The Home Office isn’t always known for its fleet-footed response to events.
But the new home secretary is clearly determined to show she is listening – and isn’t afraid to get tough.
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Shabana Mahmood has been under massive pressure to take action in response to pro-Palestine protests continuing on the streets of Manchester and London in the aftermath of Thursday’s attack, inflaming the raw pain of the Jewish community.
On Friday, alongside the prime minister and the chief constables of the Metropolitan and Greater Manchester police forces, she appealed directly to the protest organisers to show some “humanity” and pause the protests as a mark of respect for the community’s initial shock and grief.
Her criticisms were punchy, straight-talking and designed to cut through: pushing ahead with the demonstrations was “un-British” and “dishonourable”.
But words alone were clearly not enough – a message plain to see from the boos which greeted David Lammy’s arrival at the synagogue vigil and public calls from Israel’s foreign affairs minister Gideon Sa’ar for the UK government to “fight the pro-Palestinian marches and protests which bear antisemitic traits”.
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Home secretary reacts to moment Lammy was heckled
The home secretary has always been careful to defend the right of citizens to carry out lawful protests, and to make it clear that she understands demonstrators’ concerns about the situation in Gaza.
But her warnings ignored, she has now announced plans to change the law to give the police additional powers to restrict repeated protests which cause communities to feel “unsafe, intimidated and scared to leave their homes”.
Officers will not have the power to cancel protests but to move their location or change the timing – with organisers facing fines of £2,500 for ignoring these prescriptions, or potential prison sentences.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood. Pic: Reuters
She told Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips events of the past few days have highlighted a “gap” in the law which she is determined to address, with a further review of all the legislation in this area to be carried out to see if further additional powers are needed.
The Tories were this morning forced to accept such plans are “quite a good idea” – arguing only that such action should have been taken sooner.
But others fear the creeping impact of continuing to tighten the laws around protest – particularly following the public order legislation passed by the last Conservative government.
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The Liberal Democrats argue that this approach will “do nothing” to tackle those spreading antisemitic hate, while “undermining the fundamental right to protest”.
It’s a difficult balance to strike in a climate of anger, fear and rising community tensions – and there’s an open question about how much impact these rather nuanced additional powers would really have had on the weekend’s protests.
But Ms Mahmood has clearly decided an urgent response is needed – while leaving the door open to the possibility of tougher, and therefore even more controversial measures in future.
