An Act to abolish the common law offences of riot, rout, unlawful assembly and affray and certain statutory offences relating to public order; to create new offences relating to public order.
Before the introduction of the Public Order Act 1986, policing public order was based on various relevant common law offences, and the Public Order Act 1936. Several factors influenced the introduction of the Public Order Act 1986. Significant public disorder, such as the Southall riot in 1979, the Brixton riot that extended to other cities in 1981, and the national miners' strike and associated disorder between 1984 and 1985 – in particular the Battle of Orgreave in June 1984 – and the Battle of the Beanfield in June 1985. Furthermore, the 1983 Law Commission report, Criminal Law: Offences Relating to Public Order recommended updating the law.[3]
The Law Commission stated its desire to further to extend the codification of the law in England and Wales. It advocated the abolition of the common law offences of affray, riot, rout, and unlawful assembly. It argued the changes it recommended to public order legislation made it more practical to use, and make the law more comprehensible to the courts and juries.[2]
The long title of the Act details the intention of the Public Order Act 1986:[4]
An Act to abolish the common law offences of riot, rout, unlawful assembly and affray and certain statutory offences relating to public order; to create new offences relating to public order; to control public processions and assemblies; to control the stirring up of racial hatred; to provide for the exclusion of certain offenders from sporting events; to create a new offence relating to the contamination of or interference with goods; to confer power to direct certain trespassers to leave land; to amend section 7 of the Conspiracy, and Protection of Property Act 1875, section 1 of the Prevention of Crime Act 1953, Part V of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 1980 and the Sporting Events (Control of Alcohol etc.) Act 1985; to repeal certain obsolete or unnecessary enactments; and for connected purposes.
requires at least six clear days' written notice to be given to the police before most public processions, including details of the intended time and route, and giving the name and address of at least one person proposing to organise it; creates offences for the organisers of a procession if they do not give sufficient notice, or if the procession diverges from the notified time or route
Section 12 – Imposing conditions on public processions
provides police the power to impose conditions on processions "to prevent serious public disorder, serious criminal damage or serious disruption to the life of the community"
Section 13 – Prohibiting public processions
a chief police officer has the power to ban public processions up to three months by applying to local authority for a banning order which needs subsequent confirmation from the Home Secretary.
Section 14 – Imposing conditions on public assemblies
provides police the power to impose conditions on assemblies "to prevent serious public disorder, serious criminal damage or serious disruption to the life of the community". The conditions are limited to the specifying of:
Originally meant an assembly of 20 or more persons in a public place which is wholly or partly open to the air. The Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003 amended the act to reduce the minimum numbers of people in an assembly to two, and removed the requirement to be in the open air.
Parts 3 and 3A – Racial and religious hatred, and hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation
If the act is intended to stir up racial hatredPart 3 of the Act creates offences of
use of words or behaviour or display of written material (section 18),
publishing or distributing written material (section 19),
public performance of a play (section 20),
distributing, showing or playing a recording (section 21),
broadcasting (section 22). or
possession of racially inflammatory material (section 23)
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (November 2018)
The Act should be considered in connection with Article 11 of European Convention on Human Rights, which grants people the rights of (peaceful) assembly and freedom of association with others.
Controversies
Misuse of section 14
The police have been accused by protestors and journalists of misusing the powers in section 14 on several occasions.[7] During the 2009 G-20 London summit protests journalists were forced to leave the protests by police who threatened them with arrest.[7][8][9]
The campaign to reform section 5
The "Reform Section 5" campaign was established in May 2012 to garner support for an alteration of section 5, and led to an increase in the threshold from "abusive or insulting" to strictly "abusive" for speech restricted by the act. It was reported that under section 5 alone, 51,285 people were convicted between 2001 and 2003, 8,489 of whom were between 10 and 17 years of age.[10]
In 2013, a House of Lords amendment to a forthcoming Crime and Court Bill meant the removal of "insulting" from the definition of section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986. A subsequent House of Commons briefing paper acknowledged the government's acceptance of the amendment and detailed the reasons for its decision.[3]
Proposed amendments
In 2021 the government published the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill which would amend and strengthen the Public Order Act 1986 in certain ways, including widening the restrictions police can place on protests and demonstrations, impose conditions on one-person protests, and define what is meant by protests causing "serious disruption" to wider communities.[12]
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