Freedom of Expression (Religion or Belief System)

Some say public order offences are not the same as a blasphemy law, and that it can be legitimate to prosecute somebody for saying something that might cause wider disorder. Perhaps in some circumstances that may be so, but we should interrogate this line of thinking. First, the Crown Prosecution Service gave the game away by charging one man with causing “distress” to the “religious institution of Islam”, which is pretty much the dictionary definition of blasphemy. Secondly, twisting the law to make a protestor responsible for the violent reaction of those who will not tolerate the opinions of others is wrong; it destroys our freedom of speech. Some argue that although this may be regrettable, it is now an unavoidable consequence of the multicultural society in which we live today.

By this logic, the state must police the boundaries between different ethnic and religious groups to avoid disorder, but we should be clear that that means state intrusion and a loss of liberty on some occasions, and mob rule on others. This is the very essence of the two-tier policing row we have seen recently: rough justice for those belonging to identity groups that play by the rules, and freedom from justice for those belonging to groups willing to take to the streets and threaten violence. This is the logic of using the Public Order Act to prohibit us from saying what we like about a religion. A person may be found guilty because of the violent reaction of those offended by their actions.

From Sir Salman Rushdie to the Batley teacher still in hiding with his family, the threat of violence is what lies behind these new blasphemy laws. Perhaps we should not be surprised. There are at least 14 Muslim-majority countries where the penalty for blasphemy or apostacy is death, and we have significant diaspora populations from many of them. With the number of people here who came from those countries growing and the increasing assertiveness of organised political Islam in Britain, this is a problem that seems likely only to get more severe. But the answer is not to surrender to the mob; it is to hold the line, and that is why today I bring forward this Bill.

I said earlier that section 29J of the Public Order Act protects “criticism”, “insult” and even “abuse” of

“religions or the beliefs or practices of their adherents”.

However, that applies only to part III of the legislation, because part III introduced offences relating to racial hatred, later amended to include religious hatred. Nobody thought sections 4 and 5, which in part I of the Act make it an offence to cause “harassment, alarm or distress” by using

“threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour”

would be used to criminalise the expression of opinions about religious belief.

This Bill would therefore extend the scope of section 29J to the whole Public Order Act—thus preventing the use of sections 4 and 5 as a de facto blasphemy law—and would apply section 29J also to section 127 of the Communications Act 2003 and section 1 of the Malicious Communications Act 1988. In so doing, this Bill would restore free speech as it applies to religion in England and Wales. It would stop the police, prosecutors and judges from creating a blasphemy law from legislation that was never passed for that purpose. It would send the strongest powerful message from this place, where political power legitimately and democratically resides, that this country will not tolerate intimidation, violence or censorship, that there will be no special treatment here for Islam, and that there will be no surrender to the thugs who want to impose their beliefs and culture on the rest of us.

That Nick Timothy, John Cooper, Dr Luke Evans, Mr Richard Holden, Robert Jenrick, Rupert Lowe, Rebecca Paul, Jack Rankin, Sir Alec Shelbrooke, Bradley Thomas, Tom Tugendhat and Sir Gavin Williamson present the Bill.

Nick Timothy accordingly presented the Bill.