Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton) Financial privilege is
not engaged by any of the items in the Lords message relating to
the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. Clause 55 Imposing
conditions on public processions 5.45pm The Minister for Crime and
Policing (Kit Malthouse) I beg to move, That this House insists on
its disagreement with Lords in their Amendment 73, insists on its
Amendment 73C to the words restored to the Bill by its...Request free trial
Madam Deputy Speaker ( )
Financial privilege is not engaged by any of the items in the
Lords message relating to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and
Courts Bill.
Clause 55
Imposing conditions on public processions
5.45pm
The Minister for Crime and Policing ()
I beg to move,
That this House insists on its disagreement with Lords in their
Amendment 73, insists on its Amendment 73C to the words restored
to the Bill by its disagreement to that Amendment, insists on its
Amendment 74A to Lords Amendment 74, disagrees with the Lords in
their Amendment 74B to that Amendment in lieu, disagrees with the
Lords in their consequential Amendments 74C, 74D, 74E, 74F and
74G, insists on its disagreement with the Lords in their
Amendment 87, insists on its Amendments 87A, 87B, 87C, 87D, 87E,
87F and 87H to the words restored to the Bill by its disagreement
to that Amendment but proposes Amendment (a) in lieu of Lords
Amendment 73 and additional Amendment (b) to the words restored
to the Bill by its disagreement with the Lords in their Amendment
87.
Madam Deputy Speaker
With this it will be convenient to consider the following
Government motion:
That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in
their Amendment 80, insists on its Amendments 80A, 80B, 80C, 80D,
80E, 80F and 80H to the words restored to the Bill by its
disagreement with that Amendment, disagrees with the Lords in
their Amendment 80J instead of the words left out by that
Amendment but proposes additional Amendment (a) to the words
restored to the Bill by its disagreement with the Lords in their
Amendment 80.
I rise to speak to the motions in the name of my right hon.
Friend the Home Secretary, including the associated amendments in
lieu. We return yet again, I have to say with a smidgin of ennui
and irritation, to the issue of police powers to attach
conditions to protests. It is disappointing that the debate on
these provisions continues to be characterised by misinformation
about what the Bill actually does and irrationality.
I shall start with the issue of noise. As I said in round 2 of
ping-pong, at the Opposition’s behest, we have added provisions
to the Bill that can be used to limit noise and disruptive
protests outside schools and vaccination centres. I am therefore
at a loss to understand why they would not agree to these
provisions outside, say, a convent, a hospital, an animal
sanctuary or, God forbid, a factory. What happened to the
workers’ rights?
It cannot be that a protest can inflict any amount of noise on
those living or working in the vicinity for prolonged periods of
time, day or night. I agree that it would not be necessary or
proportionate, for example, to attach conditions relating to the
generation of noise to a procession that will pass a particular
location within a matter of hours, but the same cannot be said of
an ongoing raucous protest, perhaps encamped in a residential
area, which includes the banging of drums and the use of
loudhailers. It is intolerable that local residents should have
to endure that day and night, and it is right that in those
circumstances, the police should have the power to act. I do not
understand why those residents’ rights are so lightly set aside
by the Opposition. When the hon. Member for Croydon Central
() rises to address the motions,
I hope she will answer that question.
I can, however, assure the hon. Members for North Antrim () and for Belfast East ()—they questioned me on this
in the last round—that there are no new powers here to restrict
what is said and, for that matter, sung. These provisions are
simply about the harm caused by excessive noise; the content is
irrelevant. Of course, the existing criminal law relating to hate
or intimidatory speech will continue to apply.
(Strangford) (DUP)
I have a real concern about Lords amendment 80. I am not sure
that my concern, or the concerns of my hon. Friends the Members
for Belfast East (), and for North Antrim
(), have been dispelled. Can the Minister give me an
assurance in this House today, on the record in Hansard, that
open-air or other events will not be affected? The letter of the
law does not give that protection; sadly—this has been done in
this country already—officers have the power to arrest those
preaching the word of God. I seek an assurance from the Minister
that on no occasion and under no circumstances will the
opportunity to preach the gospel in the streets of this kingdom
be in any way thwarted, reduced or restricted.
