Reid heckler accused under 2006 act

[Bernie Gunther]

You pass laws that you know perfectly well go far beyond any reasonable definition of terrorism and which magically turn several well established forms of dissent into terrorism. You use those laws to prevent heckling at Labour conferences and then you expect us to believe that they won't be used to prevent other forms of dissent that you find inconvenient. Please excuse me for being sceptical, but I don't see any reason to trust you or anything that you stand for.

 

[Fullyplumped]

You pass laws that you know perfectly well go far beyond any reasonable definition of terrorism and which magically turn several well established forms of dissent into terrorism. You use those laws to prevent heckling at Labour conferences and then you expect us to believe that they won't be used to prevent other forms of dissent that you find inconvenient. Please excuse me for being sceptical, but I don't see any reason to trust you or anything that you stand for.

I've never passed a law in my life!

But I'm hurt that you don't trust me. Wounded, so I am.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Yes. I waited a bit to see if Bernie or someone else would make the factual correction, but you must have been otherwise occupied.

And the other 600-odd people who were prevented from inconveniencing nuLabour during the same conference?

MORE than 600 people were detained under the Terrorism Act during the Labour party conference, it was reported yesterday.

Anti-Iraq war protesters, anti-Blairite OAPs and conference delegates were all detained by police under legislation that was designed to combat violent fanatics and bombers - even though none of them was suspected of terrorist links. None of those detained under Section 44 stop-and-search rules in the 2000 Terrorism Act was arrested and no-one was charged under the terrorism laws.

source

That was all a mistake too eh?

If a law is can be intentionally abused to restrict dissent that Tony finds inconvenient without the risk of bringing the alleged offences to trial and getting kicked out, that makes it all ok and lovely then does it?

People might think twice about e.g. non-violent direct action of the Greenpeace type if they thought that it might leave them open to charges of terrorism, or get their organisation proscribed as a terrorist organisation yes?

The mere threat is pretty effective without ever going near a court I think.

But of course, any such effect would be entirely unintentional wouldn't it?

My arse.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

I'd also question the happy, optimistic assumption that any abuses of this legislation to restrict legitimate dissent are likely be redressed by the courts.

The use by police of anti-terror laws to stop and search demonstrators at an east London arms fair was valid, the House of Lords has ruled.

Five Law Lords unanimously rejected a civil rights group's attempt to challenge it as disproportionate.

source

 

[TAE]

... mistakenly thought they needed to use powers under anti-terrorism legislation ...

Point is, they were happy to use those powers in that way, which is not good.

 

[TAE]

I've never passed a law in my life!

You, plural, i.e. NewLabour.

 

[Jografer]

The fact that it plausibly could be used against striking health care workers or those doing non violent direct action is sufficient grounds for concern.

We can't make the assumption that it won't be so used.

It was passed in full knowledge that it could be so used.

Other anti-terror laws have been so used for example at the Labour conference, specifically to restrict dissent with no suggestion that any of the people affected, such as the octgenarian heckler Walter Wolfgang were actually terrorists.

Doomed, doomed, we're all doomed...

.... you do talk a load of bollocks, rather than working yourself into a lather about hypothetical siuations which ain't going to happen you'd be better off watching out for that asteroid that might be going to hit us...

 

[Bernie Gunther]

I don't think there is anything hypothetical about the use of anti-terror laws to restrict legitmate dissent, when there are hundreds of cases of exactly that.

 

[TAE]

Doomed, doomed, we're all doomed...

.... you do talk a load of bollocks, rather than working yourself into a lather about hypothetical siuations which ain't going to happen you'd be better off watching out for that asteroid that might be going to hit us...

Did you know that freedom to demonstrate was guaranteed under East German law? Unfortunately there were also other laws (for state security etc) which meant it was possible to out-law all anti-government demonstrations.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Going back to the nut-job and his heckling of John Reid, Darcus Howe who was present at the incident in question has something rather interesting to say about it.

... it was only a stunt, a cynical preamble to Reid's bid for the Labour Party leadership at the upcoming conference. And Abu Izzadeen, they agreed, was way off-beam, a showman full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. All the young men there had visited his meetings once or twice, but his message had fallen on stony ground.

Off went Abu Izzadeen to the BBC the following morning, calling for sharia law in the Islamic state of Britain. And Reid? He played on cue at the Labour party conference. No no-go areas, he shouted from the platform. We will go where we please, he declaimed, as he laid down the law to Abu Izzadeen and any others who questioned his presence in their midst.

