31 Mar 2021 | News and features, United Kingdom
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”116514″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][vc_column_text]An author of a government report into the handling of public protests has expressed her serious concerns about the independence and impartiality of the police watchdog. The report from Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary looked at policing in the wake of the Black Lives Matter and Extinction Rebellion protests, was published on 11 March 2021 and backed Home Office proposals for tightening up the law. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill which followed sparked protests across the country.
Alice O’Keeffe, who worked as an associate editor at the HMIC, feared the conclusions may have contributed to the crackdown on the vigil for Sarah Everard on Clapham Common in south London. The 33-year-old’s killing provoked a national outcry in the UK about violence against women. Ms O’Keeffe was removed from the team tasked by Home Secretary Priti Patel to report on the policing of the vigil itself after she expressed her view that the “handling of the vigil was completely unacceptable and disproportionate.”
In its report, the HMIC concluded the police acted appropriately in handcuffing and arresting women protestors at the vigil, although it recognised coverage in the media had been a public relations disaster.
In a letter to HMIC head Sir Tom Winsor, seen by Index on Censorship, the civil servant raised her “serious and urgent concerns about breaches of the civil service code” during the earlier inspection into public protests. She raised questions about how the inspection team could be impartial when she was the only member who was not from a policing background. The letter makes a number of serious claims about the impartiality of the inspectorate:
- The civil servant was the only person on the team from a non-policing background, apart from two human rights lawyers who sat in on some discussions.
- A serving Chief Inspector from the Metropolitan Police sat on the team during the fieldwork evaluation even though this was the force originally responsible for demanding the new powers.
- There were only two women on the team of 12 (although a further woman joined later to work on case studies).
- Although a significant part of the inspection concerned the policing of Black Lives Matter protests, only one member of the team of 12 was from an ethnic minority background.
- There was no one with a specialism in equality and race on the team.
- The threat from extreme-right wing groups was not considered.
- The team demonstrated consistent bias against peaceful protest groups, drawing comparisons between them and the IRA.
- The report misrepresented public opinion on the policing of protest.
The civil servant claimed the inspectorate decided to back the government’s proposals before fieldwork has been completed. She quoted correspondence between the inspectorate and the Home Secretary from late 2020 which said the government’s proposals “would improve police effectiveness (without eroding the right to protest) and would be compatible with human rights laws. Moreover, measured legislative reform in these respects would send a clear message to protestors and police forces alike about the limits of the right to protest”.
In her letter to Sir Tom Winsor, the civil servant claimed: “The purpose of the report was not to collect evidence and then make a decision, but rather to collect evidence to support the decision that has already been made.”
Ms O’Keeffe has worked as journalist at the Guardian, the Observer and the New Statesman. She previously worked at the Equalities and Human Rights Commission.
In a statement the inspectorate confirmed it was evaluating Ms O’Keeffe’s observations. However, it said that as an editor “she was not privy to all the work which assessed and weighed the evidence in the inspection”. The final judgment was made by one of the inspectors of constabulary, it said, and approved by the board of the inspectorate.
The statement went on to explain that a thorough legal analysis carried out by external counsel had been completed by the time the letter referred to by Ms O’Keeffe was sent to the Home Secretary. No final judgement was made until fieldwork into the policing of protests had been concluded and the Home Secretary was informed the initial judgement was provisional.
HMIC said its inspection teams always include seconded police officers and that officers from the Metropolitan Police were often used. It denied peaceful protestors were equated to the IRA.
The statement concluded: “The Clapham inspection was entirely objective as is apparent from the report just published. Ms O’Keeffe was not put on the Clapham report because, by her own acknowledgement, she had already made up her mind what the conclusions should be before any evidence had been obtained.
“The independence of the inspectorate has always been conspicuous. It is led by Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary whose reputation for independence goes back many years.”
Read extracts from the letter and why Index defends the right to protest even during a pandemic.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
17 Mar 2021 | News and features, United Kingdom
Violence against women and girls begins and ends with censorship. Domestic abuse, sexual violence and all forms of exploitation rely on silence and censorship above any other weapon.
Without curtailing the freedom of a woman’s speech, you cannot curtail her physical and sexual freedoms. Every perpetrator knows that you must convince a victim that if she speaks things will get worse:
“They will take the children off you if you tell anyone.”
“If you say anything, I will have you deported.”
“I will lose my job if this ever gets out and then we would lose the house.”
And of course, the most chilling of all, the threat we associate with tyrannical regimes in faraway lands which is happening on pretty much every street in the United Kingdom:
“I will kill you and the kids if you don’t do what I say.”
The outpouring of grief by women in the wake of the death of Sarah Everard is not just because of our sorrow at her loss and the loss of all the other 119 women who fell to her death at the hands of a violent man in the last year.
The case of the killing of Sarah Everard has reminded women that we have been self censoring on behalf of society who didn’t want to hear about our fears and our pain. We have been putting on a face.
Women say to their friends when they leave them on the street, “text me when you get home.” It is our way of saying I love you and I want you to be safe from likely harm. We have made our language palatable and chipper to mask the reality of what that means. 2.3 million people are living with domestic abuse in the UK, you are likely coming across them week after week.
When you ask them how they are they say that they are fine, because even if it was safe to tell you, it isn’t socially acceptable to do so. She says she’s fine and that she is looking forward to seeing her family again, she knows you cannot bear the truth. She is censored by social norms. She literally cannot move through life truthfully because while we claim to want women to come forward, in reality you don’t want to hear about her rape last night in the queue at Tescos.