As I have already explained, what is said is irrelevant for the
purposes of this legislation. The Bill merely covers the distress
that may be caused by the volume or persistence of the noise. The
existing criminal law already covers content. If the
content—obviously, not in this case—is intimidating, somehow
hateful or incites some kind of violence, there are already
provisions against that kind of speech. The hon. Gentleman
describes somebody simply preaching the gospel; if they are not
causing alarm or distress through the level or persistence of the
noise, I cannot see why that would be offensive to anybody, or
that the police would use these powers.
I turn to the other provisions in clause 56, enabling the police
to attach any condition to a public assembly where such
conditions are necessary to prevent serious public disorder,
serious damage to property, serious disruption to the life of the
community or intimidation. I welcome the belated acceptance by
the other place that existing powers in section 14 of the Public
Order Act 1986 are insufficient, but I am afraid Lords amendment
87J is not up to the task. The police have told us that the
distinction drawn in that Act between processions and assemblies
is outdated, and it does not reflect current-day challenges of
policing dynamic protests that can morph from a procession to an
assembly and back again. The current situation prompts all sorts
of questions. For example, how slowly would a procession have to
move before it becomes static? If protesters walk in a 200 metre
circle, is that a procession or a static protest?
It will continue to be the case that any conditions must be
proportionate, and necessary to prevent serious disorder and the
other serious harms set out in the Bill. None of that, however,
is to say that we have not listened to and reflected on the views
expressed by the other place. In the last round, we raised the
threshold for the exercise of noise-related powers by removing
the “serious unease” trigger, and we have tabled an amendment in
lieu that will place a duty on the Secretary of State to prepare
and publish a report on the operation of the relevant provisions
in clauses 55, 56 and 61 within two years of their commencement.
In one of our earlier debates, my right hon. Friends the Members
for Newark (), and for Hereford and South
Herefordshire (), stressed the need for a
post-legislative review of those provisions, and the amendments
would enshrine that in law.
We have reached a stage of the legislative process where the
issue at stake is no longer simply the merits or otherwise of the
measures that we are debating. A more fundamental issue is at
stake: the primacy of this elected House in our constitutional
arrangements. This House has already debated and expressly
approved the noise-related provisions on no less than three
occasions: on Report last July; on consideration of Lords
amendments at the end of February; and again at the end of March.
That is not to mention the separate votes on Second and Third
Reading of the Bill. I hope and expect that hon. Members will
endorse the provisions for a fourth time when we come to the
Division. The other place, composed as it is of hereditary and
appointed Members without any democratic mandate, has done its
duty in asking this House to reconsider this issue. We have now
done so and made our position abundantly clear. We should send
the provisions back to the Lords again, with a clear and
unequivocal message that they should now let them, and the Bill,
proceed.
(Croydon Central) (Lab)
I am sorry that the Minister finds himself bored by the
democratic process, but this is the process, and sadly he has to
come to the Dispatch Box to engage in this debate. There is
one—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker ( )
Order. The hon. Lady is giving a speech. Carry on, .
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I do not mind how noisy the
Minister is; I do not want to curtail his right to be as noisy as
he likes.
We are debating one topic: the right to protest and make noise.
We have indeed debated it several times. Members from across the
House have spoken passionately about why this issue matters, and
why the Government have got this so wrong. One might think that,
with crime up 14%, the arrest rate having halved since 2010, and
prosecution rates at an all-time low, the Government might spend
their time on the bread-and-butter issues of law and order, such
as fighting criminals. Instead, they seem intent on criminalising
singing at peaceful protests. That suggests that the Government
are tired, out of ideas and have no plan, and are searching round
for anything eye-catching to distract from their years of
failure.
The Lords responded to the Minister’s defence of his policy by
voting against it again. Lords amendments 73 and 87 remove the
Government’s proposed noise trigger, which would allow the police
to put conditions on marches or one-person protests that are “too
noisy”. Labour agrees with the Lords, and we support Lords
amendment 80, which removes clause 56 from the Bill altogether.
As with most Government policies thought up on the hoof, there
are many questions about how the proposed powers would work.
This is a genuine question. For many years, I was a councillor in
central London and a London Assembly member. I am conscious that
central London is particularly targeted by protests, which happen
pretty much every weekend and often every day of the week.
Central London is characterised by a quite dense residential
population. Where is the balance between the rights of those
residents to the peaceful enjoyment of their homes, and the
rights of protesters to protest throughout the night, which the
hon. Lady seems intent on preserving? Will she please explain why
residents do not deserve some kind of protection from noise?
I ask the Minister back: where is the evidence that residents
have asked for this change in legislation? [Interruption.] I see
no evidence that anybody has asked for this change in the law,
not least the police—
You should see my inbox.
