Islamist Hate Speech Is A Crime Against Democracy, It Should Be Illegal

This weekend saw the tragic loss of over 120 people in France. They were murdered by a terrorist network that we increasingly see was supported by a chain of hateful people, including those who constantly call for jihad against the West and give succour and shelter to terrorists in full knowledge of their heinous intentions. We need to shut this network down.

It is time that parliament repealed Section 73(a) of the Coroners & Justice Act 2009.

This law, passed by the last Labour government, removed sedition and seditious libel from the statute books.  British subjects should be entitled to live peacefully in a democratic society, without fear of our government’s actions or its laws being subverted.

Sedition was a crime that prevented the undermining of common law and democracy to which we owe every right we have. It made it extremely difficult for those who despise us simply for being free to abuse that freedom to assemble to call for the subversion of our democracy and oppression of our freedom of expression, by intimidation and by violence.

Sedition and seditious libel were removed from the statute books by the Coroners and Justice Act 2009. This permits individuals to incite hatred and violence towards the realm and thereby towards its subjects.

Sedition and seditious libel allow ritual humiliation of veterans returning from conflict as we saw clearly at Royal Wootton Basset. Sedition disseminates violent hateful messages and converts our public places to a university of malice against our society’s values. Proscription of a seditious organisation and not sedition is implausible: it is the seditious nature of the organisation which leads to it being banned.

It is impossible to make the case that terrorists acting last week in Paris or today in London can do so without the support of a base, a network of people willing to aid and abet this hate filled scum in attacking the fabric of our society’s existence: common law made for man, by man, that can be repealed or challenged by reason and logic.

Recriminalising sedition will make the secretive, non-violent cheerleaders of jihad far less willing and capable of supporting those wish to destroy our culture through violence. It would also make it far easier to detain and disrupt those planning such attacks at an earlier, non-specific stage of preparation or indeed recruitment.

Shouting for Britain, or our allies, to be killed or demanding Sharia law for all would be that little bit harder to do. Chastising the relatives of those falling in battle to keep us free would not be tolerated and the open recruitment of people to attack our nation would be all but impossible.

I am not calling for any new law.  I am calling for parliament to debate the repeal of a law that kept our democracy and way of life safe. I am calling for the repeal of Section 73(a) of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009. I hope you will too.