Public space

Dispersal powers • Public space

Doncaster council’s draconian dispersal form

This is the form that Doncaster Council ‘city centre engagement officers’ use to bar people from the city centre. It shows that the pettiest council officers are being given absolute powers to order people around. The officer can ban someone if the officer thinks that the person ‘is likely to cause annoyance’ to any other person. The form allows the officer to specify when the person must leave the area (immediately/in 15 mins/30 mins/1 hour) The officer must state the ‘anti-social behaviour giving rise to the dispersal’ (this is the only slight requirement of evidence, but given the broad nature of the…

Briefings • PSPOs • Public space

Doncaster officers issue more dispersals than most police authorities

A small group of Doncaster Council officers are issuing more dispersal notices than most police authorities. In 2023, the council’s ‘City Centre Engagement Officers‘ issued 504 orders to people to leave Doncaster city centre for 24 hours. The officers counted 90 breaches, and issued 12 fixed penalty notices for breach. Data from police authorities in the year up to July 2023 found that only four authorities – Hampshire (990 dispersals), Northumbria (833), Norfolk (753), and the Metropolitan Police (522) – issued more dispersal notices than these council officers. The 14 other police authorities able to provide the information issued fewer dispersals than…

PSPOs • Public space

UK councils, stop hassling dog walkers

With Britain under lockdown, dog walkers’ daily walk with their animals is literally one of their last remaining freedoms. Yet the Manifesto Club has been receiving an increased number of complaints about arbitrary and pointless crackdowns on dog walkers. New restrictions on dog walkers have been introduced under lockdown, dog walkers have found themselves in the dock, and dog wardens have been out in force. North Somerset has decided that now is the best time to criminalise dogs off leads in the whole of the borough. This would mean that there will only be a few designated areas where dog walkers can…

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…

Coronavirus • Public space

Covid Marshals – The latest yellow-jacketed busybody

The government has announced a new band of ‘Covid marshals’, to patrol Britain’s streets and ensure that no-one is breaking social distancing rules. They will remind people to keep a two-metre distance, enforce one-way pavements, and break up groups of more than six. The Local Government Association (LGA) and police were critical of the announcement, because it has not been costed, nor the wardens given proper powers. But in fact, these institutions – and a whole class of officials – are entirely ready for this development. There is, ready and waiting, a class of wardens absolutely primed for this role. This is…

Blog • PSPOs • Public space

Against the abortion clinic PSPOs

Ealing and Portsmouth councils are planning to use Public Spaces Protection Orders (PSPOs) to ban anti-abortion protests outside abortion clinics. Ealing has approved the plan, and will start consulting at the end of January. It certainly appears that some of these protesters are guilty of harassment, with acts including blocking people’s paths, trespassing on clinic property, filming women entering the clinic, and displaying offensive imagery. However, this does not mean that PSPOs should be used to create ‘buffer zones’, which would criminalise protests or gatherings per se within a certain distance of the clinic. The proposed PSPOs would create a sort of ‘no-protest…

Blog • Public space

How falling asleep on public transport could land you with a criminal record

(A guest post by a supporter of the Manifesto Club). We hear a lot about how the ‘British justice system is the best in the world’ but I wonder if most people know how it really works. My family have just been through an awful experience, and are suffering from the fall-out. About a year ago one of my wife’s relatives took a long-distance bus journey. He was travelling alone. It was a warm summer afternoon and he picked a seat and, naturally enough, began to doze. At the first stop a party of young people got on, and a teenage woman…

Public space • Take action!

Dog owners rebelling against no-dog zones

As I said in a Spectator article, dog owners are rising up across the country in protest against no-dog zones. Here are a few of the groups taking on their council’s zero-tolerance rules… Friends of dogs in parks – Holland Park, London. A group (including vets) taking on Holland Park’s dogs-on-leads orders, which prevent dogs from getting proper exercise in this large central London park. Their petition has 3000 signatures… West Shore Dog walkers – North Wales – a well organised group opposing Conwy council’s ‘bullying and illegal’ enforcement of no-dog zones, carried out through private enforcement officers. Caroline and Tony Costa…

Booze bans • Dispersal powers • Leafleting bans • Public space

Banned in London – Online map

You are in danger of unwittingly committing an offence if you stray into one of 435 special zones in London. The boundaries of these zones are often unmarked and within them many everyday activities are either banned or restricted. A new Manifesto Club online Google map, Banned in London, reveals the 435 special zones that now cover half the area of the UK capital. In these areas, people can be fined or prosecuted for activities that would not otherwise be an offence – including leafleting, protesting, dog walking, gathering in groups, and drinking in public.   Go to the Banned in London…