My inbox—I do not know about the Minister’s—is full of emails
asking us to vote against the Government’s provisions today. I
have not had a single one asking me to vote in favour.
(Cynon Valley) (Lab)
I may be able to enlighten the Minister as to why there is no
need for the provisions on noise. The Minister for Social Justice
in Wales, , has been quoted as saying that
the current legal framework already provides sufficient scope,
and that
“this means there is no requirement or need to include a new, far
more draconian measure”.
We have sufficient laws in place, and there is no need for these
provisions. The Bill rides roughshod over the devolution
settlement.
My hon. Friend is right. I am proud to have campaigned with
. She knows what she is talking
about, and she delivers results—something that this Government
could learn from.
Recently published guidance on this bizarre change to the law
gives us the helpful tip that
“a noisy protest outside an office with double glazing may not
meet the threshold”
in the Bill. The guidance is seriously asking the police to base
their consideration of whether a protest is too noisy on how many
buildings around it have double-glazed windows. How on earth will
the police know? Is it fair to our police if the law is so
peculiar that they could interpret it in a million different
ways, and would stand accused of bias whatever they did? I urge
Ministers to bear in mind the consequences of these provisions on
the police officers trying to put them into practice.
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way, if only so that I
can, hopefully, enliven our proceedings slightly. I am a bit
confused; the hon. Member for Cynon Valley () seemed to imply that the
Minister in the Welsh Government says that there is plenty of
legislation to deal with this problem. Is she therefore content
for legislation to be used in Wales to control protest noise?
The point we are trying to make is that there is a balance to be
struck between what is reasonable in protests and what is not. We
believe that the right to protest is not an absolute right; there
have to be provisions in place to ensure that protests are
reasonable, and do not put out the public too much. These
provisions on noise are almost impossible to interpret—they are
really unclear—and the police and the public have not asked for
them. There are existing rules to ensure that reasonable,
peaceful protest can take place, and the Bill rides roughshod
over those genuine rights.
(Wirral West) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making some good points, particularly around
interpretation. In Wirral West, we had a successful campaign
against underground coal gasification after the coalition
Government granted a licence for drilling in the Dee estuary
underneath Hilbre island. People were very concerned about that,
and we had a mass demonstration on the beach. When people go to a
demonstration, they do not know who else will be there. I am
concerned that people will feel intimidated by this law, and will
perhaps feel that they should not attend a protest that they want
to go on because of concerns that they will not be in control of
the noise volume.
That is an interesting point. Thank goodness for those protests
and for our right to protest in that way. It is not fair and not
right to force the police to make political decisions about how
much is too much noise. Imagine a scenario where two sides of a
public debate are protesting, with one group on a street where
there is lots of double glazing and the other on a street where
there are old houses and no double glazing. Are we really saying
that the police, who might close one protest for being too noisy
and not the other, would not find themselves in a difficult
political situation, with criticism from the public?
6.00pm
The Government often point to a report by Her Majesty’s
inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services that
argued that the police needed to balance better the rights of
protesters with disruption to the wider public. It asked for
a
“modest reset of the scales”.
However, Inspector Matt Parr, who wrote the report, gave evidence
to the Joint Committee on Human Rights in which he said:
“Neither the police nor HMCIFRS called for a new trigger based on
the noise generated by demonstrations”.
He also said that he was not even asked by the Government to
“look specifically at whether noise should be included”
or assess whether the change was necessary. The Joint Committee
on Human Rights said that there was “no evidence” of a gap in the
law that needed to be filled and that there was already a
“range of powers to deal with noise that impacts on the rights
and freedoms of others”.
Why on earth is the Home Secretary continuing to push for those
powers when the police did not even ask for them?
As the Bill has progressed through Parliament, we have seen many
and various attempts to justify the provisions on noisy protest
that no one has asked for and no one wants. In Committee, the
Minister of State, Home Department, the hon. Member for Louth and
Horncastle (), said:
“The police will impose conditions on the use of noise only in
the exceptional circumstances where noise causes unjustifiable
disruption”.––[Official Report, Police, Crime, Sentencing and
Courts Public Bill Committee, 8 June 2021; c. 397.]
The Government also added the caveat of the word “serious”,
raising the bar for securing a conviction, and the Minister for
Crime and Policing has said a number of times that the power may
be used only in the most exceptional circumstances. However,
since then, Ministers have taken away the “serious” caveat, so
they have lowered the bar. If alarm or distress does not have to
be serious, surely the powers may not be used only in such
exceptional circumstances.
