LORD WALNEY’s long-anticipated report on “protecting democracy from coercion” is in fact a programme to coerce democracy into mute acquiescence in Establishment diktat.
Walney, a former Labour MP on the far right of the party who quit Labour while under a cloud of sexual harassment charges — which he denied — has been reincarnated as a peer, a lobbyist for the arms industry and an adviser to the government. He is also a long-standing champion of apartheid Israel.
And those are the interests his report serves. His aim is clear — to shut down protest against Israel’s genocide, against climate change, against the arms monopolies, and against racism.
He makes no bones about his intention to focus on what he calls the “extreme left,” describing his review as “a contribution to the much-needed task of redressing this imbalance in our understanding of the damage that can be done to society by the extreme far left.”
Essentially, he has abused his position to recommend measures which suit his personal interests.
Almost every proposal constitutes a threat to democratic rights. He wants to make protesters pay the police for the privilege. He wants to exclude demonstrations from anywhere politicians actually work.
He wants to proscribe organisations like Palestine Rebellion and Just Stop Oil, or at least take the first steps in that direction.
Above all he wants to make it easier for the police to ban the demonstrations of solidarity with the Palestinian people.
Walney’s review has been absurd in its bias. For example, he spoke to Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit about the disruption to its operations caused by pro-Palestinian protest, but did not bother to talk to Palestine Action itself.
Indeed, he did not bother to speak to any of the organisations on the left that he pontificated about.
Instead, he has served up pre-cooked conclusions, mainly addressing non-existent problems, that confirm to his prejudices and those of the Establishment he serves.
Worryingly, if unsurprisingly, his report received an immediate warm welcome from the government’s leading neoconservative Michael Gove, who described it as “brilliant.”
The Tories are itching to find a way to clamp down on the mass protests their policies have caused — above all, indifference to climate change and support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
For them, no form of protest is really legitimate, and their commitment to free speech stretches no further than the expression of views they agree with.
Labour has been initially silent on the proposals. The instinctive authoritarianism of the Starmer leadership makes it unlikely they will reject them as unequivocally as they deserve.
Indeed, Starmer may find the proposals useful to protect his own prospective government from democratic pressure, since on the most important questions he proposes a policy little different from the present administration.
But the labour movement must find its voice in defence of democratic rights and build the broadest possible anti-Walney alliance in society, drawing in all organisations and individuals concerned to protect liberty, whatever their other views.
Above all, the Tories and Lord Walney must learn that they cannot and will not defeat or demobilise the movement of solidarity with the Palestinians.
Any attempt to ban one of the national marches, as was attempted by Suella Braverman when home secretary last November, must be met, as it was then, by a vast mobilisation.
When hundreds of thousands gather to exercise their democratic rights they have the power to impose their priorities. Smarter police officers know that, which is why they have been unenthusiastic about playing the Braverman-Walney game.
But make no mistake — the Establishment is moving against democracy. Democracy must now fight back.
