Condemnation of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers condemns the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill (‘PCSCB’) which passed its second reading on 16th March 2021. We are gravely concerned that this Bill contains multiple threats to the right to peaceful protest, lacks adequate measures to protect women, will serve to criminalise communities and is a bonfire of our basic civil liberties. 

We further note that despite its gravity, the PCSCB has been rushed through by the Government at an alarming and opportunistic rate; giving less than a week between its publication and second reading. This is a derisory timescale, and has meant that the general public, affected communities MPs and their staff, have been obstructed and denied the opportunity to fully understand what the devastating impact of this Bill will be. The Bill passed with an exclusively Tory vote of 359 votes for and a cross party vote of 263 against, with Labour MPs being told to vote against it. 

This Bill should be seen as a continuation of the slide to authoritarianism that this country has seen in recent times at the hands of a Tory government. This attack on our basic civil liberties should be seen in the same context as the Trade Union Act 2016, the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Bill (the ‘Spycops Bill’) and the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill. 

The PCSCB, dubbed the ‘Police Crackdown Bill’, will:

·     Further extend already draconian police powers, giving them new powers against static protests, granting the ability to impose allocated times and where they can be held, and enforce maximum noise limits (amongst other measures);

·     Prevent protests outside Parliament;

·     Expand powers to shut down peaceful demonstrations;

·     Introduce new offences for protesters, including on the basis of causing “serious annoyance”;

·     Increase penalties and lower the thresholds for breaching police conditions on protests; 

·     Reduce public access to the countryside by creating a trespass offence, which will serve to criminalise the way of life of Gypsy and Traveller communities.

 It is also worth noting that the Ministry of Justice, the courts and the wider justice system have been allocated no extra funding from the Treasury in its recent Budget to accommodate the demands of the PCSCB. 

As well as serving to criminalise communities, the implications and scope of this Bill are huge for any individuals calling for economic, environmental and social change, and further criminalises the right to challenge existing power structures. 

We urge the government to scrap the above provisions. We urge the Labour Party to do more to oppose the Bill and continue to stand against it. We call on our members, comrades, concerned activists and targeted communities to publicly condemn the PCSCB. The Haldane Society stands in solidarity with the individuals, groups and MPs who have publicly opposed the Bill, as well as those most affected by it. 

Solidarity with the Shrewsbury 24 in their recent Court of Appeal Hearing

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers stands in solidarity with and supports the Shrewsbury Pickets in their recent Court of Appeal hearing, heard on 3rd and 4th February 2021.

It should be noted that this appeal hearing has been long awaited, hard won, and the culmination of tireless, committed campaigning on behalf of the individuals affected, the Shrewsbury 24 Campaign and others. The case concerns building workers from North Wales who were prosecuted for picketing during the 1972 national building workers strike. Five months after the strike ended 24 pickets were picked up and charged with over 200 offences, including unlawful assembly, intimidation, affray, and six of the pickets were also charged with conspiracy to intimidate. As a result of the disputed charges, six received prison sentences and sixteen received suspended prison sentences. This is despite their consistently maintained innocence of all charges, and serious issues surrounding the fairness of their original court proceedings. Alarmingly, original witness statements were found to have been destroyed by the police and concealed from defence counsel and the court. Furthermore, the fairness of their trials was undermined through the broadcast of a highly prejudicial documentary on ITV during the first trial, which was contributed to by a covert agency within the Foreign Office.

Our Chair, Declan Owens, states the following:

‘The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers is proud of its history of solidarity with the trade union movement; a movement which has done so much to advance the material interests and wellbeing of the working class in this country and worldwide.

We're proud of the work that our Executive Committee member, Paul Heron, and Public Interest Law Centre have done in pursuing justice for Ricky Tomlinson and Arthur Murray, which has contributed so much to the campaign for justice for the Shrewsbury 24. We featured Ricky in the 74th edition of our magazine, “Socialist Lawyer”, in October 2016 where he was wearing his t-shirt entitled, "The State killed my mate. RIP Dezzie."

We look forward to this miscarriage of justice being addressed for those affected by the Court of Appeal and we pay tribute to Dezzie Warren and his family. The "enemy within" this country has always been the establishment, their political supporters and those who conspire against trade unionists and socialists. Solidarity with the Shrewsbury 24.’