The Minister talked about Labour’s amendments on public space
protection orders outside schools and vaccination centres as if
they included noise. However, the word “noise” does not feature
in any of them. Our proposal to offer councils fast-track powers
to set up protection zones around schools and vaccine clinics is
quite different from the Government’s sweeping powers on protest
that could criminalise peaceful protesters singing in the street.
The truth is, the police have a raft of powers that they can use.
We do not need these new provisions, and the Government know it.
That is why, in this round of ping-pong, they have tabled
amendments to review the changes in two years’ time. However,
Ministers are kidding themselves if they expect a review in two
years to reassure us. I urge the Minister to scrap this
cut-and-paste job of amendments, change the guidance that does
not make sense and accept Labour’s sensible amendments.
If I were the Minister, I would not want to be known as the
Minister who pushed through these provisions on protest. Is that
the legacy that he wants? Think of the freedom songs of the civil
rights movement or of the protesters singing the Ukrainian
national anthem all over Europe and here on Whitehall. Protests,
song and the sounds of protests give voice to the voiceless. Let
protest annoy us. Let protest be loud. Let us accept that noisy
protest can be uncomfortable.
The conditions in part 3 on noise are anti-democratic and we
should all vote to reject them. It would be a great shame if
Conservative Members voted to curtail the freedoms that so many
before us fought for and which so many more are still fighting
for around the world.
(Hemel Hempstead) (Con)
I will not detain the House for long, because that is what the
other Chamber is doing. The House has voted with huge majorities
to put the legislation through, and actually the need for it is
found in most of our constituency surgeries. [Interruption.] If
the hon. Member for Croydon Central () listens for five minutes, she
might hear my argument. It is fine to disagree with me, but
chuntering is probably not the answer.
One of the biggest things that upsets my constituents is noisy
neighbours, whether the noise comes from music or hard floors
upstairs. At my surgeries, people often ask, “How can we control
this? Can the council make recordings?” The council works hard to
try to address these disputes, which are small in scale but mean
a lot to the individuals who are having their lives blighted by
noise.
As a trade unionist, I am more than happy to have legal
demonstrations. They are part and parcel of the
process—[Interruption.] I was in the Fire Brigades Union when we
were thrown out of the Labour party, so I have a bit of a track
record here. However, we are talking about people having their
lives blighted continually because of a right being exercised
near their homes or offices day in, day out. To be fair, we are
talking not about a demonstration on a beach but about one right
outside where people live.
The right hon. Member brings a lot of experience to the House,
and I listen to him carefully. I agree with him about noisy
neighbours, which are a distressing part of my case load because
we often struggle hard to do something about it. However, the
Bill does not do anything on that; it is about protests. We need
to be clear that those are two completely different things. There
are rules on antisocial behaviour and neighbours, and local
authorities and the police have powers to deal with that—sadly,
often those cases do not get dealt with—but that is not what we
are arguing about.
Madam Deputy Speaker ( )
Order. May I give a little reminder that interventions should be
quite brief?
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, you made my point exactly. With
respect to the shadow Minister, they are different, and I agree
that the Bill has nothing to do with noisy neighbours, but noisy
demonstrations blight people’s lives in exactly the same way, and
that is why the legislation is trying to do something about
them.
We may disagree, and that is probably right and proper—this place
is about debating and not just agreeing with each other all the
time—but the principle must be that this House, with huge
majorities, has voted for these measures. I respect many of the
people on both sides of the other House—they bring huge amounts
of experience—but they are not elected. They should listen to
this House and consider the size of the majority. If it had been
tiny, we could argue about the principle, but it was not, and the
measures have been voted through. On that, I completely agree
with the Minister, who is in the position where I used to be.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I call the SNP spokesperson, .
(Glasgow North East)
(SNP)
Throughout the proceedings on this woefully drafted Bill, I have
maintained that, although it is largely reserved to England and
Wales, part 3 on protest will severely restrict anyone from
Scotland, or indeed anyone across these islands, from exercising
their fundamental and democratic right to protest. None of us can
sit back and allow that to happen. What happens here in the
coming days will outlive this Government, so the Scottish
National party will vote against the Government motions to
disagree with the Lords, who have worked tirelessly to help
restore some balance to the Bill. I am seriously concerned about
what will happen when the Bill is forced through the Lobby, and I
know that that worries some Conservative Back Benchers who have
been lobbying Members of the other place to allow the Commons the
opportunity to think again on protest measures. We are back here
to consider part 3 on protest, and rightly so.
