Home Secretary describes plans to ‘change legal framework’ on UK protests

The Home Secretary has described the need “to make changes in… [the UK’s] legal framework” with regards to public order protests, describing the effect that rising antisemitism has had on the UK’s Jewish community.

During an appearance on LBC this morning, Shabana Mahmood agreed that “there’s no doubt about the fact that antisemitism in our country has been on the rise for some years now.” When asked by radio host Nick Ferrari about the scale of demonstrations, Mahmood responded by saying: “I absolutely recognise the pressure that the Jewish community feels. One of the things that was most depressing that was said to me after the Heaton Park Synagogue terrorist attack, when we lost two Jewish lives for the first time in this country for many many decades, simply killed for being Jewish – was that people said it was only a matter of time. They were expecting that attack. I don’t want Jews in our country, British Jews, citizens just like you and me, to have to live a smaller life in their own country because of this hatred.”

The Home Secretary acknowledged that “one of the challenges with these protests is that they really expose some gaps in our public order legislation”, highlighting issues such as a lack of consistency as to how police forces in different parts of the country responded to specific behaviour at such protests.

She told LBC: “I do believe we’re going to need to make changes in our legal framework here”, referring to a review she has asked Lord McDonald, a former director of the Public Prosecutions Service, to undertake. The Home Secretary referenced issues such as whether certain chants can be described as political speech or not, as well as “wider charges on conditionality for repeat protestors.”

Earlier this month Craig Guildford, Chief Constable for West Midlands police, resigned after serious concerns had been raised relating to the force’s behaviour regarding last year’s Europa League match between Aston Villa and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Mahmood, an MP for a Birmingham constituency, had publicly announced, in the wake of a damning report on the WM police’s conduct, that she had lost confidence in Guildford.

Asked about the situation by Ferrari, Mahmood said: “I think he’s done the right thing by leaving, by retiring, and we will move forward with fresh leadership… the thing that’s so important here is every community…has to be able to trust the police when they say ‘we’ve made an operational risk assessment’.”

She said that if a police force reached the conclusion that a situation was unmanageable and that they could not deal with it, “it’s a big thing for them to say and they’ve got to be able to back it up. And that’s not what happened here, and that’s why I’m glad there’s been some change.”