GMLC has been opposing the Police Crime Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Bill as part of the Kill the Bill Coalition in Greater Manchester. The PCSC Bill is a severe threat to our right to protest, which affects the communities we represent. Disability rights groups, renters, workers, migrants and benefits claimants have all used protest to raise awareness of what they are facing and to fight for better rights, or to protect their existing rights when they are under attack. Protest is an integral part of social change, and has a proud history in Greater Manchester. The PCSC Bill would give police powers to limit, repress and criminalise protest. It is a huge Bill that also enables more Stop and Search without reasonable suspicion, and targets homeless people and Gypsy Roma Traveller (GRT) communities for further criminalisation. The Bill is due to finish its journey through Parliament in early 2022, which would mean it is likely to be brought into force in 2023.
We spoke to protest lawyer Simon Pook about the risks of the new Bill, the role of Legal Observers, how we can continue to fight back if it passes, and what to do to look after yourself and your friends at protests.
What do you think are the most significant attacks in this Bill for people looking to protest?
People organising a protest now run the risk of being criminalised and spending up to ten years in prison. So now it is called into question whether people will want to put their head above the parapet and organise a protest. A protest can now count as one person on their own. These are all very worrying developments.
I think protests must be rowdy, colourful and creative, with banners that draw the public’s attention to what’s going on, and yet this Bill attacks the right to make ‘noise’ at protests. This Bill seeks to remove the ability of protesters to highlight the very issues that they’re campaigning about.
The next area that concerns me is the attack on people living on land without consent. This will have a significant effect on Gypsy, Roma and Traveller (GRT) communities, but it will also affect protest encampments that have done fantastic work over the years to change the law and teach people about what’s actually happening in the world.
I went to the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp that was around between 1981 and 2000 against nuclear weapons and nuclear armament. That was a very successful campaign that lasted many years. Even now I meet women who were some of the key organisers who lived on the camp, and they have told me of the lasting friendships that they maintained since the camp ended.
There was also a camp on Barton Moss in 2013-2014 against fracking. The policing at Barton Moss was so draconian, so violent and so aggressive that it created a watershed moment in British policing.
There’s a report called Keep Moving that highlighted sexual violence perpetrated by the police against women at Barton Moss. The impact of the policing made people afraid to go and protest.
These camps create a hub of corrective information to challenge the narrative being put forward by the police, by the government, by the weapons and oil and gas industries. Without those camps, the public would rely on the media repeating the ‘official’ narrative, which are often distorted, and the propaganda being put out by the industry without it being challenged.
So the camps create not just a successful form of protest, but a way of forming an alternative narrative. It’s a credit to the activist movements in these cases that they’ve been able to maintain sustained protest camps to the point where they have been able to stop industries in their tracks – though after many years, and many imprisonments.
I think police across England and Wales, along with representatives from agencies such as oil and gas, may have put together their concerns around the effectiveness of protest camps and how it creates problems with policing them. I can see why successive governments might be concerned about the effectiveness of these camps and decide to just criminalise them to prevent them from happening again.
You’ve mentioned that these laws are designed to put people off protesting. How do you think we can overcome that fear to give people the confidence to keep protesting?
I think this legislation has a grave potential to put people off protesting, but people will get round it (and I myself will be one of those people who will continue to go out and protest).
I’m grateful that history shows that the people of England and Wales protesting have changed policy and law – the suffragettes being one of the key examples. Only by taking to the streets can we bring about change, but the change will also take place in the courts when people are arrested.
If this Tory government believe they can extinguish the people’s passion for justice and protest, then they are wrong, and I recommend they read some history. I think the government are misguided, and people will continue to take to the streets and defeat this if it becomes law.
Even those who go to prison will continue the fight. I know a fracking activist who went to prison, and they were met with a positive reception in prison from people wanting to learn about fracking and why it does damage. Prison was an educating facility where they were able to share their concerns.
A few months ago, the Joint Committee of Human Rights wrote a report on Part 3 of the PCSC Bill that said that it was incompatible with human rights. What do you think this will mean?
The government have indicated that they are reviewing the Human Rights Act and the Equalities Act and they’re going to replace it with what’s called a Bill of Rights. Part of the Bill of Rights is looking at the right to freedom of expression.
The government claim they are going to strengthen freedom of expression in terms of what the media can say and be protected, but that appears to be the only part they’re going to strengthen.