The protest measures in the Bill have been the headline
grabbers—the clauses most briefed on, tweeted on, reported and
debated—and, most importantly, they are the clauses that people
are concerned about, because they are a threat to our long-held
right to have our voices heard. My office also receives hundreds
of emails on a daily basis asking me to stand up and act against
the threat to those rights. People are worried not just because
of this Bill in particular—although it is terrifying—but because
of the context in which it is being pushed through this
place.
This week, we will debate the Elections Bill, the Nationality and
Borders Bill and the Judicial Review and Courts Bill, each
carrying its own threat to our fundamental rights. People know
how this works: they know that the Government have seemingly
unfettered powers to make any law that they want. put it best
when she said:
“Because they have a huge majority…they can afford not to care
about how the Bills are written or about their
content.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 31 March 2022; Vol.
820, c. 1707.]
The Bill is badly written. No well written legislation would
require so many amendments—it borders on the ridiculous. When we
are forced to create a database for amendments just to keep
track, we know that fundamentally something has gone wrong at the
front end. However, it is our job to amend, correct and stop
badly drafted legislation and, whatever the Minister says, it is
the second House’s job to have its say on that.
I will speak briefly on specific amendments, but I would like to
make a general point: all the amendments under discussion clean
up ambiguous and badly worded clauses that will, as the shadow
Minister, the hon. Member for Croydon Central (), said, only force the police
into making quasi-political decisions on the spot. Former police
chiefs and senior officers have warned against the
“political pressure the Bill will place on frontline
officers.”
It has become apparent through these debates that it is not more
legislation or laws that the police need or want.
Lords Amendment 73 would remove sections of the Bill that allow
the police to intervene and limit processions based on the
criterion of noise. We have heard a lot about that today. The
Government have got this wrong—they simply have. They have tried
to make assurances that powers to act on noise will be used only
in the most extreme circumstances, but it is all just too vague.
As the shadow Minister said, what kind of law would ask a
frontline police officer to assess the thickness of walls in an
office or the kind of glazing in a building prior to intervening
on a protest? Seriously! It is in the guidance, if Government
Members opposite want to check it. Here is a quote from the
guidance:
“A noisy protest outside an office with double glazing may not
meet the threshold”.
It is not just the way a building is constructed that frontline
officers might have to contend with, but the duration of the
noise and the type of noise. The list goes on. This is
ill-conceived and ill-defined. It will load pressure on to
already pressurised police forces and simply will not work. And
that is before we get to the crux of the matter: our right to
protest is our democratic right. It is not for this Government or
any successive Governments to take that away.
We continue to oppose the Government’s apparent concession to
remove the term “serious unease” for the simple fact that it is
nestled in badly drafted sections and has the unintentional—or
possibly intentional—effect of lowering the threshold for police
intervention. Removing the term would lower the threshold of
“serious alarm or distress” to “alarm or distress”. My hon.
Friend the Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East
() eloquently made that
point in a previous debate, and I stand by his remarks.
We supported Lords amendment 80, to remove clause 56 on public
assemblies, and we continue to support it. This is yet another
clause rife with hidden dangers, attempting to replace public
order legislation that is operating perfectly well. The Public
Order Act was careful to delineate and differentiate the
conditions that could be imposed on static demonstrations, as
opposed to a march or a moving protest, and that was sensible.
That reflected the relative ease by which a static demonstration
can be policed.
I understand the hon. Lady’s point, but I am afraid I disagree
with it. In Scottish jurisprudence, Scotland has an advantage
over England in that it has a well-expressed and commonly used
offence of nuisance. Would she support the use of this
legislation in controlling nuisance emanating from a protest?
So many of us have already answered that on so many occasions.
There already exists legislation and the powers for the police to
control demonstrations that are not peaceful and out of control,
but we are not talking about that. The proposed legislation
allows the police to make decisions according to very spurious
guidance. The removal of the distinction regarding statics
demonstration could hand the police unfettered discretion to
impose further conditions on static protests, such as the words
and slogans that can be used on placards. That is ridiculous.
Sometimes they are the best bits! I really wish I had the time to
read out some of my favourite words and slogans that I have seen
recently, but I do not think the Government would be too pleased
about that.
