Racial and Religious Hatred Bill

My Lords, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Ahmed, I do not support the Government. I approach the Bill with a strong presumption in favour of freedom of speech. I shall quote John Stuart Mill, although it is a different passage from that cited by the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker. He stated:"““If all mankind minus one were of one opinion and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind””." I would not have thought that it was necessary to restate that liberal position, but for the danger of it being overwhelmed by social arguments for suppressing unpopular and extreme views. Free speech is part of the general system of liberty that is required for humans to flourish. It is a necessary safeguard against the abuse of power and is essential for the advancement of knowledge. Mill was especially concerned with the last. A society which prevents things from being said or discussed because they cause offence is a society that has given up the quest for truth. That implies some tolerance for derogatory language, however hurtful it may be. Free speech cannot be absolute, it must be balanced against the need for privacy and to protect public order. The noble Lord, Lord Ahmed, referred to the Public Order Act 1936. I remind him that it made it an offence to use threatening, abusive or insulting language causing or likely to cause a breach of the peace. For language to be made illegal, it had to cause reasonable people to feel that it would lead to a breakdown in law. That is a clearly defensible position, building on a number of famous case law examples. The Public Order Act 1986 overturned that tradition. Part III created a new offence of stirring up racial hatred and had no intrinsic connection with public order. As Card, Cross and Jones observed in their textbook commentary:"““None of the offences under POA 1986, Part 3, requires an intent to provoke a breach of the peace, or the likelihood of such a breach, nor that it be proved that racial hatred was actually stirred up””." Moreover—back to John Stuart Mill—"““the truth of the contents of any written material or words is not a defence””." The Bill merely adds,"““stirring up hatred . . . on religious grounds””," to stirring up racial hatred. It is a bad extension to what I have always regarded as a bad Act. Given that it is not possible to repeal Part III of the Public Order Act 1986, I would leave existing legislation severely alone. The Lord Chancellor admitted that the Bill is designed to close a small gap in existing legislation—a gap so small as to appear invisible to many of us. The gap is said to be that the existing law does not cover religious attacks which are merely a cover for racial attacks.