Please join Haldane in support of the Shrewsbury Pickets on social media through Twitter, using the #Shrewsbury24C hashtag.

For more information please visit: https://www.shrewsbury24campaign.org.uk/

Submissions in response to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee’s ‘Call for Evidence’ on the Constitution, Democracy and Rights Commission

Introduction

1. The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers, founded in 1930, provides a well-respected and knowledgeable forum for the discussion and analysis of law and the legal system, both nationally and internationally, from a socialist perspective. We are independent of any political party and our membership comprises lawyers, academics, students and legal workers as well as trade union and labour movement affiliates. Our President is Michael Mansfield QC. Our Vice-Presidents are Geoffrey Bindman QC, Louise Christian, Liz Davies, Tess Gill, Tony Gifford QC, John Hendy QC, Helena Kennedy QC, Imran Khan QC, Catrin Lewis, Gareth Pearce, Estella Schmidt, Jeremy Smith, Frances Webber, Richard Harvey and David Watkinson. Our members and vice presidents include noteworthy experts on areas including the rule of law, access to justice, administrative law, human rights, extradition law, disability rights, amongst other areas. The contributions in this submission therefore draw upon significant professional expertise and offer a public-interested perspective into the proposed Commission.

2. A commission to examine “the broader aspects of our constitution” and “come up with proposals to restore trust in our institutions and in how our democracy operates” is to be welcomed in principle. Our submissions in response to the questions posed by the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (“the Committee”) with regards to the proposed Constitution, Democracy and Rights Commission (“the Commission”) should be read in combination with our submission to the Independent Review of Judicial Review and are informed by the following observations:

3. Successive governments have used neoliberal narratives of cost, streamlining and efficiency to effectively curtail and erode rights within the judicial system, particularly within the past decade. Meanwhile, the same governments have failed to reverse the trend of rising inequality beginning at the end of the 1970s. It is such curtailments and reductions, resulting in an increase in the burden on those who are both lacking in power and in most need of judicial remedy, combined with economic inequality, that undermine trust in our institutions and in how our democracy operates.

4. The world is experiencing a climate emergency, exacerbated by global capitalism which encourages overuse of natural resources and does not account for value beyond profit. The scale of the climate emergency we are currently experiencing means that an examination of “the broader aspects of our constitution” must necessarily include a reexamination of the natural environment’s place within the Constitution.

5. The United Kingdom must recognise its significant contribution to and responsibility for the global climate and biodiversity crises through its colonial exportation of private property ownership and capitalism. This is no exaggeration when considered in the light of the fact that by 1913, the British Empire held sway over 412 million people, 23% of the world population at the time, and by 1920, covered 35,500,000 km2 (13,700,000 sq mi), 24% of the Earth's total land mass. Given Britain’s unique history of global imperialism, any approach to a future constitution must take into account rights and duties with regards to reparations to former colonies. British imperialist ‘exceptionalism’ grounded in imperialist readings of the Constitution is not a thing of the past, as evidenced by recent disregard for international law in relation to the Good Friday Agreement, the disgraceful treatment of the Chagos Islanders and the willingness to sweep aside the Sewel Convention in passing the EU (Withdrawal Agreement) Act.

6. Today, the fluidity of international capital and its ability to transcend nation state regulation (e.g. Amazon and Apple’s scrutiny from the EU over its tax affairs) calls for increased organisation of workers and the working class. We stand with our comrades in the International Association of Democratic Lawyers and the European Lawyers for Democracy and World Human Rights in this respect, as we seek to ensure that the process of decolonisation is completed, including within the UK’s offshore tax havens and other outstanding colonial territories. In doing so, we respect the potential of international law as it currently operates but have a strong critique of its underlying premises, such as the disproportionate power that manifests in the vetoes of the permanent members of the UN Security Council. We note in this respect the injustice of the Chagos Islands and the role of the UK and the US therein: we recognise the terrible injustice of cleansing them of their native peoples for the sake of a US airbase and support calls to properly compensate the victims.