Finally, I want to touch on Lords amendment 87, on one-person
protests. The amendment removes the ability of the police to
impose conditions on a one-person protest. That was rejected in
the last round of ping-pong and the Lords have rightly asked for
it to be reconsidered. I have twice now heard the Minister talk
in derisory terms about the House of Lords because some of them
are hereditary and none of them are elected. The SNP is opposed
to the House of Lords on that basis, but his party is not and it
puts people in there all the time. If that is the system he
supports, he cannot really complain when they do the job they are
asked to do. Are we really going to see a law passed today that
will allow the might of the state to bear down on a single,
individual protester? It is ridiculous, disproportionate and
nothing short of bullying. And be careful anyone who even stops
to chat to a protester, because they could be snared by the
clause, too. How many times have we all stopped to chat to the
wonderful array of protesters outside this place, whether we
agree with them or not? Well, Madam Deputy Speaker, doing so
could soon see you committing a criminal offence.
We are not impressed with the Government’s amendments to lay
reports before the House with regard to changes to the Public
Order Act. They are lip service posing as concessions. They are
better than nothing, but they are not much better.
I understand that time is short, so I will finish with this: we
support the Lords in their amendments and fundamentally disagree
with the undemocratic way the Government are throwing their
weight around. If the Government are intent on dissuading
protest, they are intent on silencing voices. From the huffing
and puffing coming from the Minister today it is clear he is no
fan of democracy, so I am sure he will not mind if I tell him the
Bill is undemocratic, unworkable and unfair.
6.15pm
(Ruislip, Northwood and
Pinner) (Con)
A noise annoys. That was a common reproof from my mother in my
early days, and indeed to her grandchildren today. I think we all
recognise, in the course of the debates we have had in this
House, that there are occasions when noise is a part of the
democratic process that helps the atmosphere and the challenge,
and there are times when it becomes extremely disruptive to the
democratic process and begins to get in the way. I rise to
support the Minister and the Government on that point. I would
like to set out briefly the particular reasons why I take that
position.
Like the Minister and a number of colleagues across the House, I
have spent a lot of time in local government. I am very aware
that one of the most common complaints to local authorities is
about disruption caused by noise. This element of the Bill deals
with a very specific subset of noise where it is caused by
protest, and I agree with what the Minister and the Government
have said. It probably depends where in the country someone is
and what their experience has been. Certainly for local
authorities in places such as my area—I speak with experience of
a local authority where Heathrow has occasioned many protests
over the years—where relatively low levels of noise carry on 24
hours a day, sometimes for days on end, or where extremely loud
noises are generated by the kind of portable amplification
technology that has become available even to lone protestors,
such things can cause enormous disruption.
That disruption is not just to residents who live in those
places—I appreciate that for central London Members of Parliament
it is certainly a very big factor—but to businesses. I have many
constituents who either work or have business interests in
central London. Hoteliers may struggle to sell their hotel rooms
in a location where there is constant disruption caused by noisy
protest, which means that people cannot sleep and the normal
business of an office is disrupted.
In my view, given the development of tactics used by some
protests that aim specifically to make persistent noisy protests
that do not cross the thresholds set out in existing legislation,
it is right that we update the law. We have heard a lot that
existing powers are available, in particular to local
authorities, to address concerns about noise. I have heard that
argument made at the Joint Committee on Human Rights, and we have
heard it in a number of debates on a lot of different aspects of
the Bill.
However, it seems clear to me that there are occasions when the
role of this House is not simply to respond to what the police
are asking for, but to recognise when constituents, businesses
and residents have concerns and find that the powers available,
for example to local authorities, are not sufficient to remedy
the problems they are experiencing. It is then the duty of the
House to consider how we increase the penalties and powers
available, so that those problems can be properly addressed. For
example, as the Bill contains provisions to deal with trespass
that crosses a criminal threshold and powers to increase
sentencing, in my view it is right that it also increases the
powers of the police to deal with persistent and noisy
protests.
For people experiencing disruption to their sleep, disruption to
their family life and disruption to their business—disruption to
normal lawful activity that these types of protest can
cause—waiting for the processes available to a local authority is
simply insufficient. By law, councils have to go through various
processes to gather evidence, which takes a long time. It can be
enormously difficult to identify the cause in a way that meets
the legal test, whereas the police have powers to act, when an
offence is being committed, to deal with those things and ensure
that residents and businesses are no longer impacted
inappropriately. For those reasons, although it is right that the
Government have listened to what has been said in the other
place, I think it is right that we push ahead with this.
