The heavy-handed arrest of Damian Green has highlighted one set of threats to freedom of speech, thought and inquiry in Britain. But there are others, notably our draconian libel laws. As Nick Cohen writes in The Observer today:
“Listen as hard you like, but you will never hear a Law Lord tell Eady that he cannot censor writers at the behest of plutocrats, or New Scotland Yard and the Home Office tell Quick that he cannot arrest opposition MPs, or the CPS tell Thames Valley detectives that they cannot harass an innocent reporter.
No one in authority ever seems to say to the bewigged authoritarian or uniformed goon: ‘This isn’t Zimbabwe, you know. This is Britain and you just can’t do that here.’”
To be clear, Britain isn’t Zimbabwe or a police state. But that should not be the standard we are holding ourselves to; our liberties have been hard won and should be protected with zeal. It is time for this great parliamentary democracy to make sure that our laws and institutions favour liberty and protect the rights that so many of our ancestors has to fight for.
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