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Neil Parpworth considers the decision to ban the Al Quds march & associated counter-protests
- Looks at s 13, Public Order Act 1986, when and under what circumstances it is used, and the political and legal context around a recent ban on public processions in London.
Banning public processions is not a course of action which is often taken in England and Wales. Thus, writing in 1985, LH Leigh noted that ‘in the period from 1951 to 1979, only nine banning orders were made in England and Wales’. As he proceeded to observe, ‘the power to ban is obviously highly sensitive politically in a free society, and of this chief officers of police are well aware’: see Police Powers in England and Wales (1985, 2nd ed) Butterworths, p196.
Following the enactment of the Human Rights Act 1998, any proposed banning order is now potentially subject to legal challenge on the grounds that it represents a disproportionate and unreasonable interference with freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly,
