Briefings

Briefings • CPNs

Record number of prosecutions for Community Protection Notices in 2022

Community Protection Notices (CPNs) are on-the-spot legal orders that can be issued on the basis of a police or council officer’s opinion that somebody’s conduct has a ‘detrimental effect on the quality of life’. There is no requirement for the officer to gather evidence, or even to speak to the CPN recipient, before issuing the notice. People have received CPNs banning them from wearing a bikini in their garden, looking at their neighbours, entering the town centre, feeding birds in their garden, or using leather footballs in a school playground. If a person fails to appeal a CPN within a 21-day window…

Briefings • Free speech • Public space

Do we want to still have a right to protest in 2022? The Police Bill must be stopped at all costs

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill must be stopped at all costs. This Bill would in effect remove the right to protest; it would give police officers the power to ban or place restrictions of their choice upon public demonstrations. This Bill would mean that someone could be locked up for 10 years if they put others ‘at risk of’ disease, or at risk of ‘serious inconvenience’ or ‘serious annoyance’. This Bill comes after freedom of association has effectively been suspended for months, with organisers slapped with £10,000 fines and demonstrations violently broken up by police. This Bill would mean that…

Briefings • PSPOs

Dozens of council orders now illegal under new government guidance

The Home Office has published new Statutory Guidance governing Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs), a power that has been used to ban a wide range of public activities, including ball games, rough sleeping and standing in groups. We have carried out FOI surveys into the use of the PSPO power in the period up until June 2017 (this data is available in one report published in February 2016, and another in July 2017). Using this data, we estimate that around a fifth of existing PSPOs are explicitly prohibited, or strongly advised against, by the new guidance. The important change is that the new…

Briefings • PSPOs

Statutory Guidance on PSPOs and CPNs: A campaigner’s guide

After campaigning from the Manifesto Club and others, the Home Office has released new Statutory Guidance covering the use of anti-social behaviour powers, including Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs) and Community Protection Notices (CPNs). We still believe that these powers are inherently flawed and should be scrapped altogether. This Guidance is not perfect and could have gone further, but nonetheless it makes several important changes, and could significantly limit the abuse of these new powers. Here are the significant new elements to the Statutory Guidance, below:   PUBLIC SPACES PROTECTION ORDERS GUIDANCE 1. The Guidance states that PSPOs should target the activity causing…

Briefings • PSPOs • Take action!

LGA Guidance on PSPOs: a campaigner’s guide

The Local Government Association has produced guidance on Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs), which may be useful to those seeking to oppose PSPOs locally or nationally. The guidance is non-statutory, and so councils are free to ignore it. But the guidance has advisory authority, and could be invoked by those seeking to oppose PSPOs in their area. It shows that there is some concern in councils and local authorities about the over-use of these powers, and efforts to direct them towards more reasonable uses. Some of the salient points in the guidance are below: 1. The LGA guidance suggests that PSPOs should target actually…

Briefings • On-the-spot fines • PSPOs

The Corruption of Punishment (2017)

For several years, the Manifesto Club has raised the alarm about the practice of private companies being paid on commission to issue litter fines for local authorities. It is our view that punishment should never be associated with a financial incentive; private companies should never be paid per fine. When this happens, it is inevitable that miscarriages of justice will occur. It is inevitable that these wardens will not seek to punish the worst offences, in the public interest; instead they seek to issue as many tickets as possible. Even if there are no offences, they still must issue tickets, without which they will not get paid. The result…

Briefings • PSPOs

Busybodies’ Charter Update: The 20 worst new PSPOs

Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs) – introduced in October 2014 under the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act – allow councils to ban any activity they believe to have a ‘detrimental effect’ on the ‘quality of life’. A Manifesto Club FOI survey published in February 2016 showed that 130 PSPOs had been issued by 79 local authorities – including 9 bans on swearing, three bans on rough sleeping, and 12 bans on loitering or standing in groups. Since then, the rate of new PSPOs has further increased, leading to increasingly bizarre new criminal offences. Here is our selection of the 20 worst new PSPOs,…