7. The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers is conscious of its history and the struggles of comrades in the past. It is in this sense, that we are acutely aware that the constitutional tectonic plates are shifting in the UK. The devolution ‘settlement’ of 1998 is under scrutiny with developments relating to Brexit. The British Government has chosen to disregard international law in its implementation of Brexit and undermine the constitutional basis of the Belfast Agreement, which is an international obligation that it is willing to breach in a “‘specific and limited” way.

8. Given the above observations, it is not only desirable, but urgently necessary that a different system be adopted. The hope of the Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers is that such a system would be a socialist republic, supported in law by a constitutional convention and citizens assemblies, with further devolution and an amended electoral system, although we recognise that it is the role of the Commission to present such solutions, and not our role in presenting these submissions.

Continue reading for our more detailed proposals for the Commission’s consideration.

Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers submission to the Independent Review of Administrative Law

Introduction

Judicial Review (JR) seeks to provide an independent mechanism within the jurisdiction of the judiciary, for the review and remedy of flawed administrative and executive decisions. The aim of JR quite simply is to redress power imbalances between those subject to the controls and discretion of these institutions’ decision makers, and those endowed with the tools and protections of state-sanctioned power.

JR serves as a vital independent check-and-balance for the challenge of government, public bodies and corporations with significant control over socially vital resources in that jurisdiction, within the bounds of Wednesbury reasonableness. The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers, founded in 1930, provides a well-respected and knowledgeable forum for the discussion and analysis of law and the legal system, both nationally and internationally, from a socialist perspective. We are independent of any political party and our membership comprises lawyers, academics, students and legal workers as well as trade union and labour movement affiliates. Our President is Michael Mansfield QC. Our Vice-Presidents are Geoffrey Bindman QC, Louise Christian, Liz Davies, Tess Gill, Tony Gifford QC, John Hendy QC, Helena Kennedy QC, Imran Khan QC, Catrin Lewis, Gareth Pearce, Estella Schmidt, Jeremy Smith, Frances Webber, Richard Harvey and David Watkinson.

Our members and vice-presidents include noteworthy experts on areas including the rule of law, access to justice, administrative law, human rights, extradition law, disability rights, amongst other areas. The contributions in this submission therefore draw upon significant professional expertise and offer a public-interested perspective into the proposed consultation.

Our responses to this consultation are informed by a context where successive governments have misused neoliberal narratives of cost, streamlining and efficiency to effectively curtail and erode rights within the judicial system, particularly within the past decade. These curtailments and reductions have resulted in an increase in the burden on those who are both lacking in power and in most need of judicial remedy.

The broader political context is also noteworthy in the stark contrasts of power between those with control over executive and administrative mechanisms as well as presence in the public discourse. This discourse is of course influenced by a lack of media plurality, lobbying from those with deep pockets, commercial pressures that limit other modalities of surfacing injustice and powerful politicians’ public positions that seek to curtail the scope and independence of the judiciary and express a marked distaste for the work of so-called “activist lawyers” and critical challenge. This is coupled with the use of procedural tools to limit the ability of the judiciary to opine on issues of relevance, as well as limiting the remedies available.

Other alternatives to JR including administrative reviews continue to be limited by obvious factors, such as power dynamics within the executive and administrative arms, but also underlying factors such as group-think within the institutions themselves and the need for trustworthy, independent and unbiased review of decisions made by those with institutional access to power and resources.

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers have intervened on behalf of the public interest throughout its history. We were particularly prescient in our warnings regarding the impact of legal aid cuts in 2011. It is a shame that the findings of the Commission on legal aid were not considered; many of the problems within the legal system, and within British society, including the abuse of public power, can be traced to the short-sighted austerity measures cutting legal aid funds and reducing its scope. We set out our specific concerns regarding the potential problems with relevant constitutional blindspots or, indeed, the conscious ideological agenda of Tory legislators below.

To continue reading the submissions, including Haldane’s answers to the Review’s specific questions, click here.

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Statement following the death of Ebru Timtik, in solidarity with all lawyers and other comrades facing persecution in Turkey

The Haldane Society honours Ebru Timtik’s courage and sacrifice in persevering in a 238-day hunger strike and death fast, while mourning her death and deploring the Turkish state’s many crimes against Ebru and her comrades.

