UK to act over extremist's activity

The UK government has released details of proposals which it hopes will curb animal extremists. The 'Animal Welfare - Human Rights:protecting people from animal rights extremists' document sets out how the government intends to combat the threat from such activities.

It says that the Government's strategy to tackle animal rights extremism is simple: it is to stop the extremists. They aim to do this by:

• launching a concerted drive to catch those involved and bringing the full range of existing laws to bear on their activity;

• working with the police, CPS and courts on the most effective approach, to keep

performance under review and to identify new initiatives;

• raising awareness of the methods of extremists among all the criminal justice agencies and to ensure the most effective co-ordinated response to extremism;

• ensuring that the Courts are aware that illegal acts of violence and intimidation are

committed as part of a concerted campaign of extremism which could be aggravating factors which attract higher sentences on conviction;

• introducing further legislative changes to catch the activities of extremists, including making it illegal to protest outside people's homes where the effect is to intimidate or cause distress.

The BioIndustry Association (BIA) has welcomed the publication of the proposals.

'This is a big stride forward. The BIA has led the campaign for new measures to put a stop to the violence and intimidation suffered by those involved in medical research using animals. We welcome the fact that the Government has listened to our arguments for legislative change, and we are pleased that the door has not been closed on a single piece of legislation,' said BIA Chief Executive Aisling Burnand.

'It is very positive that key points of what we were calling for, such as tackling home visits and harassment, feature in the Government's proposals, and we will do all we can to help make them work. It will be crucial to monitor the situation and conduct a review to ensure that these measures do effectively tackle animal extremism.'

In particular, the BIA welcomed the Government's intention to:

• make it an offence to protest outside homes in such a way that causes harassment, alarm or distress to residents. The new offence would also mean that police will be able to deal with protestors after the event, which will address the difficulties of having to enforce a direction at the scene of the protest.

• make it an offence for a person subject to a direction to return to the vicinity of the premises within three months for the purposes of representing to or persuading the resident or another that he should not do something he is entitled to do or that he should do something he is not obliged to do;

• extend the Protection from Harassment Act to cover harassment of two or more people who are connected (e.g. employees of the same company), even if each individual is harassed on only one occasion;

• give further consideration to making it an offence to cause economic damage to the suppliers of firms or research groups engaged in the legitimate and licensed use of animals;

• seek to identify individuals responsible for the writing and posting of material on sites where it is associated with an offence, and take action including where appropriate criminal prosecutions;

• tackle harassment by extremists who order goods or services in the name of third parties with the intention of causing distress and nuisance.

The full paper can be accessed from the link below.