Society colludes with perpetrators of abuse by feeling too awkward to confront the scale and reality of violence suffered by women. For the last three years more than half of all violence crime was committed against women. The complaint of women over the past week, months and years and the constant drum beaten by the women’s sector is that women’s voices are not listened to.
Too often we fail to criminalise rape or sexual violence because the police and courts simply cannot find away to give a woman’s voicing of her account an equal billing to that of a man. 55,000 rapes were reported in the UK last year, less that 10 per cent were charged and made it to court and 1,800 rapists were convicted. Does this statistic scream come forward we can hear you?
All state and most private institutions don’t put in place specific measures to enable victims of violence and abuse to be freed from their social and personal censorship. It is on all of us to learn the language that helps these people speak, because at the moment we are all colluding in keeping women pretending and censoring every day. We have done this to such an extent that most women stopped noticing that they were pretending.
Society must get better at confronting and talking about the tyranny of male violence against women because if we don’t we are actively supporting tyranny on our shores.
5 Feb 2021 | Opinion, Ruth's blog, United Kingdom
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”116171″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Picture the scene.
A freelance photojournalist attends a demonstration, does his job, documents the protest, sells the images to a national newspaper and then goes home. A few hours later, five police officers arrive at his home, confiscate his equipment and his mobile phone. He is arrested in front of his family. He is taken to the police station, fingerprinted and has his DNA taken. He is then put in a cell.
You would assume that I’m describing an event that happened in Russia or Belarus or Myanmar. I could be outlining a plot in a Hollywood film. I’m not. This happened in Kent, on Thursday, last week.
Andy Aitchison is a freelance photographer. He was taking photos of a protest at Napier Barracks in Folkestone, where people had gathered to raise concerns about the treatment of asylum seekers held inside. Andy wasn’t part of the protest, he was there as a member of the press. He sold the images to The Guardian, among others, and then, job done, went home.
Six hours later, the police arrived at his home and arrested him in front of his children on suspicion of criminal damage. They weren’t interested in his press card or why he was there. But they knew enough to seize his equipment including the memory card holding the images and his mobile phone. He was taken to the local police station, processed, fingerprinted, had his DNA taken and then held in a cell for seven hours.
When they finally released him, he was remanded on bail until 22 February and barred from going back to the Napier Barracks. This prevented him from covering the impact of a fire that occurred on the site the following day.
Andy is a journalist. He is registered with the National Union of Journalists. He is protected under Article 10 of the Human Rights Act.
The British Government talks a good game on media freedom. They are launching a National Action Plan for the Safety of Journalists. They are proposing legislation to protect free speech on campus. They have spoken out about Putin’s show trial of Navalny. Of Lukashenko’s repressive regime. Of the military coup in Myanmar. But what credibility do they have if they are enabling British journalists to be arrested on UK soil – for doing their job?
Index is truly disgusted at this behaviour. The authorities have absolutely no right to arrest a journalist for doing his job. Andy needs to be de-arrested immediately. His equipment needs to be returned to him immediately. And he needs an apology.
The British Government has zero moral authority to promote free speech and free expression around the world if they won’t abide by it at home.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][three_column_post title=”You may also want to read” category_id=”41669″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
15 Dec 2020 | News and features, Statements
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Today, Tuesday, the British government has finally responded to its own consultation on Online Harms. Our role at Index on Censorship is to defend free expression and free speech for all citizens wherever they live. This includes in the UK.
Index has significant concerns about the government’s proposals and their unintended consequences on our collective right to free speech. We are concerned about the global impact of these proposals and the message that is being sent by the British government – by instituting restrictive policies for social media companies – to repressive regimes who relentlessly seek to undermine the rights of their citizens.
While acknowledging that there are problems with regulation of online platforms, Index will be engaging with policy makers to try and make this legislation better in protecting our right to free expression.
Our key concerns are:
- Legal but harmful
The British government is proposing a new classification of speech. Legal but harmful content, such as abuse, would be deemed illegal online but would be perfectly acceptable offline. A lack of consistency in our legal framework for speech is ludicrous and would have significant unintended consequences.
- Emphasis on the platforms not the perpetrators
The penalties outlined in these proposals focus on the role of the platforms to regulate their online spaces – not their customers who seemingly have limited personal responsibility. It also fails to acknowledge that this is a cultural problem and therefore needs a carrot as well as a stick.
- No one is going to be fined for deleting too much content
The proposals will fine social media companies for not complying with the new regulatory framework. Although ministers have issued warm words about protecting freedom of speech it seems highly unlikely that a platform would be sanctioned for deleting too much content, leaving social media companies to always err of the side of caution and delete challenging content even if it isn’t contravening the legislation.
- Digital evidence locker
These proposals seemingly advocate the permanent removal of significant amounts of content, thus curtailing a victim’s ability to prosecute, as once deleted by a platform there is no way to retrieve the content even by law enforcement. This includes evidence of terrorism atrocities; 23% of the Syrian War Crime Archive has already been deleted by the platforms. The lack of legal protections in place for the platforms to store this content (out of sight) for access by law enforcement, journalists and academics results in a lack of prosecution and analysis. Index believes a compromise would be the creation of a legal framework to allow social media platforms to create Digital Evidence Lockers.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][/vc_column][/vc_row]