Ebru was sentenced to 13 years and six months in prison in March 2019 for membership of a proscribed organisation, having been arrested, tried and convicted along with 17 other lawyers known for defending opponents of the AKP government. She began her hunger strike on 2 January 2020 while she persisted in challenging her conviction in Turkey’s appeal courts, based on the many abuses of her right to a fair trial. Aytaç Ünsal, who had been sentenced to 10 years and six months, joined the strike on 2 February.

As Ebru’s health deteriorated, courts and detaining authorities colluded to abuse her and weaken her resolve, hastening her death in the process. She and Aytaç applied for release from prison on health grounds but were refused, and were instead removed to separate hospitals on 31 July. Friends and family described conditions in the hospital as worse than in prison: both protesters were prevented from sleeping, and cold air was blown into Ebru’s room.

Ebru died on 27 August, but the state’s campaign of cruelty continued. The following day police abducted her body, causing fear among her mourners that she would not be allowed a burial. She was then driven directly to the site of the funeral so that friends and colleagues could not carry her body there. Those attending the funeral were attacked with teargas outside the cemetery, and police backed up with armoured vehicles and a helicopter tried to prevent people from gathering outside the Bar Association to commemorate her.

Ebru’s is the fourth death this year of a hunger striker in a Turkish prison. She is preceded by Helin Bölek, İbrahim Gökçek, and Mustafa Koçak. Each of these deaths calls on us to strengthen our solidarity with all comrades risking their lives in Turkey, and to honour their sacrifice in our own work.

As we mourn Ebru, we celebrate the news of Aytaç Ünsal’s release on 3 September, undoubtedly in response to domestic and international pressure following Ebru’s death. His release represents a victory for justice and accountability, and shows that protest remains effective even where tyranny may appear complete. We note the European Court of Human Rights’ failure to recognise the imminent danger to Aytaç’s life, days before the Turkish decision to release him on health grounds.

We now join colleagues in Turkey and across Europe in urging the release of the 16 lawyers who remain unlawfully imprisoned. We call on the British government and European Union to end their political and material support for the Turkish government, which facilitates this and other injustices.

Solidarity with Black Lives Matter following the killing of George Floyd

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers stands in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement globally.

On the 25th May 2020 in Minneapolis, an African-American male was murdered by the state. His name is George Floyd. George was subject to extreme police violence which resulted in his death. A video circulated showing a White male officer kneeling on his neck. The officer continued to do this for several minutes even as George told him he could no longer breathe. George was not resisting arrest and was in handcuffs, and the footage shows him in pain and distress. George pleas for help were ignored and his life cut short because of the actions of the police.

This comes just after the recent arrest of a former police officer for the racist murder of Ahmaud Arbery. He was murdered because a former officer and his son thought Ahmaud, who was out jogging in a white middle-class neighbourhood, was a burglar. It took public outcry on social media about the murder (which happened on 23rd February 2020 ) and video circulation of the incident for an arrest to take place on the 7th May 2020.

This is not the first instance in which black people have felt the heavy hand of the police since the lockdown measures came into place.

Since lockdown measures began, Black people in the UK and aboard have been subject to a tirade of disproportionate policing. The latest, resulting in the death of George Floyd.

The UK is not exempt from this. Black men in the UK are 40 times more likely to be stopped and search by the police. Black men also disproportionately die as a result of the use of force or restraint by the police.

The Haldane Society stands with Black Lives Matter globally and calls for an end to racist policing.

Please support Haldane in condemning the recent unjust Murder of George Floyd and many others on social media by tweet #Justceforgeorgefloyd online and using the #blacklivesmatter hashtag. Please also donate and support the Black Lives Matter movement on their page.

You can also support some UK racial justice organisations here.

Statement against the prosecution of Paul and Sam Newey

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers condemns the decision to prosecute Paul and Sam Newey, who attended court remotely on 7 May, and urges that all charges against them be dropped.

Both are charged with supporting terrorism. Paul is charged with funding terrorism for allegedly sending a sum of £150 to his son Dan who in 2017 joined the People’s Protection Unit (YPG) in Rojava (the autonomous region of North and East Syria, western Kurdistan) in their fight to defend themselves against Da'esh (ISIS). Sam is accused of engaging in conduct to assist his brother to prepare or instigate acts of terrorism.

