The High Court has ruled that the UK government’s proscription of the group Palestine Action was unlawful. This is a welcome decision for advocates of free speech and the right to protest, but it is not the end of this story.
Organisations can be proscribed (banned) if the home secretary believes they are “concerned in terrorism” under the definition in the Terrorism Act 2000. But the home secretary’s power to do this has restrictions – chiefly, that such a ban must be “proportionate”.
The court decided Yvette Cooper, home secretary when the ban was introduced, was inconsistent with her own policy on this front, including by unlawfully considering that proscribing the group would offer “significant disruptive benefits” to the police.