As it turned out, the Sky News clash was staged by Reid and his cohorts at the Home Office. They organised the meeting, Abu Izzadeen was invited in advance - his performance guaranteed - and the press was alerted to film and report the confrontation.

source

 

[nino_savatte]

What does "encouraging terrorism" actually mean?

Did the government manage to get their way with the banning of the "glorification of terrorism"?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Here's a rather choice selection from the Joseph Rowntree Trust report 'The Rules of the Game'

These measures encourage the suppression of dissenting views well beyond the parameters of glorifying terrorism to legitimate and peaceful protests, for example, against the Iraq war or heckling the Foreign Secretary at a party conference.

Perhaps the most telling, and absurd, of examples of heavy-handed suppression was the charging in June 2006 of Steven Jago, a management consultant, under the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 for carrying a placard in Whitehall bearing – a delicious irony! – the George Orwell quotation, ‘In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.’

Jago compounded his offence by carrying several copies of an article in the American magazine Vanity Fair, headed ‘Blair’s Big Brother Legacy’ which were confiscated by the police. ‘The implication that I read from this statement at the time was that I was being accused of handing out subversive material,’ Jago said. Henry Porter, the magazine’s London editor, wrote to the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, ‘The police told Mr Jago that this was “politically motivated” material, and suggested it was evidence of his desire to break the law. I therefore seek your assurance that possession of Vanity Fair within a designated area is not regarded as “politically motivated” and evidence of conscious law-breaking.’

source (pdf!)

 

[agricola]

Funny how noone else picked up on that. Of course, it couldnt mean that it was not true, could it?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Funny how noone else picked up on that. Of course, it couldnt mean that it was not true, could it?

I'm not quite clear what you're saying isn't true. Could you clarify please?

 

[agricola]

I'm not quite clear what you're saying isn't true. Could you clarify please?

I am saying it seems strange that noone else - not even Private Eye - suggested that Izzadeen had been invited by the Home Office. I therefore wonder about the veracity of Howe's information.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Alternatively, does it not seem strange that a well-known local islamic nut-job could have got into a carefully staged nuLabour press event by accident and been allowed to rant and rave at the Home Secretary, when octegenarian holocaust survivors generally don't seem to be accorded any such latitude for disagreement?

I find Howe's account rather more plausible than that alternative, but either way, it's very clear what sort of use John Reid made of the incident a couple of days later when he made his 'no no-go areas' speech to the conference.

 

[nino_savatte]

Alternatively, does it not seem strange that a well-known local islamic nut-job could have got into a carefully staged nuLabour press event by accident and been allowed to rant and rave at the Home Secretary, when octegenarian holocaust survivors generally don't seem to be accorded any such latitude for disagreement?

I find Howe's account rather more plausible than that alternative, but either way, it's very clear what sort of use John Reid made of the incident a couple of days later when he made his 'no no-go areas' speech to the conference.

D'accord. A PR job in all but name.

 

[agricola]

Alternatively, does it not seem strange that a well-known local islamic nut-job could have got into a carefully staged nuLabour press event by accident and been allowed to rant and rave at the Home Secretary, when octegenarian holocaust survivors generally don't seem to be accorded any such latitude for disagreement?

I find Howe's account rather more plausible than that alternative, but either way, it's very clear what sort of use John Reid made of the incident a couple of days later when he made his 'no no-go areas' speech to the conference.

The alternative is what - that Brooks found out there was a meeting and went to it? Is that "less plausible" than some form of conspiracy?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Well, if that is what happened, it does rather raise some questions about what Reid's security people were doing and why they were so much less efficient in this case than the security at the Labour conference in shutting up hecklers.

In the absence of factual information one way or the other, we can only speculate.

On the other hand it is very clear that the incident was extremely serviceable for John Reid in making a speech that the JRT report I linked above characterises as 'unhelpful grandstanding'

It's also going to be interesting to see exactly what this nut case (Izzadine, not Reid) is eventually charged with.

I mean, if you're going to pass laws against certain kinds of speech, someone like that is really a gift from heaven when you want to try them out in court.

 

[agricola]

Well, if that is what happened, it does rather raise some questions about what Reid's security people were doing and why they were so much less efficient in this case than the security at the Labour conference in shutting up hecklers.

In the absence of factual information one way or the other, we can only speculate.

