Cleverly: The only fear MPs must face is the ballot box
POLICE officers must use existing powers to protect MPs from protesters, the Home Secretary said yesterday.
James Cleverly said politicians should ‘only fear the ballot box’ as he condemned demonstrators who target MPs’ homes.
He added that security minister Tom Tugendhat had written to chief constables urging them to step up after the Dorset home of Tory MP Tobias Ellwood was targeted by a pro-Palestinian group earlier this month.
Mr Cleverly’s predecessor Suella Braverman was fired last year for writing a newspaper article suggesting the police apply a ‘double standard’ in their approach to Left- and Right-wing protesters.
‘I’m very conscious that there has been increased pressure on members of Parliament,’ Mr Cleverly said. ‘Tom Tugendhat wrote to chief constables last week outlining… the powers that we expect them to use to keep elected people safe.’
The MP for Braintree in Essex, Mr Cleverly wants senior officers to ‘understand that they have our backing when they use those powers’.
He told Sky News it was nonsense for protesters to deny they were seeking to intimidate MPs, adding: ‘The only thing that MPs should fear is the ballot box.’
However, the Government’s political violence tsar has called for new police powers to disperse protests in some locations. Lord Walney, known as John Woodcock when he sat as an MP, said: ‘We ought to be looking at those sites that are crucial to the functioning of democracy on a national or local level, like MPs’ offices, like local council chambers, like Parliament itself’. Speaking on Radio 4’s Today programme, the peer called for ‘an easier and a faster process’ for police to ‘disperse [protests] more quickly, which is clearly not happening at the moment’.
A forthcoming report by Lord Walney will propose legislating for democratic sites to have protest ‘buffer zones’ – similar to those around abortion clinics. This month the Home Office unveiled plans to toughen public order powers, with new measures making it easier for police to remove road- blocking demonstrators; criminalising climbing on war memorials; and banning masks and fireworks at demonstrations.
They will be introduced as amendments to the Criminal Justice Bill currently going through Parliament – but it is unclear whether Lord Walney’s proposals will be drawn up in time to be included.
A Mail on Sunday investigation revealed last week that Just Stop Oil activists are plotting a nationwide blitz to ‘occupy MPs’ homes’ ahead of the General Election.
Two serving MPs – Labour’s Jo Cox and Conservative Sir David Amess – have been murdered in
‘Call for protest buffer zones’
the past eight years. Tory MP Mike Freer announced this month that he will stand down at the next election, after an arson attack targeted his constituency office last December.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, who has faced calls to quit as Commons Speaker over his handling of this week’s opposition day debate on a Gaza ceasefire, cited politicians’ safety as a reason for his actions during an apology to MPs. Yesterday Mr Cleverly backed Sir Lindsay.