Graham Linehan was arrested over posts he made on X (Image: Getty)
Police forces are 'getting it wrong' on freedom of speech, the Chief Inspector of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services has admitted. Sir Andy Cooke said police were treating incidents as a crime when no crime has been committed, and wrongly recording others as “non-crime hate incidents”.
But he said they were scared of being criticised if they failed to act. Sir Andy called on the Government to clarify the law, and to abolish “non-crime hate incidents” entirely. It follows a series of controversies over freedom of speech in the UK which have also sparked concern in the US, with American vice-president JD Vance accusing the UK of “going down a dark path”.
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Comedian Graham Linehan, co-creator of Father Ted, was arrested at Heathrow Airport on suspicion of inciting violence in posts on the X website.
Journalist Allison Pearson was visited at home by officers from Essex Police last year following a complaint over a social media post.
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And in Warwickshire, officers logged a non-crime hate incident against someone for refusing to shake a person’s hand in a dispute over gender identity.
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Sir Andy said: “In my last inspection or one of my last inspections of the last year about activism and impartiality in policing it was quite clear that the police were getting it wrong on too many occasions in relation to what was a non-crime hate instance and what was an actual criminal offence.
“We saw many offences when we went into a number of forces where they’ve been recorded incorrectly, where they’ve been over-recorded and I think for police officers in the society we have at the moment there is a fear that if they undercook it then they will be criticised for it.
“So we did see more offences being wrongly categorised as crimes that could have been recorded as something else and some non-crime hate incidents that didn’t actually meet the definition.”
He told Times Radio that the law around non-crime hate incidents “needs clarification”, particularly around online offences which are no longer suitable:
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“I’m not here to say the police get it right every time. Our own inspections have shown that is quite clearly not the case and they need to get it right more often.
“But in order to do so there needs to be a clarification of the laws around a lot of these issues. A lot of the laws that policing has to use to deal with online offences were actually introduced before we saw the social media explosion.
"So they are not suitable in my view and a full review of the legislation that sits around this and the removal of non-crime hate incidents will certainly make life a lot more sensible for police officers and a lot more understandable for the public.”
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