Nobody should be labelled a ‘domestic extremist’ for attending a peaceful rally
What does a “domestic extremist” look like?
Someone wearing a red baseball cap emblazoned with slogans claiming to make their country “great again”?
A far-right thug who uses the threat of violence in an attempt to intimidate anyone who looks different from them?
Or members of a community peacefully waving home-made placards, campaigning to protect themselves from pollution?
It’s far from a term of endearment and I doubt that many people would welcome being labelled as a “domestic extremist”, whether they fit the descriptions above or not. Yet that’s what Police Scotland sees me and other environmental activists to be.
Police Scotland has hit headlines recently for trying to infiltrate communities near the Ineos petrochemical plant at Grangemouth and disrupt other campaigns.
This is described in both their local and national planning documents, lumping peaceful protesters into the same category that includes the far-right threat posed by banned neo-Nazi groups such as Scottish Dawn and National Action.
Greens have been consistent in the cross-party fight against fracking in Scotland, but that case has also been made by members of the SNP and even people who are now government ministers.
That means members and supporters of the Greens, Labour, the SNP and members of other parties and none have been given this insulting and ludicrous label. People who have been peacefully protesting for their own communities have also been dubbed extremists.
Let me say unequivocally, anti-fracking campaigners who exercise their democratic right to protest are heroes, no matter what Police Scotland thinks of them.
If individuals, campaign groups and communities cannot peacefully campaign on issues that matter in our society without being treated as “domestic extremists”, the same category used to describe racist and fascist forces, this strikes at the heart of freedoms which are of critical importance in a democratic society.
We’ve known for years that environmental campaigners, along with peace activists and others, have in the past been spied on or infiltrated by police forces in the UK, including in Scotland, but this statement of current practice is shocking.
The section of the Police Scotland annual plan which lumps anti-fracking and animal welfare campaigners in with the far-right states an intention to “explore all opportunities to disrupt and detect their activities”. This cannot be allowed to stand.
We have a right to a guarantee that nobody will be designated by Police Scotland as domestic extremists merely for attending a peaceful rally.