TRIGGERnometry - Why Are the Police Investigating “Non-crime”?

Episode Date: May 3, 2024

This authoritarian abuse of state power has to stop. Andrew's Substack - https://open.substack.com/pub/andrewdoyle/p/the-lessons-of-batley-grammar?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web Andrew's Twitter - https://twitter.com/andrewdoyle_com Advertise on TRIGGERnometry: [e-mail] Join the Mailing List: https://www.triggerpod.co.uk/#mailinglist Find TRIGGERnometry on Social Media:  https://twitter.com/triggerpod https://www.facebook.com/triggerpod/ https://www.instagram.com/triggerpod/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What business do our police forces have in investigating non-crime? Is this not the precise opposite of their purpose? It would be the equivalent of a doctor who limits his attention to the vigorous and the healthy. And yet this is precisely how our law enforcement officers are spending much of their valuable time. Between 2014 and 2019, almost 120,000 non-crime hate incidents were recorded by forces in England and Wales. Estimates now suggest that since then the figure will have risen to well over a quarter of of a million. In Scotland, the situation has arguably got even worse, what with the introduction of the SMP's new hate crime law. Police Scotland is already stretched to the limit, which is why

it recently announced its proportional response strategy, that is to say, the police will no longer investigate vandalism or theft if the crimes are unlikely to be solved. And yet, First Minister Humza-Yusuf believes that non-crime ought to be a priority. Here's what he had to say in a recent interview with STV. In terms of incidents and hate crime incidents, it's important that they are recorded because what it does is it gives police an idea of where there might be spikes in hatred. That behaviour might not be criminal, but they can then see a pattern that is simply done so police can see if there's a rise in anti-Semitism, for example, or a rising homophobia right across

the country. It's important that police are able to monitor any patterns of hatred that might emerge. It has apparently escaped Yusuf's attention that the rate of non-crime has escalated in recent years because there is no evidential threshold required for such incidents. They are recorded by police even when there is no evidence of hatred other than the perception of the victim. And these numbers become wildly inflated the more that the police appeal to the public to report them. Who would have thought that people with a grudge might exploit such a system? Yusuf comments came about because a Scottish Conservative MSP, Murder Fraser, discovered that the force recorded a non-crime

hate incident against his name. This was a result of criticism he'd posted online of the SMP's policies on gender self-identification. Choosing to identify as non-binary is as valid as choosing to identify as a cat. I'm not sure governments should be spending time on action plans for either. And Fraser is not the only politician who has fallen foul of the non-law in recent times. In 2017, the then-home secretary Amber Rudd had a non-crime hate incident recorded against her because she referred to migrant workers in a speech at the Tory Party conference. Someone took offence and contacted the police. That was all it took.

And Rachel McLean, the MP for Redditch and deputy chair of the Conservative Party, was in the news in December for reposting a tweet in which she referred to Green Party candidate Melissa Poulton as a man who wears a wig and calls himself a proud lesbian. This happened to be a statement of fact, but this didn't stop the West Mercia police adding the dreaded mark against her name. So where has all this come from? In 2014, the College of Policing, the Quango responsible for training police forces in the UK,

introduced non-crime hate incidents. They had no mandate from the government. It was more a case that activists who believe in the need to control the language of the public had become predominant, as they have in so many public institutions. The idea would be that even if someone hadn't committed a crime, signs of hate needed to be monitored in case these sentiments developed into criminal activity in the future. Philip K. Dick once described this kind of thing as pre-crime, He thought he was writing dystopian science fiction, but in actuality, he was predicting the state of the UK in the early 21st century.

Non-crime hate incidents work in the following way. If someone feels insulted or offended and perceives that the slight is motivated by hate, they can contact the police and the person in question will have a hate incident recorded against them. They usually won't be informed and the only way to find out is to submit a subject access request. Hate is defined as an offence against one of the protected characteristics, and you can find those listed on the websites of the Crown Prosecution Service and the College of Policing. Race, religion, sexual orientation, transgender identity and disability. The SMP has added a sixth category in its new hate crime legislation,

variations in sex characteristics, which is apparently related to those described as intersex. Those familiar with UK law will have noticed that this list is a riff on the protected characteristics of the Equality Act 2010. Gender reassignment has turned into transgender identity, and the category of sex has been removed entirely. In other words, the law enforcement agencies are using revised lists of their own making to better reflect their ideology. This explains why threats against women for standing up for single-sex spaces tend to be ignored by the police, while those accused of misgendering have been strong-armed into custody. And although nobody has been actually arrested for non-crime, there can be serious implications. There are certain jobs such

as teaching for which a disclosure and barring service check is a prerequisite. Applicants for posts of this kind are likely to be eliminated from consideration if a non-crime hate incident is flagged. And in any case, the principles of a liberal democracy ought to override such practices. It is deeply sinister and authoritarian to have the police recording lists of citizens who have committed wrong think. One wonders how many of us have been logged as hateful in this way. A man in Bedfordshire was slapped with a non-crime hate incident for whistling the theme tune from Bob the Builder at his neighbour, which for some reason was interpreted as racist.

Other actions that have been recorded as hate incidents by police include a disputed line call in a tennis match, a dog defecating on someone's lawn, and a man saying that he was campaigning for Brexit. Even children's playground insults have been logged as non-crime hate incidents. The lawyer, Sarah Fillamore, who has appeared on my show many times, was recorded as having committed a hateful act

when she posted a satirical tweet, which featured a picture of her puppy, along with the caption, My dog will call me a Nazi for cheese. As Fillamor has noted in relation to Yousef's recent comments on the subject, the recording of malicious and ideologically motivated complaints of hate provide the police with zero useful operational information, even assuming they can ever get round to analysing them.

This is about, says, Etzong, the Starzy technique of psychological degradation to make us afraid to make us our own jailers and our own censors. Cheaper that way than prison or bullets. Not only is all of this a huge waste of police resources and taxpayers' money, but it's not even lawful. We know this thanks to the efforts of Harry Miller, a former constable who was contacted by Humbersy Police in 2019, following a complaint by an offended party about a poem that he had shared on social media which was deemed to be transphobic. Harry, being an ex-cop, knew something was amiss. He asked the officer why the unnamed complainant was being described as a victim if no crime had been committed,

and why he was being investigated at all. To which came the baleful response, we need to check your thinking. Thankfully, Harry is a tenacious type, who took the police to the high courts with the help of the Free Speech Union. In December 2021, the Court of Appeal ruled that the recording of non-crime hate incidents is plainly an interference with freedom of expression. Earlier that year, the Home Secretary Pretty Patel had instructed the police to stop all such investigations. And in March 2023, Home Secretary Suella Braverman published new guidelines reminding police that the recording of non-crime cannot continue. But in spite of these government decrees and the High Court ruling that has emphasised its illegality, the College of Policing has merely fudged the language

of its guidance and carried on as before. And with its recent hate crime law, the SMP are just taking this to the next level. At some point, this has got to stop. Surely it's beyond the point now where the College of Policing ought to be abolished and replaced with a service that observes the law rather than the demands of activists. And surely the Scottish electorate will soon begin to wake up to the authoritarianism that is hardwired into the DNA of its own government. We are now firmly in the age of thought crime anticipated by George Orwell. If those in charge do not understand the importance of liberty, the people will have to remind them, either through the ballot box or through civil disobedience. The alternative is too chilling to contemplate. If you enjoy this

video, please do check out my substack where all of these articles appear weeks in advance. There's plenty of other material there too, so do check it out.