Green Party councillors and activists staged a small protest in Hereford on Saturday against the government’s imminent “draconian” policing bill.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill is approaching its final reading in the House of Lords, before amendments are approved in the Commons and it passes into law.

The most controversial aspect of the wide-ranging bill is its potential impact on the right to assembly, by giving the police the power to criminalise protests.

Ellie Chowns, leader of the Green Party councillors who are in joint control of Herefordshire Council, said: “This bill is a threat to basic civil liberties right at a time when we need to hold government to account over so many issues.

“Our democratic right to protest is being eroded.”

She explained: “This legislation has become worse following a series of amendments that have been slipped into the bill at a late stage without proper scrutiny or debate. We cannot allow that.”

RELATED NEWS:

Demonstrating on Hereford's Cathedral Green, the protesters urged the public to raise the issue with their MP – a message backed by Baroness Jenny Jones, former chair of Herefordshire Green Party and Deputy Mayor of London, and currently one of two Greens in the House of Lords.

“The government sidestepped the Commons by introducing 18 pages of draconian laws as amendments in the Lords, but if peers vote against them they cannot be reinserted,” she said.