Does this government give a hoot about human rights? I think the evidence before us is that they don’t, and that is extended not only to protest but to people fleeing for safety from other countries.
Nevertheless, I think they are concerned that the judiciary will tell them that the new laws are incompatible with human rights. Even when these laws come into force, they will be interpreted by the judiciary.
One example where the Supreme Court did find in protesters’ favour recently is the case of Zeigler (2019) [where the Supreme Court found that a peaceful protest that obstructed the road should not result in convictions, as it was incompatible with the protesters’ human rights to freedom of expression and assembly.
In that case, the judiciary strongly pushed back against the government. It seems to me that currently [in the case of the PCSC Bill], the judiciary are saying to the government: “You’re going too far. We will interpret these for you, and we will give you them back looking very different.”
I think this Bill is an act of tyranny against the people of England and Wales, and the judiciary will have to play a role in saving people from tyranny.
What has the House of Lords’ role been pushing back on the government’s proposals?
The House of Lords have been a bit of a vanguard in sending this back to government and saying this simply can’t pass in its current form. The House of Lords have echoed what the Human Rights Committee have suggested re: amendments.
We know the House of Lords simply roars, it has no teeth; it cannot bite. The government are aware it cannot bite. They enjoy a massive majority in Parliament. We are now reliant on MPs having some guts to say “we’re going too far”.
April 2021 Kill the Bill protest in London. Credit: Steve Eason, Flickr.
It seems like there are lots of offences being added in this Bill to do with ‘intent’. What is your opinion about the effect of making intentions criminal?
‘Intent’ in law is nothing new – we have it in other parts of legislation. ‘Going equipped’, for example, means you have an intention to do something. But when we’re applying intention to protest: clearly if I buy a tin of paint to paint a slogan on my placard, my intention is to go to a protest. I think the government will have great difficulty in the courts convicting people of the intention to peacefully protest.
How do you think ‘intent to reside’ is going to affect traveller communities?
I think the GRT community is already marginalised and oppressed within society. This Bill will give the police greater powers to move them on. In the hope that I’m not being naïve, but a saving grace for Traveller communities is that they are already a distinct group within the Human Rights Act. Any challenge to eradicate their culture, not withstanding existing legislation, can be greatly challenged in the courts.
So I think they are at risk, and the police will use these powers, but we should be doing the work of getting information to the Traveller community that they do have rights, and that their rights are enshrined in domestic and international law. They are a protected group, and should any of these bits of legislation be applied to them, they can challenge it through the courts.
What does it mean that the government are turning several things into new statutory offences, like public nuisance?
Public nuisance was a common law offence before [whereas making it into a statutory offence enshrines it more securely in law]. It’s a wide ranging power that will fall to the police to interpret, and I think that how it is enforced will depend whether the police think the protest they are policing is a ‘problem’ protest.
My advice to anybody seeking to arrange a protest is to contact Green and Black Cross (GBC). They’ve been around for 20-odd years and have a very good reputation. They feed directly into the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Peaceful Assembly and Association. The only way that we can bring international scrutiny on the police and this government is to make sure that there’s a factual record that is presented to an international body who can hold countries to account. I know that the UN isn’t all it’s meant to be, but it does serve that role. GMP was held to account for its actions at Barton Moss by the Special Rapporteur.
So I would say to people, if you’re thinking of having a protest, contact GBC Manchester if you’re up in the north. GBC Manchester covers from Birmingham right up to the borders of Northumbria.
Does GBC deal with many enquiries at the moment, and do you think the Bill is likely to increase those numbers of people needing support?
I am not a spokesperson for GBC, but I am aware GBC run Know Your Rights groups that run for half a day, and if you want an in-depth one, they can run it for a full day. If you want to be a legal observer, GBC offer great training, and I like the interactive nature of a face-to-face training session. The Law Centre allowed GBC to use their building for the last training session, and I have to say it was one of the best. The Law Centre has great facilities – such as tea and coffee!
What do you think is the importance of legal observers? Are there other ways people can protect themselves going forward at protests?
I think there will be an increasing need for legal observers from now on. GBC Legal observers are trained by solicitors and barristers, so their training is from a range of professionals with experience in protest law.
They are up to speed in terms of developments in the law and case law. It’s important that we get more people trained because the need for legal observers to be on the ground will be getting greater.
