Preventing those subject to banning orders
from leaving the country if the police suspect there may be grounds
for a banning order
That the police should be given “a new power effectively to prevent
a person from leaving the country where they believe there may be grounds
for making a banning order. There would be a power of arrest in that
respect”.
(All quotes are taken from Jack Straw's address to the Commons on
4 July, 2000.)
Combining the international and domestic
banning orders
This provision is contained in section
1a of the Act, where the definition of a banning order is given.
It essentially says that if a person receives a banning order, then
they will be banned from domestic and international games.
Requiring the surrender of passports
This is provided for in Schedule
1, section 14E (3) of the Act, which says; “A banning order
must…impose a requirement as to the surrender…in connection with regulated
football matches outside the United Kingdom, of the passport of the
person subject to the order”.
Essentially, if a match is considered to be‘.regulated’,
then anyone who is subject to a banning order must do two things:
Report
to a police station described in the order
(not of the person's choosing)
Surrender
their passport
Failure to comply with the requirements of is banning order means
that the person is subject to a prison sentence of up to six months
or a fine up to level five or both. The person
accused of failure to comply is tried before a magistrate, not a jury
(summary conviction).
Allowing the banning order to be made without
prior conviction
Banning orders can be made under a variety of circumstances. The
first is an extremely wide definition of violence.
Under section
14B, in which “an
application for a banning order in respect of any person may be made
by the chief officer of police for the area in which the person resides…[if
it appears that the person]…“has at any time caused or contributed
to any violence or disorder in the United Kingdom or elsewhere”.
Violence and disorder includes “threatening violence”, and
using racist, abusive words or “displaying writing or any other
thing which is threatening, abusive or insulting” (see
14C).
The police must make their application to a magistrates court.
Under section
14C, a magistrate may take into account the following factors
when deciding to award a banning order:
ź Court or tribunal appearances
in the UK or elsewhere
ź Deportation or exclusion
from any other country
ź Removal from football
grounds in the UK or elsewhere
ź Video evidence
What this means is that no prior conviction
for any crime is required for a banning order to be made. Merely being
captured on CCTV might be enough for a banning order to be placed
on someone.
Preventing those not subject to banning orders
from leaving the country if the police suspect there may be grounds
for a banning order
Under section 21A,
during the control period, if the police have “reasonable grounds”
for believing that a person has committed acts of “violence and
disorder” (as defined above), and will cause trouble at a regulated
football match then they can detain the person in custody for up to
four or six hours (depending on the rank of the police officer) whilst
they decide whether they wish to:
Require
the person to appear before a magistrate
Prevent
the person from leaving England or Wales
Require
the person to surrender his/her passport
Note that there is no requirement for anyone to be convicted of anything.
It requires only that the police have “reasonable grounds”
for suspicion, based on threats, insults or abuse.
Commentary [to be completed]
The
Act imposes unnecessary restrictions on civil liberty
The Act imposes restrictions that are not required to achieve the
purpose of the order (to stop hooligans from attending international
matches and causing trouble).
Firstly, by requiring a person to report to
a police station named in the order, the person subject to the order
is severely restricted in their movement. For example, such a person
would be unable to travel elsewhere in the country (even to see family
or relatives) if that compromised their ability to report to the police
station.
Secondly, the requirement to surrender your passport is unnecessary
and excessive. If a person subject to the order has to report to a
police station, then they can not leave the country. There is simply
no need for them to surrender their passport, and places unnecessary
restrictions on the person's freedom of travel. For example, insisting
that they surrender their passports makes applying for visas impossible,
even if the application is to travel somewhere entirely unrelated
to football.
During the debate in the House of Lords, Lord Goodman, whom I quote
at length below, addressed this issue:
“So there are two elements both of which are compulsory: one
is attending a police station and the other is surrendering the passport.
The obvious course of action is to require the subject of the order
to attend the police station at the time when a match is taking place.
That already happens in domestic banning orders. Effectively, in the
case of a match outside the United Kingdom, that prevents the subject
of the banning order travelling to watch the match.
Therefore, what on earth does an order to surrender a passport accomplish
that cannot be accomplished by a banning order? Effectively, the answer
is nothing. A subject of a banning order is not likely to be persuaded
to hand in his passport if he is not willing to comply with such an
order anyway. In either case, if he does not comply he will go to
gaol. The only possible value of a surrender of a passport is a symbolic
one.
It has been said in the press that the Germans prevented hooligans
from travelling to Euro 2000 in the Netherlands and Belgium by removing
passports from known hooligans. In fact, as became apparent last night,
that is wholly untrue. The Germans imposed reporting orders on most
of their hooligans. Under German law a passport can be required to
be surrendered only for very serious crimes and there is no question
of a football hooligan being required to surrender a passport. Sometimes
the authorities stamp a passport in such a way as to make it ineligible
for admission to the country where a match is to take place. That
is something that the Government, in this case, have decided not to
do.
The requirement to surrender a passport is wholly unnecessary. It
is not only unnecessary but for many people it is also a highly intrusive
order. It will have all sorts of effects which may happen at unpredictable
times and which may persist for long periods such as a month or more
continuously. The requirement to surrender a passport may prevent
someone from going abroad for family reasons, for work or even for
a pre-booked holiday to Florida, which is thousands of miles from
the nearest serious football match
The surrender of a passport is a serious infringement of the right
of movement and is almost certainly contrary to European Union law
unless it is proportionate to the evil which it is sought to prevent.
It may be that if the surrender of a passport was the only possible
way in which a hooligan could be prevented from going abroad, that
condition might be satisfied. But what is plain here is that, given
that a reporting order will do the job just as well, requiring the
surrender of a passport in addition is wholly disproportionate, serves
no useful purpose, is certainly contrary to European Union law and
possibly also to the Human Rights Act.
In those circumstances it is impossible to see why this provision
has been included. It should be removed from the Bill as soon as possible.
I beg to move.”
Matthew Robb