The Haldane Society also urges the release of Dan Burke, currently remanded in custody pending trial on terrorism charges related to fighting with the YPG.

The YPG is not a terrorist organisation and those who support them should not be liable to prosecution under terrorism related legislation. The YPG and its sister organisation the YPJ have defended the people of the autonomous region of Rojava first against Da’esh, and then, following the defeat of Da'esh due in large part to their efforts, against invasion from the Turkish state. The decision to treat the YPG as a terrorist organisation must be understood in the context of European states' capitulation to Turkish geopolitical interests, in an effort to maintain the violent externalisation of the EU's borders.

In line with its historic persecution of Kurdish people within its own territory, and viewing the existence of an autonomous Kurdish region as an existential threat, Turkey has repeatedly attacked Rojava. This has been both militarily, through the invasion and ongoing occupation of Afrin and airstrikes on the border in October 2019 following the withdrawal of US forces, and also through violent enactment of settler colonialism, enforcing demographic change by replacing Kurdish families in the region with displaced Arab families from other parts of Syria and Palestine (with Erdogan even stating that desert-dwelling Arabs were more suited to the region than mountain-dwelling Kurds).

Not only is Turkey a member of NATO, but the 2016 EU-Turkey deal made it an outpost of fortress Europe as Turkey agreed to stem the “flow” of refugees into European states in exchange for €6bn in EU aid. As a result, Erdogan has been able to weaponise EU anti-migration border politics, notably through lifting controls on migrants leaving Turkey on 28 February this year after suffering a heavy military loss in north-west Syria. This was with the aim of pressuring the EU to support its offensives in Syria, including those against the YPG and YPJ.

It is in this context that the prosecution of Paul and Sam Newey on terrorism-related charges must be understood. It must be seen also as part of an ongoing practice of raids, arrests and criminalisation of the Kurdish community and allies in the UK, as well as the recent inclusion of many leftist and anti-fascist groups in counter-terrorism policing guidance. The British state's willingness to criminalise its own citizens and their family members for fighting fascist forces should be deeply troubling to us all, and must be resisted.

Covid-19 and domestic abuse: Haldane supports the campaign for housing funds

The UK government has not responded adequately to increased rates of domestic abuse that have resulted from laws introduced to control the spread of coronavirus. By failing to ensure that all survivors have somewhere safe to go if they flee, the government is endangering survivors’ lives and contributing to the conditions for widespread violence and mistreatment.

Public Interest Law Centre and Southall Black Sisters have launched a legal challenge against the government’s failure to allocate ring-fenced funding for housing. They have also created an email campaign, to increase pressure on the government to provide this support as urgently as possible.

We call on our members and comrades to join and publicise this campaign.

Statement regarding the proposed extradition of Julian Assange to the United States

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers opposes the extradition of journalist and publisher Julian Assange to the United States of America. We are gravely concerned that any extradition would legitimise the extra-territorial over-reach of the US state, who are which is proposing to try Mr Assange, a non-US citizen, in the US under US laws, without First Amendment protections of free speech. If extradited, Mr. Assange, will be placed in administrative detention and, if convicted, he faces a possible prison sentence of 175 years for his actions that revealed serious war crimes. Permitting the extradition of Mr. Assange to the United States would therefore set a dangerous precedent.

The Haldane Society also notes that the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention have found Mr Assange to be a victim of prolonged and severe psychological torture and arbitrary detention. Given these findings, we urge the British government to observe its duties under international law and domestic law, to investigate and to take appropriate action to address any breaches of Mr Assange’s human rights.

We are also deeply concerned about the breaches of Mr Assange’s rights to privacy and to legal privilege. Mr Assange, like all other accused, has the right to a free and fair trial. The British state is required to afford all defendants their human rights, to honour international law whether deriving from treaty or from international custom and practice, and to ensure that British domestic law is upheld. Such considerations are not intended to be optional or dependent on the nature of the crime, the nature of the circumstances or the discretion of the judge or the State.

At the present time of pandemic, the Haldane Society also strongly supports Mr Assange’s request for immediate bail, given his chronic lung and other medical conditions, the expert testimony regarding the spread of COVID-19 in prisons and other detention facilities, and the risks therefore arising to the life of Mr Assange and all prisoners from potential exposure.