The powers will be required for a relatively narrow subset of
occasions. In my view, however, the disruption that is caused to
businesses, my constituents’ business activities and interests in
central London, and many other people around the country—in
places such as Heathrow, where persistent, long-running protests
can cause this kind of disruption—demonstrates that there is a
need for an improvement in the powers. I wholly support the
Minister in defending them at the Dispatch Box.
We truly are in a remarkable situation of political crisis for
the Government, who seem determined to pursue an assault on the
rule of law, democracy, the devolution settlement and human
rights. In the week that the Government intend to prorogue the
House, multiple Bills are coming before us, following repeated
Government defeats in the Lords. The Government are seeking to
pursue this assault on democracy just a few days after the Prime
Minister was found to have broken the law.
Much of this legislation was not part of the Tory Government’s
election manifesto. The Government cannot therefore claim, in
pursuing this legislation, that it commands the support of the
electorate. That is certainly the case regarding today’s
amendments. The mass of public opinion is better demonstrated by
the joint coalition of non-governmental organisations opposing
the Bill, which stretches from Amnesty International to 38
Degrees, End Violence Against Women and many, many more. The
Lords have reflected that civil society concern. I welcome their
decision to insist on their amendments to clauses 55 and 61.
My noble Friend , the former Member of this
House for Gedling, spoke plainly when the other place last
considered the Bill. As he highlighted, the Government proposals
make a bad Bill even worse by lowering the threshold from
establishing policing powers in relation to
“serious unease, alarm or distress”
to simply “alarm” or “distress”, making shutdown of protest even
more likely. He highlighted that the Government’s fact sheet
guidance for the clauses on “too noisy” protests make it clear
that this is unworkable and, in reality, makes protest
unpoliceable.
If the Government cannot clarify whether a protest would meet the
noise threshold under this legislation because of double-glazing,
they do not know what they are doing. Therefore, amid the
confusion, we can only conclude that the Government are simply
creating powers that can be exploited to shut down noisy protest
and scrutiny of the Executive.
In referring to the earlier comments about the devolved
settlement, I wish to share with the Minister—if he is not
already aware of this—the fact that the Welsh Government have
withheld legislative consent from the provisions of the Bill that
come within their competence, including clauses that relate to
the right to protest and noise nuisance. I have the legislative
consent memorandum with me today, if he is interested in seeing
it. The Welsh Minister for Social Justice, , stated that the wish was to
“send a united message to the UK Government that this eradication
of the fundamental right to have our voices heard cannot and will
not be tolerated.”
The Government should and must respect the devolution settlement.
The Welsh Government have withheld legislative consent from 17
Bills so far. This is absolutely unacceptable.
Colleagues on the Government side have said that the police want
this legislation, but police constables in Wales have expressed
significant reservations about the Bill in recent evidence to the
Welsh Affairs Committee. Carl Foulkes of North Wales Police said
that police officers could choose not to enforce part of the
Bill. Jeremy Vaughan of South Wales
Police insisted that
“protest…by its very nature, needs to be disruptive”.
He insisted that “most” in the police would be “vociferous and
protective” of the public’s right to protest.
Will the hon. Lady give way?
No, I will not.
As with the Judicial Review and Courts Bill, the Elections Bill
and the Nationality and Borders Bill, which we will discuss later
this week, the Government are in chaos, thrashing around to
restore order. The Government must accept the Lords amendments,
although we would be in a far better position if they dropped the
Bill completely.
(Nottingham East) (Lab)
It was through protest that many of our fundamental rights were
won, including the right to vote. Noise is an essential part of
protest. What is the point of a demonstration if no one can hear
its message? What is it if not a show of strength of feeling?
Thousands of people gathered together will inevitably be loud.
Make no mistake: the Bill is an assault on our right to protest
and our ability to hold the powerful to account. What is to stop
a corporation that is being protested against calling the police
and claiming that the noise is causing significant disruption in
order to shut down the demonstration?
The powers also give huge discretion to police officers. That
will make the law on protests completely unpredictable. People
will attend protests not knowing whether the noise that they are
making is illegal and whether they will go home that evening and
have dinner with their family or be thrown in the back of a
police van. I have no faith that the police would show restraint
with these new powers when other powers have been abused time and
again.
