Whatever happened to the repeal of Serious Organised Crime and Police Act sections 132-138?
It’s a time when every politician desperate to keep his or her job is banging on about giving more power to the people (strange it’s taken them until now, mind).
So, I was wondering if anyone could tell me whatever happened to Gordon Brown’s nearly two year-old promise to repeal sections s132-138 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act (SOCPA) 2005, banning free protest within a kilometre of Parliament.
Update: Right. While the actual repeal is trapped in the paralysis of a dying government…
…with recession-fighting measures now central to the Government’s plans, there was no Bill to enact the constitutional “renewal” reforms…
…it seems…
…although SOCPA is still on the statute books – and can therefore still be enforced at any time – it seems like the CPS have been given orders not to proceed with any prosecutions over “demonstrations” within the 1 km radius, so the law is effectively dead.
Posted on May 26th, 2009 at 1:34pm under Civil liberties, New Labour
…although SOCPA is still on the statute books – and can therefore still be enforced at any time – it seems like the CPS have been given orders not to proceed with any prosecutions over “demonstrations” within the 1 km radius, so the law is effectively dead.
Except it’s not. It’s only sleeping until Brown or one of his successors deems it prudent to shake it back into wakefulness. So long as it’s on the statute books it’s not “effectively dead”.
That’s true. And thinking about it, nothing stops police breaking up a protest under the terms of SOCPA even if no prosecution results.
There are no laws in Oceana.
Laws enforced at the whim of government are nothing but reintroduction of the crime of sedition.
Best regards
Maybe we should organise a protest to see if they’ll use it?
I think Mark Thomas tried something similar to this a couple of years ago – deliberately trying to get arrested for the most ridiculous crimes on the statute books to show up how stupid they were.