As the crackdown on free speech accelerates, the UK government is set to ban people silently praying in their heads outside abortion clinics.
MPs voted for legislation last year that would ban silent prayer within ‘buffer zones’ 150 metres around the location of a clinic or hospital providing abortion services.
However, this has not come come into force and guidance was subsequently published allowing silent prayer within ‘safe access zones’ where activists would be able to hand out leaflets and engage in conversations with women considering abortions.
The guidance stated that, “Silent prayer, being the engagement of the mind and thought in prayer towards God, is protected as an absolute right under the Human Rights Act 1998 and should not, on its own, be considered to be an offence under any circumstances.”
The issue shot to public attention in March 2023 when campaigner Isabel Vaughan-Spruce was arrested by police for silently praying in front of a British Pregnancy Advisory Services clinic that was subject to a ‘buffer zone’ order.
🚨BREAKING: Isabel has been arrested, AGAIN, for THINKING.
— ADF UK (@ADF_UK) March 6, 2023
MPs vote TOMORROW on banning silent prayer near all abortion facilities in🏴&🏴
"You've said you're engaging in prayer, which is the offense."
"Silent prayer."
"You were still engaging in prayer, which is the offense." pic.twitter.com/AId3OguiXz
Vaughan-Spruce’s arrest drew international condemnation and was denounced by the US Commission on International Religious Freedom.
West Midlands Police later released her without charge and were forced to issue an apology after Vaughan-Spruce complained that she had been arrested for a “thought crime”.
However, such rights are set to be trampled completely as the new Labour government pushes to scrap the guidance and completely outlaw silent protest near abortion clinics, effectively criminalizing anyone who stands outside one and engages in ‘wrongthink’.
The Telegraph reports, “That ministers will now be reviewing this guidance. Pro-choice campaigners hope the review will result in both silent prayer and the handing out of leaflets being limited.”
"Home Office 'considering banning silent prayer outside abortion clinics'"
— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) August 16, 2024
Free speech is under threat in Labour Britain, and so too, it seems, is free non-speech. https://t.co/jVHuEXuOii
Dame Diana Johnson, the new policing minister, stated, “We specifically voted against proposals to allow silent prayer and consensual communication in safe access zones.”
“I notice that the Home Office has produced guidance which includes those measures being allowed.”
“I just wondered why you would do that when Parliament had been very clear that that was not the will of Parliament,” she added.
As we document in the video below, Brits are now being arrested and imprisoned for posts on social media which contain “anti-establishment rhetoric” as the purge intensifies following the recent anti-mass migration riots.
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