It has fallen to Jonathan Hall KC, the independent reviewer of state threat legislation, to say the obvious in pointing out that the recent riots following the attacks in Southport show ‘why the public must be told more’ when such attacks happen.
Hall, speaking at a conference organised by the Counter Extremism Group, highlighted the dangers posed by the ‘information vacuum’ in the immediate aftermath of the stabbings. He said:
‘I think we are at a point in time where trust in public institutions should not be taken for granted and when matters of high importance in the public mind happen that, as far as is possible, the police, the government and the media should level with them.’
Hall went on to warn that trust will quickly dissipate if people sense that things are being hidden, and that is ‘exactly what the conspiracy theorists and grievance merchants depend upon’. That is certainly what appears to have happened in Southport on the day of the attack in July, when three children lost their lives.
It comes down to the contempt of court laws
Hall is perhaps too diplomatic to point out that trust in many public institutions is already quite low. Far too many people – not just conspiracy theorists – suspect the authorities of being less than forthcoming with information, except when it suits them. The aftermath of the Southport attacks will have done nothing to allay such suspicions. Hall points out that there was a ‘huge, huge interest’ in the identity of the Southport attacker and that people ‘quite reasonably wanted to know as much as possible about a massacre of children’. He is right.
That thirst for information was met by social media accounts spreading fake news, some of it with the deliberate aim of fostering anger and inciting trouble. The most egregious disinformation was the claim that the Southport suspect was a Muslim asylum-seeker newly arrived in Britain. He was, in fact, a 17-year-old male who was born in Cardiff. That information was released in a statement on the evening of the attacks by Serena Kennedy, chief constable of Merseyside Police, in an attempt to quell the growing speculation online. Yet, in the hours before, there was precious little from the police or anyone else in authority. Why?
The silence came down to the contempt of court laws, which mean that once a suspect is in custody very little can be published in order not to ‘substantially’ prejudice future legal proceedings. Yet the laws are in danger of being used as a blanket excuse to publish no information at all, rather than that which is strictly necessary to abide by the legal rules.
Hall is not being unreasonable in suggesting that critical facts don’t necessarily prejudice a fair trial until much further down the line. There is often a long time before the case comes to court and many of the details will have faded by then. Judges themselves are experienced at ensuring that juries disregard potentially prejudicial information they may have come across.
The authorities are floundering in another important way. They appear determined to live in an alternative universe in which social media simply doesn’t exist. This has led to a ridiculous situation in which official sources of reassurance, such as the police, are forced into a vow of silence while every kind of untruth is promulgated online and on social media. This is not a sensible or realistic strategy.
Hall ends with a plea for those in authority to be as ‘level and straight’ as possible with the public. He is right to do so. There is a vital public interest in transparency in the aftermath of tragedies like the Southport stabbings. Lessons must be learnt to ensure there is no repeat of the same mistakes next time.
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