I’m always pleased when the courts act in the interests of the people by hitting back at unjust laws or interpretations of laws. A good example of this is today’s Appeal Court case brought by Harry Miller and the Free Speech Union against the shadowy and extremely politically bent College of Policing.

According to a report by Guido Fawkes Harry Miller, who is also known as Harry the Owl on Twitter, has won in the appeal court over the issue of recording of the sinister and damaging allegations of ‘non crime hate incidents’. To recap this story for those who do not know the background, a few years ago Mr Miller, an ex police officer, was visited by an officer from Humberside Police who asked Mr Miller to ‘check his thinking’. The police visit was in connection to a limerick that Mr Miller had put up about transsexual women in which he stated that their ‘breasts were silicone’.

Mr Miller brought a case against Humberside and the College of Policing at the lower courts and one but it was appealed by the College of Policing. However today Mr Miller has won his case and the College of Policing have lost.

Guido Fawkes said:

The Court of Appeal has just ruled a landmark judgement that the recording of non-crime hate incidents is an unlawful interference with freedom of expression. The court explicitly says that such matters being recorded and stored in police databases is likely to have a serious “chilling effect” on public debate. Astonishing: some common sense…

The case was sparked by ex-police officer Harry Miller receiving complaints over allegedly “transphobic” tweets, leading to a visit by a Humberside police officer in January 2019 who recorded it as a “hate incident”. While the High Court last year ruled that the police force’s actions were a “disproportionate interference” with Miller’s right to freedom of expression, his challenge to the College of Police’s guidance was dismissed, with the court finding it “serves legitimate purposes and is not disproportionate”.

It appears that today’s case does indeed rule that the recording of ‘non-crime hate incidents’ does adversely affect the right to speak freely for all British subjects. This is a very very welcome ruling and hopefully should cause the College of Policing to amend this dangerous policy of recording these ‘non-crime hate incidents’ that are too often brought by people who make anonymous or semi-anonymous claims of ‘hatred’ against others. Another reason why this judgement is good news is that the presence of a ‘non-crime hate incident’ record on a person’s criminal record may end up preventing them from entering certain types of employment when an enhanced criminal record check is undertaken. People who are otherwise of exemplary good character could find themselves prevented from working with children for example merely because some snowflake has complained about a joke on social media.

This is a good result but in my view does not go far enough. What is ultimately needed is the removal from the statute books of ALL ‘hate speech’ and ‘hate crime’ legislation as they help to create different categories of people, some who are able to access protection under this ‘hate speech’ and ‘hate crime’ legislation and some who are not. These laws go against the idea that everyone should be equal before the law.

Personally what I’d like to see is the enactment in British law of something similar to the US First Amendment to the Constitution which would allow everyone to say what they damned well want with the proviso that direct, immediate and credible incitement to violence would be forbidden. Everyone wins when everyone can speak freely even if what some people say is complete and utter bollocks. Bad ideas need to be dragged into the open and debated and ‘hate speech’ laws get in the way of that process.

I welcome this judgement but it should not be seen as an end in itself. There is still a long way to go to restore the free speech rights that have been stolen from British subjects by successive governments. I applaud the hard work that has been done by Mr Miller, the Free Speech Union and all those who have contributed to this very important win for common sense and freedom.