PSPOs

The Anti-Social Behaviour Crime and Policing Act 2014 includes a swathe of unprecedentedly open-ended powers, which significantly undermine rights in public spaces.

The Manifesto Club is focusing on ‘Public Spaces Protection Orders’ (PSPOs), which give local authorities the power to ban any activity they judge to have a ‘detrimental effect’ on the ‘quality of life’ of a locality.

See our briefing document – Buskers and homeless under threat from new ASB powers

Free speech • PSPOs • Take action!

Manifesto Club response to JCHR inquiry

The Joint Commission on Human Rights (JCHR) has launched an inquiry on the freedom of expression, and issued a call for submissions. One of the questions they are investigating is: ‘Is there a need to review the wording and application of Public Space Protection Order (PSPO) legislation?’ The Manifesto Club submitted a response to the inquiry, arguing that PSPO legislation is not fit for purpose and should be urgently reviewed. Read our full submission on the parliament website.

PSPOs • Take action!

In support of PSPO reform petition

A petition has been published on the UK Parliament website calling for the review and reform of Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs). The petition states: We believe that local authorities are unfairly implementing Public Space Protections Orders that adversely impact dog owners, cyclists, bikers and others, without adequate consultation or consideration of the impact of these orders. The Government should review reform the rules for creating PSPOs, so the intention of an order has to be set out clearly in the consultation survey, consultations must have a minimum response within a certain time period, and evidence must be produced to support the…

PSPOs

A local resident takes on Peterborough’s anti-cycling PSPO

Peterborough introduced a PSPO that restricted cycling; the punishment and issuing of fines was outsourced to a private company. The result was a massive 2430 fines issued in Peterborough in 2018, largely to sensible cyclists. The council recently called a consultation on the renewing of its PSPO. David Jost, a local resident, sent the following response: Earlier this year Peterborough City Council declared ‘climate emergency and resolved to achieve’zero-carbon’ by 2030. Amongst other measures this requires a general switch from carbo-generating motor traffic to walking and cycling whenever and wherever feasible. Thus cycling needs to be given every encouragement. To ban cycling…

Free speech • PSPOs • Take action!

Manchester Council abortion clinic PSPO: Manifesto Club response

Manchester City Council is proposing a PSPO outside a Marie Stopes abortion clinic, which will include a prohibition on ‘protest, namely engage in any act of approval / disapproval or attempted act of approval / disapproval, with respect to issues related to abortion services by any means. This includes but is not limited to graphic, verbal or written means, prayer or counselling.’ While the Manifesto Club wholeheartedly supports women’s right to access abortion services without harassment or obstruction, we have grave concerns about the broad nature of this order and its impact upon freedom of speech. Here is our response below to…

Blog • PSPOs

PSPOs and the ‘Preventative State’

(A guest post by Dr Ben Stanford, Coventry University). In the 2019 Reith Lectures, former Supreme Court judge Lord Sumption described what he perceived as the law’s expanding empire into every corner of our lives. Whilst some of the law’s intervention is forced upon us, Sumption argues that two of the reasons for its expansion are down to collective choices – the growing moral and social pressures to produce conformity but also the constant quest for greater security and to reduce risk in our daily lives. Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs), introduced by the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, are…

Blog • PSPOs

How PSPOs are a threat to busking

(A guest post by Chester Bingley, head of Keep Streets Live Campaign.) The rather Orwellian-sounding Public Spaces Protection Order forms part of the 2014 Antisocial Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act. Introduced by Theresa May during her time as Home Secretary, the aim of the Act was to streamline and speed up the process of dealing with antisocial behaviour and, in the words of the White Paper that proposed it “to challenge dangerous and yobbish behaviour of those who make victims’ lives a misery“. One of the frightening things about the PSPO is that Local Authorities are effectively handed a book of blank…

Free speech • PSPOs

Comment on Birmingham school protests

Birmingham City Council is considering a PSPO to restrict parents protesting outside primary schools, in disagreement with the schools’ teaching on sexuality. Here is the Manifesto Club statement on the issue: PSPOs should not be used to restrict peaceful protest in public places. There are already powers to prosecute acts of intimidation, violence or harassment, but the peaceful expression of opinions should not be criminalised. Indeed, a PSPO exclusion zone could well be illegal: the primary legislation on PSPOs requires councils to ‘have particular regard to the rights of freedom of expression and freedom of assembly’, to ensure that these rights are…

PSPOs

Stop Kensington and Chelsea Council stamping on street entertainment

Kensington and Chelsea Council is planning a wide-ranging crack-down on street entertainment, which will severely limit, and in some areas prevent, busking in the borough. The council has drawn up a ‘voluntary code’, which includes measures such as: limiting performances to 45 minutes; banning busking before 10am or after 7pm; limitation of performers to 6, or in some areas 2 or 3; requiring buskers to have public liability insurance; requiring buskers to limit sound levels. These measures would prevent choirs or larger groups, prevent busking at peak times, and restrict busking slots to an unreasonably short period. Still worse, the council is…