In recent weeks Members across the House will have seen the
heroic actions of anti-war protesters in Russia and Ukraine. If
MPs truly support their right to protest and their ability to
make noise, they should vote against these powers. Many
Conservative Members also consider themselves great champions of
freedom of speech, quick to condemn so-called cancel culture. If
they truly believe in freedom of expression, they should vote
against the powers.
I would also bet that the majority of Members in this Chamber
will at some point have taken part in a protest that could have
fallen foul of a noise trigger—thank goodness the Chamber is not
subject to these anti-noise laws, because otherwise I expect that
would be happening every Wednesday. I urge every Member here to
think about those protests, the causes they were championing and
the people they were with. If they feel that those protests were
legitimate and that they should not have been arrested for making
some noise, I urge them to extend the same right to others and to
vote down these powers.
Let me deal with the closing point from the hon. Member for
Nottingham East () about Prime Minister’s
Question Time. She will recall that the Speaker spends quite a
lot of his time semi-threatening Members of the House, saying
that they should keep quiet so that the voices and rights of
Members on both sides of the House can be respected. Control is
exercised, as we all make our views known.
As we close this debate, I want to focus broadly on where we
agree. We all agree that, in an ancient democracy such as ours,
protest is intrinsic to, and a cornerstone of, our rights. The
Government are resolute in defending the rights of freedom of
speech and of assembly. We should all be able to take to the
streets to express our views on the issues of the day. In doing
so, it is inevitable that some will be offended, inconvenienced
or put out, and we should all accept that as part of the
debate.
However, I think we have all accepted, on both sides of the
House, that even in a protest situation, controls can and should
be mandated and that there is not an unqualified right. As both
Opposition Front Benchers—the hon. Members for Croydon Central
() and for Glasgow North East
()—have accepted, in Scotland
and Wales there is a legal basis for controlling all forms of
protest, including noise. All that we are trying to do is give
the police the power to do so in challenging and exceptional
situations in England as well.
When one person is exercising a right that infringes on the
rights of others, whether it involves the use of hate speech,
running on to motorways, endangering lives or generating such a
cacophony of noise that it causes alarm or distress, the law must
be able to step in—as it does, perhaps for a tenant or resident
in Croydon. I would be interested in the view of the hon. Member
for Croydon Central on this: if the noise that the resident
complained about from the neighbours was Bob Dylan protest songs
all day and all night in furtherance of a protest in their home,
should that just be allowed? [Interruption.] Well, exactly. The
point is that we have to be able to qualify these rights and we
have to give the police control in exceptional circumstances.
The time has come to say unequivocally to the House of Lords that
enough is enough. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel
Hempstead ( ) said, this elected House has
made its views on the measures crystal clear four times. It is
time for the other place to acknowledge that, accept the
amendments that the Government have put forward in the spirit of
accommodation and let the Bill pass.
Question put.
[Division 258
The House divided:
Ayes
300
Noes
220
Question accordingly agreed to.
Held on 25 April 2022 at
6.29pm](/Commons/2022-04-25/division/CD6ED08F-E61F-473C-9066-5A88083A6E3B/CommonsChamber?outputType=Names)
Resolved,
That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in
their Amendment 73, insists on its Amendment 73C to the words
restored to the Bill by its disagreement to that Amendment,
insists on its Amendment 74A to Lords Amendment 74, disagrees
with the Lords in their Amendment 74B to that Amendment in lieu,
disagrees with the Lords in their consequential Amendments 74C,
74D, 74E, 74F and 74G, insists on its disagreement with the Lords
in their Amendment 87, insists on its Amendments 87A, 87B, 87C,
87D, 87E, 87F and 87H to the words restored to the Bill by its
disagreement to that Amendment but proposes Amendment (a) in lieu
of Lords Amendment 73 and additional Amendment (b) to the words
restored to the Bill by its disagreement with the Lords in their
Amendment 87.
Clause 56
Imposing conditions on public assemblies
Motion made, and Question put,
That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in
their Amendment 80, insists on its Amendments 80A, 80B, 80C, 80D,
80E, 80F and 80H to the words restored to the Bill by its
disagreement with that Amendment, disagrees with the Lords in
their Amendment 80J instead of the words left out by that
Amendment but proposes additional Amendment (a) to the words
restored to the Bill by its disagreement with the Lords in their
Amendment 80.—(.)
[Division 259
The House divided:
Ayes
302
Noes
221
Question accordingly agreed to.
|
