On the beat
6 April 2011
Sophie Khan talks shop April 6 - Speak now, or forever hold your truth
The tough new security measures that have been proposed by the Home Secretary to “help [the police] to do their work” on the day of the Royal Wedding will signal the beginning of a policy that will be used to interference with the right to protest beyond the 29 April. Once these proposals will come into force it will be difficult to stop the police abusing the powers that they have been given as we have previously witnessed with the disproportionate use of section 44 stop and search power against protestors. The new proposals will go as far as using ‘football-style’ banning orders for ‘known hooligans’ and the power to forcibly remove head and face wear at a protest. But what the new proposals do not set out is who will be classified as a ‘known hooligan’ and what rights they will have to challenge their classification? Without knowing the answers to these questions it is likely that many protestors could be subjected to an unacceptable interference will their right to protest. The police, in my opinion, are using this opportunity to redefine the landscape in which to protest and restrict this fundamental liberty which will see even more protesters classed as criminals. The new Metropolitan Police team, Operation Brontide, set up following the anti-cut demonstrations is a definite move by the police to crackdown on the right to protest, especially as it is hot on the heels of Operation Malone, which led to an unprecedented level of arrests of students across the country. But with many of these arrests now concluding in no further action have the men behind Malone taken advantage of the situation? I feel that they have and the distress that they have caused in criminalising the younger generation while they themselves ‘live the good life’ now needs to be scrutinised so that the same mistakes are not made again. The damage and distrust that has been then created by their actions should not be underestimated and the news that 138 UK Uncut protestors have been charged with aggravated trespass over their sit-in at Fortnum & Mason on 26 March galvanises feelings among protestors that the law is being used and abused to fit ulterior motives. If this is the case the police run the risk of discrediting their own investigations and opening up a chapter in policing that I felt was dead and buried. The right to protest will live on whether the police like it or not as many, like myself will not let this cornerstone of our liberty be extinguished without a fight.
http://www.solicitorsjournal.com/story.asp?sectioncode=3&storycode=17725&c=1
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