it is very rare for this to lead to conviction, but by the time they are vindicated the damage is done to the individual subjected to a prolonged criminal process, to the public’s confidence in policing and, indeed, to freedom of speech. Such miscarriages of justice have an abiding chilling effect, leading many—indeed, many thousands of people—across our country today to self-censor deeply-held views, which is a problem far more widespread than is currently recognised and that will no doubt be exacerbated by new clause 11.

[Stella Creasy]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Fiona Bruce]

I am just about to conclude.

One of the main reasons freedom of speech and thought are treasured and rightly protected in law is so that they can be used precisely for the purposes of influence. The free and frank exchange of viewpoints is the lifeblood of a genuinely democratic society. Rather than seeking to erode this most precious principle, we should be seeking instead to strengthen the law, to put it beyond doubt that freedom of speech—and, indeed, of belief—when peaceably expressed should never be a criminal offence. We must stand against this here today. Our cherished freedoms of thought, conscience, belief, speech and assembly have been hard fought for, and our democracy depends on their robust protection.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I am surprised we are debating this again. It was only in 2018 when the Home Office concluded there was no need to introduce so-called buffer zones. I am referring here to new clause 11. Buffer zones are disproportionate in the restrictions they impose on freedom of expression, and unnecessary in that there remains a lack of evidence that they are needed. The Government have recently affirmed this position, and rightly so given that existing laws enable the police and local authorities to deal with protests that are harmful. Before we rush to create new laws, it is only right that the Government expect the police and local authorities to use their current powers appropriately and where necessary.

The 2018 review showed that

“it would not be proportionate to introduce a blanket ban”

as the evidence found that protests occurred at less than 10% of abortion clinics. That is a very small number. Of course—we emphasise this point—any kind of harassment is absolutely wrong. It should be dealt with by the law and can be dealt with by existing laws. We have heard much in the debate about how we should turn to existing laws, rather than create new ones. Any remedy must be proportionate to the problem. The review—not my review, but an objective Government review—concluded that most of the activities during these protests were passive in nature. My hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), in a very powerful speech, described just how passive they can be. They can be standing there and praying silently, not even holding up a banner of any nature or saying anything. It could include praying or handing out leaflets. The review found that disruptive or aggressive behaviour was the exception, not the norm. Crucially, it also confirmed that the police have the necessary powers already to take action and protect the public when protests become harmful or disruptive. A blanket ban of the kind proposed in new clause 11 would be disproportionate in the face of those facts. The law must be proportionate.

To be clear, the people this amendment targets are peaceful protestors, often elderly grandmothers, frankly, who are entirely peaceful. They politely pray and hand out leaflets. The contrast could not be greater between those protestors and those of the likes of Just Stop Oil, who glue themselves to roads and create human blockades that are disruptive and obstructionist. If any so-called protesters at abortion clinics did anything like that, they would be immediately arrested. While the police have the powers to take action so that ordinary people can go about their daily lives, they will not stop Just Stop Oil protests.

Are we in this House really going to criminalise people who are peacefully trying to raise awareness about support available? This is the point.

[Stella Creasy]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Edward Leigh]

No, I have been told not to speak for long and I want to get on with it.

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[Jeremy Quin]

I sympathise with the sentiment behind new clause 11. I hope we all agree that it is wholly unacceptable for women to feel harassed or intimidated when accessing abortion services. However, bearing in mind the size, scale and frequency of those protests, it is still our view that placing a nationwide blanket ban on protests outside all abortion clinics in England and Wales would be a blunt approach and disproportionate given the existing powers that can and should be used.

[Stella Creasy]

rose—

[Jeremy Quin]

I give way to the hon. Lady as this is her new clause.

[Stella Creasy]

I know that the Minister is listening both to the testimony of previous colleagues and the sentiment across the House, but might the answer to this lie in the great institutions of this place, in that we should accept this amendment today and seek to further refine how it could work in the other place? We could today send a message to the other place that we will grapple with the issue and resolve it. The testimony from the hon. Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), a former Home Office Minister, powerfully set out that this is a road to travel. The challenge in this place is that without those opportunities for scrutiny and further refinement, the status quo will remain, and what the Minister is hearing from across the House is that the status quo is not acceptable. Might that not be a way forward?

[Jeremy Quin]

My hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle mentioned the reviews that have been done: the review conducted in 2018 went into this in great depth and there has been further work since, and the hon. Lady referred to further work being done in relation to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. That maintained the Government position that the current arrangements are still proportionate. There is legislation; the Public Order Act 1986 and the PSPOs provide those routes, and we continue to believe that is proportionate, but this is ongoing work and we need to continue to ensure that it is still proportionate. I will be reviewing and making certain that I understand fully the pattern of protests and the effectiveness and indeed the cost of PSPOs, and I will certainly make sure that that work is constantly refreshed if the House agrees we should maintain the current legislative environment.

There are existing laws to protect people from harassment and intimidation outside abortion clinics. The police have robust powers to deal with protests that obstruct access to clinics, and cause alarm, harassment or distress, and where protests cause harm, we expect the police and local authorities to work together at the local level to respond in a way that takes into consideration the local facts, issues and circumstances. In addition, local authorities already have powers to implement PSPOs; these can be introduced when a local authority is satisfied that protests are having, or are likely to have, a detrimental effect. We have seen increased use of these in recent weeks, with five local authorities imposing an order outside abortion clinics.