Shades of Russia... new Bill will virtually silence public protest

THE sound of the Queen’s increasingly fragile yet still determined voice telling us what “my government” will do, had hardly faded before the more ardent, strong, impassioned ones resounded, not just through the corridors of power but in quiet corners of respectable homes, and places where birds sing and lovers meet, and in the libraries of thinking people’s minds.

And it was with one accord they now chorus one single stance... “I do protest the monstrous evil of this thing.” And the object of their ire is the intended Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. The Bill, put aside in the last parliamentary session and now resurrected by this government, and intended to be hung around the neck of the most acquiescent people on the planet, the British, should they dare to stand and shout “I do protest”.

This Moscow Putin government in Westminster intends a cultural revolution, akin to Orwellian principles, watched over by ‘Big Brother’ Boris Johnson, determined that in his Government Mr Speaker will never shout “the No’s have it, the No’s have it”. And neither would we plebeians ever “have it”, that right to publicly gather and say “I do protest”, this thing is wrong. This Bill is clearly a catch-all piece of whizz kids’ writing. It says, inter alia, it will do this... ■ Protect the police and other emergency workers and enhance the wellbeing of police officers and staff;

■ Protect the public by giving the police the tools needed to tackle crime and disorder;

■ Uphold the right to peaceful protest while providing the police with the necessary powers to stop disruptive protests from disproportionately infringing on the rights and freedoms of others.

Now tell me... what does it mean, the protection and ‘wellbeing’ of police officers? A comfortable lounge suite to rest in with a cocktail cabinet? Or not having to stand around for hours at a public demonstration that’s not good for their back? Protect them by supplying water canons and catch-all legislation that frightens the would-be protester faced with a few months in the slammer? And what exactly are “disruptive protests disproportionately infringing on the rights and freedoms of others”? It’s anything and everything. What is a ‘disruptive protest’ or an act of ‘crime and disorder’? It implies all disorder is criminal, when the word crime is not associated in any definition of the word disruptive.

Is it a group of six workers protesting and shouting about working conditions through a loud speaker, and interrupting the flow of vehicles into the factory? Or a million people walking down the street in protest against hunting of pussy cats with great Dane dogs and disrupting road traffic? Or 1,000 grannies protesting that the PM of the day is a selfobsessed bigot who would be better employed selling second hand diesel powered cars and airline tickets for a winter holiday in the Falklands?

The Bill’s wording is designed to inhibit and prevent public dissent, which for years has been our democratic right. I will rename this Bill as the ‘Silencing Bill’, as it is intended to virtually silence public protest.

It means that the moment this Bill becomes an Act of Parliament, any further public protest against it can be in contravention of the Act and punishable under law. You and I – all of us – will be silenced.

If it becomes law you can send your protest to your local or national newspaper and they might publish it... until such time as they might be told they are aiding and abetting an attempt to ferment public protest. And when they are silenced, we will have... Moscow’s Putin rule.