On the other hand it is very clear that the incident was extremely serviceable for John Reid in making a speech that the JRT report I linked above characterises as 'unhelpful grandstanding'

It's also going to be interesting to see exactly what this nut case (Izzadine, not Reid) is eventually charged with.

I mean, if you're going to pass laws against certain kinds of speech, someone like that is really a gift from heaven when you want to try them out in court.

If you watch that video of his heckling (and far be it from me to cast judgement) the security (both private and the Police) sort of mills around looking bewildered by it all; plus of course there would have been rather less of them there (and they wouldnt have been from the Govt / Labour Party) than at the Conference.

That said, I agree that Brooks and al-Moo (and successor groups) have functioned as useful idiots for this type of legislation, as well as for the BNP and other groups, largely because they are so offensive they make good copy.

 

[TAE]

I remember thinking at the time (and posting on this forum) how odd it was that someone had been able to just wander into a meeting where the home secretary was speaking. Did anyone check if he had a gun?

Never-the-less, I'd like to see some evidence that this guy had actually been invited.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

<snip> That said, I agree that Brooks and al-Moo (and successor groups) have functioned as useful idiots for this type of legislation, as well as for the BNP and other groups, largely because they are so offensive they make good copy.

Precisely.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

I remember thinking at the time (and posting on this forum) how odd it was that someone had been able to just wander into a meeting where the home secretary was speaking. Did anyone check if he had a gun?

He was a well known local extremist according to numerous sources and was already under investigation

It later transpired that Mr Izzadeen has been investigated over controversial comments about the London suicide bombings, after describing the attacks as "mujahideen activity" which would make people " wake up and smell the coffee", during a BBC Newsnight interview last year.

source

 

[agricola]

He was a well known local extremist according to numerous sources and was already under investigation source

You should remember though that such information may not have been passed to the Police (during the pre-event briefing) or private security guards, so theres a very good likelyhood they would have had no idea who he was.

 

[detective-boy]

To suggest that it was an oversight is rather implausible in the light of the very loud screaming from civil liberties organisations at the time.

I'm not sure I mean that it was an oversight as such ... more a position (or belief) that the Courts would never allow it to be interpreted in such an extreme way. I have heard ministers making comments along those lines on a number of occssions over the last few years (in relation to the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006, for instance).

It is actually very difficult to draft legislation which clearly says what it is intended to say without it being capable of some ambiguity - this is the whole reason for the interpretation rules developed by the Courts in Constitutional Law.

 

[detective-boy]

Don't think so because they didn't really damage property aws such unless you were going to be really nit picking about the cost to clear the blocakage.

It would definitely be criminal damage. There would be absolutely no doubt about that on the basis of long-standing criminal law. Whether they would find it to be "serious" damage, would be another matter - the best argument that they should would, I think, be based on the effect it had (i.e. blocking the outfall, perhaps damaging processes / causing dangers in the reactors themselves or whatever) rather than it's actual value or the cost involved in clearling it.

 

[detective-boy]

Given the use of anti-terrorism laws against Walter Wolfgang for heckling

Please don't undermine and devalue your very valid points by repeating this falsehood. Anti-terrorism laws were NOT used against Walter Wolfgang for heckling. At very worst, two dipstick officers wrongly stated that they were using anti-terrorism powers to detain him when stewards stopped him re-entering the hall and he started to remonstrate with them ("wrongly" because, on the facts of the incident, they did not actually have those powers). Sussex Police issued a statement within a day or two saying that the powers had not been used and the dipstick officers had been wrong to say they were using them.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Well, I think there is a valid point to be made there about the persistent use of section 44 (legitimately or otherwise) to harass protestors. No charges actually need to be brought in such cases for the legislation to be used to restrict dissent and it's not like Wolfgang was an isolated incident (see the Scotsman report I linked about 600 other cases at the same conference)

It was just so embarassing for them in the media that they made a fuss about apologising for it in his case.

 

[detective-boy]

It's worth mentioning again because it shows that draconian anti-terror laws are likely to be abused for the convenience of the government in power.

No. It's NOT worth mentioning again because it shows that draconian anti-terror laws are likely to be misunderstood (particularly soon after introduction) through the failure of the police service to properly train in advance of legislative change (a well-known phenomenon) and through the idiocy of individual officers ...

 

[nino_savatte]

Still, if Izzadeen was so dangerous, why was he allowed in the hall to hear The Big Man speak?