- Head of Republic campaign group calls for inquiry into officers’ conduct after those arrested later released without charge
- Head of the anti-monarchy group Republic, Graham Smith, is considering legal action against the police
- The Met announced it had arrested 64 people during the Coronation, including members of women’s safety groups handing out rape alarms
- Ken Marsh, the chair of the Metropolitan Police Federation, said police acted “without fear or favour”
- Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, in response to the backlash, said, “The police are operationally independent of government, they’ll make these decisions based on what they think is best”
- The Metropolitan police have defended the arrest of anti-monarchy protesters during the coronation despite announcing that no charges will be brought against them.
A backlash was inevitable
The police’s handling of these protestors was fundamentally wrong. Their arrests represented naive policing at best, and a sign of more sinister things to come at worst.
Irrespective of an individual’s opinions on certain topics and/or political movements, the right to speak and protest must be upheld at all costs. Failure to safeguard these fundamental rights will descend into a slippery slope towards authoritarianism and fascism.
This case does, however, highlight the potential consequences of constantly pushing the boundaries of what constitutes free speech. Even the most open-minded liberal person would concede that political zealotism is not always the appropriate solution to issues.
In the last few years, protestors have become increasingly brazen, performing more outrageous stunts without fear of repercussions.
Examples include glueing themselves to roads (causing traffic for miles), defacing and vandalising public and private properties, stopping newspapers being delivered via van, climbing on top of London Underground carriages and even attempting to stop live air traffic at airports by flying drones into restricted airspace, all under the guise of free speech. This was never going to be sustainable long-term.
In fact, if reports are to be believed, the government received intelligence that certain protestors had ‘planned to disrupt the occasion [King’s Coronation] by creating a stampede of horses and covering the ceremonial procession in paint’.
It is possible, therefore, that police became too heavy-handed and arrested anybody they deemed to be a security risk or who posed a threat to the smooth operation of the day’s events.
This is a key issue with the Public Order Act 2023 (POA) is that it irks many people. It essentially gives the police the power to identify and deem any political movement as ‘disruptive’, which has the potential to be weaponised against certain groups.
Practically, it also makes it harder to distinguish political groups from one another, meaning innocent people can be arrested despite having committed no crime.
Former Greater Manchester police chief Sir Peter Fahy gave evidence in Parliament that the new law was “poorly defined and far too broad”.
“This law could affect all sorts of protests in your local community, and this legislation could be used against you, and the police would be under pressure”, he said.
The cruel irony of this case has been laid bare for all to see. When political zealots push the boundaries under the guise of free speech, a resulting backlash will be inevitable, leaving society at large with less rights than they began with.
Like Covid, we have ended up with a medicine that will turn out to be worse than the disease.
What now?
It’s yet to be seen if Graham Smith, of Republic, will take legal action against the police. The Met has since expressed regret for the arrests but Mr Smith has rejected their apology.
The backlash against the police due to the arrests of the protestors is becoming more severe. Coventry South MP Zarah Sultana tweeted, “Whatever you think of the monarchy, the right to peaceful protest is fundamental to democracy. This is a chilling violation of that right.”
