New government urged to scrap anti-protest laws to restore freedom of expression
LABOUR was urged today to scrap Tory anti-protest laws and reject harmful rhetoric used to stigmatise peaceful demonstrations.
Peace, pro-Palestine, environmental and civil liberties groups called on ministers to champion the rights to free speech by repealing the draconian legislation aimed at silencing dissent.
Amnesty International led the calls as it published a new report warning of an increasingly wide range of means to quash peaceful demonstrations and silence free speech across Europe.
It called on Home Secretary Yvette Cooper to urgently scrap the public order elements of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act as well as the entirety of the Public Order Act and the Serious Disruption Regulations.
Kerry Moscogiuri, of Amnesty International UK, said: “The new government must seize this moment to halt the alarming march towards repression in the UK by repealing the anti-protest laws pushed through by the previous government and ending the harmful rhetoric being used to stigmatise those who peacefully protest.
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