This YouTube video shows a standoff between a British citizen and a police officer. The officer is concerned that the citizen’s walking stick is actually a ‘drinking stick’, filled with alcohol, and demands to search it. The citizen responds that he does not want it to be searched, explaining that if you unscrew the pin it will take ages to get back together. Cue surreal conversation. ‘It’s a walking stick’. Officer: ‘It’s not a drinking stick then?’ ‘I don’t drink’. Officer: ‘It’s unusual to see people walking along with objects like this. Sometimes they have a little dagger in it’. ‘I can…

After Enfield Council passed a byelaw banning spitting, other local authorities have been queuing up to do the same. So far, Croydon, Doncaster, and Havering have said that they’ll seek to outlaw the habit. Hillingdon Council, meanwhile, has defined spitting as ‘litter’ and is fining offenders under littering powers. Spitting is often rude – occasionally, in cases of exercise or illness, it is necessary. But should it be criminal? The historic ban on spitting was related to the clear public health hazard of TB, which no longer exists. The objection against spitting is that it is ‘anti-social’. Which no doubt it is,…

Under the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act of 2010, free arts events will have to pay up to £7500 for an ‘arts licence’. This appears to be an even more draconian version of the UK Licensing Act 2003, which has had a devastating effect on the live music scene in England and Wales. The idea that free, grassroots arts events need to buy a council licence before they can put on a show means the death of independent civic life. We need a licence before we can leaflet, sing, dance, or show art. This sort of rule penalises the smaller and…

An art gallery in Liverpool has been served with a ‘noise abatement notice’, prohibiting it from holding live music events. Assuming the music wasn’t that loud – this is yet another sign of the growing regulation of live music. Music is often now classified as ‘noise pollution’, and many live music events have to measure sound levels outside. Of course – not all music is to everyone’s taste, but this uniform definition of music as ‘noise’ is part of the growing official view that sees all social life as messy pollution. It’s a view that comes from the EU too – with…

After the riots, Home Secretary Theresa May proposed giving police broad new powers ‘to impose a general curfew in a particular area’. ‘In the fast-moving situation we have seen in the last week, we need to make sure the police have all the powers that are necessary.’ Other politicians have suggested new powers to force somebody to remove their face-covering, or new powers to shut down social media sites. Curfews and communication shut-downs are the mark of authoritarian regimes and martial law. They are also completely unnecessary. Virtually every area affected by rioting was already a ‘dispersal zone’ – including Tottenham, Croydon,…

City of London police are setting up ‘good behaviour zones’. The policy was first announced in this poster here. A Flickr photo captures a good behaviour zone sign on location. The justification is that City of London Police believes that ‘there are grounds to believe that members of the public have been intimidated, harassed, alarmed or distressed as a result of the presence or behaviour of groups of people within the estate acting anti-socially’. As a result: ‘If an officer feels that two or more people gathering in a public place are causing or are likely to cause anti social behaviour they…