Kim Johnson

Today’s push to proscribe Palestine Action, a non-violent direct action group, as a terrorist organisation is a disastrous turning point of historic proportions. It risks undermining existing prosecution cases against activities by Palestine Action activists and is legally dubious. Human and civil rights organisations, lawyers and UN experts have all spoken out against the misuse of terrorism laws, calling the move unjustified and warning of a chilling effect on protest and advocacy generally, especially in relation to the defence of human rights and international law in Palestine. We have already seen the chilling effect on protest. Palestine Solidarity Campaign has been prevented from protesting outside Parliament this evening, with police placing restrictions on the demo and pushing it further down Whitehall. For hundreds of years, protests outside Parliament have gone ahead. Limiting dissent in this way should concern us all, and we have seen that in the last couple of weeks in relation to the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, abortion and the empty welfare cuts. The question that Members of this House must ask ourselves today is whether non-violent political groups should ever be designated as a terror threat. If Palestine Action is proscribed this week—