Reid heckler accused under 2006 act

[TAE]

As someone who has actually worked in the sort of situation you have been discussing I thought you may be interested to know what actually happens.

Is there any police related situation D.B. does not claim first hand knowledge of?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Tell you what Detective Boy, if you ever hear me mention Wolfgang again (I'll be sure to at some stage) and my words aren't quite to your liking, please take it as read that my understanding of the situation is as described below. This should save us a lot of pointless unpleasantness in future.

OK?

I think the Wolfgang case is interesting for two related reasons and perhaps its useful to be more precise about what they are.

Firstly, the guy was ejected from the nuLabour conference by burly stewards for heckling. This does not say anything about anti-terror laws but does say quite a lot about nuLabour's attitude to dissent, even from veteran members of their own party. Since the overall thrust of what I'm saying pertains to the propensity of the government for restricting inconvenient dissent, this incident is directly relevant to it.

Secondly, he was prevented from re-entering by some combination of police and stewards, and during the course of this was told that the police were acting under section 44 powers and given a section 44 slip. If I have got that wrong, then please do provide a factual correction, but that's my understanding based on the various accounts of the incident that I've read.

Now you quite correctly I believe, say that a) section 44 doesn't allow them to 'detain him', the words the police themselves used according to his MP John Austin, b) nor was the use of section 44 powers authorised in any case.

Now, you seem to think that this means the situation isn't relevant to anything but questions of police training or whatever and that I should shut up about it because you've told me to.

I happen to disagree with that though.

I think that if we're talking about the possibility of these powers being abused to restrict legitimate dissent then the inappropriate use of them as part of a wider incident in which I would happily agree stewards also played a significant role, to protect nuLabour from Walter Wolfgang's dissent is entirely relevant, even if an apology was issued afterwards.

I quite agree that the case is ambiguous in relation to the use of section 44 powers, but it's quite unambiguous in terms of nuLabour's attitude to dissent and in any case, in order to unambiguously show that these powers have been used with the appropriate authorisation to harass peaceful protestors, I have also cited the cases of the Arms Fair and Fairford.

 

[snadge]

Originally Posted by detective-boy
Whilst I agree that the definition is (probably unintentionally) extremely wide-ranging

I'm experiencing deja vu here....


I'm sure DB used that garbage when defending the abuse of the same bill when it's powers are used to arrest, detain for 48 hrs and search the house, confiscating computer equipment of someone.

cause of this " suspicious use of a mobile phone"

 

[detective-boy]

I'm experiencing deja vu here....

I certainly am ... I'm sure I've seen snadge post bollocks previously ...

 

[snadge]

I certainly am ... I'm sure I've seen snadge post bollocks previously ...

bollocks that you seem unwilling to discuss.

attacking the poster and ignoring the argument, I notice you doing this a lot.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

So, anyway. They're apparently planning to bust this (demonstrably in view of Reid's conference speech) useful idiot Izzadeen under the 2006 act for 'speech crimes.'

He's a natural for it given that he probably actually is stupid and insane enough to advocate cutting off the heads of muslim squaddies on video. So the propaganda machine will have no trouble convincing the simple that busting this nut-case for speech crimes is a fabulously sensible idea and that it demonstrates just how 'tough on terror' John Reid is, in order to thrill and perhaps bring back to the nuLabour fold an electorally significiant number of not very bright former labour voters who were thinking of switching to the BNP.

This is an interesting test case though, because given the incredibly broad definition of terrorism in the 2000 act, the 2006 legislation has all kinds of draconian potential uses in connection with e.g. advocacy of non-violent direct action, public service strikes and similar traditional means of dissent that nuLabour might find inconvenient.