We need to watch out for the police. An example of why would be at the demonstrations against the Conservative Party conference in 2021. At that protest, undercover officers came to the attention of legal observers for the way that they were conducting themselves.
It’s when legal observers decided to record information that things changed: it was the turning point for the undercover officers to identify themselves. The undercover police were so uncomfortable that they then produced their warrant cards.
There were undercover officers from the Met [London], Devon/Cornwall and Birmingham If it wasn’t for the awareness of the legal observers to identify potential undercover police officers and monitor and record their actions. We wouldn’t have known they were there. The role of the legal observer is crucial, because we know the role of undercover officers has a shady history.
The march these officers were attending was large and peaceful. What was the role of these undercover officers? Why were up to 15 undercover officers there at all? Was their role to create mischief? Was it to listen and collect information on protesters? Was this a training exercise? It costs a lot of money to have all those officers from across the country in Manchester.
Would you suggest any other practical steps to people other than getting in touch with GBC if this Bill passes?
I think it’s self-defeating to take an individualistic approach. I think people should contact bodies who defend the right to protest, such as NetPol, Green and Black Cross, Human Rights Watch, Liberty. Official records should be kept somewhere, because we will need to rely on people’s personal accounts and experiences, and what’s why I would say to people that an individualistic approach is not helpful to the wider movement. What will help us is people working together to gather data, to present it to bodies and to challenge it.
However, if groups were wanting to put a comment out, I would make some general recommendations.
If you’re travelling to an event, you should consider letting people know. If you’re a student, let someone in your house or flats know, let your friends know, and if you don’t get back by a set time, they should try to call you. (If an unknown person answer be mindful about saying anything).
The more that people share with a close group about where they’re going, even if they don’t mention it’s a protest, is useful for safety. Folk may be detained, or may be held in a kettle by the police for long periods of time, where the media are removed from the scene so it’s difficult for them to report, so it’s really important that we’re looking out for each other.
Look after each other when you’re at a protest. Ideally go with someone and keep an eye on where your friends are.
Be mindful about taking smart phones to protests. Smart phones can be interfered with by the police or other government agencies. We’ve seen this in London and Manchester. I can give you a good example. Me and other legal observers were at a protest, and we had our smart phones with us. When we left, all our social media had been disabled – Twitter, Facebook – and it took us quite some time for it to be reinstated. We couldn’t explain it, but it just seems odd that three of us at a protest, all with different phones, had our social media disabled for no apparent reason.
The police use something called an IMSI catcher, or replicator. The van will park between the group and the nearest phone mast near. Then the signal from your phones goes through the van and they capture everybody’s data before it gets to the mast. It’s been happening for at least six years.
An IMSI catcher van and its apparatus. This collects data from smart devices such as mobile phones in the vicinity.
There is a lot in the Bill about giving police access to even more data, isn’t there?
Yeah, and they don’t need it because they’re already doing a lot of it! These IMSI vans are often out of sights of the protest, they tend to be where the nearest mast is. So that could be in a backstreet – hence you’ll sometimes see legal observers there, because a legal observer isn’t just recording what’s going on at the protest, they’re recording what’s going on in the background.
Finally, are there enough protest lawyers out there to deal with the consequences of this Bill – and if not, how would you suggest people expand that sector?
There aren’t enough activist lawyers. The Law Society has identified what it calls ‘Legal Aid deserts’, not just for civil legal aid but also for criminal legal aid. Robert Lizar’s, as recognised specialist protest lawyers, are probably the only lawyers with expertise in protest outside of Birmingham and as far as Northumberland. There’s a massive drought.
The media have played a significant role in portraying activist lawyers as ‘fat cat’ lawyers rolling in money. Anybody who works in public defence knows that we’re not rolling in money. The reason why I do that is that if I don’t, somebody may lose their liberty, somebody may lose their rights – and if somebody loses their rights, then those rights will be taken from me and my friends and family. It’s simply unequitable to let that happen. I would of course be happy to work for a handsome fee, but that’s never happened in my time defending the right to protest!
Anything else to add?
The government will not choose to repeal this Act if it gets through, so educate yourself and your communities, contact groups such as GBC, arrange for training sessions, know your rights, and I’ll see you all on the streets.
Further links related to this interview:
- Guides to Your Rights on the Green and Black Cross website: https://greenandblackcross.org/action/know-your-rights/
- Get involved with or donate to Green and Black Cross: https://greenandblackcross.org/get-involved/
