It's just been on the BBC local news that the Metropolitan Police are asking the Government for a new law to change, or as they say it 'clarify', the law relating to use of breach of the peace powers at violent demonstrations.

N.B. As I've said before, when a cordon is imposed it is using powers to prevent breach of the peace NOT s60 CJPOA 1994, which merely gives them the power to search and demask. Though of course it's rather handy for them to use s60 in combination with a cordon if they have already got protesters, not to mention lots of random bystanders, in one place.

It seems the police are concerned about the legality of their cordon tactics at Mayday 2001. They have probably received unfavourable advice from a barrister. There is still a chance that the courts will retrospectively legalise the cordon tactic: the history of English law is full of the courts doing this, e.g. giving the police the right to question people in custody even though this was supposedly unlawful under the Judges Rules (replaced by the Police And Criminal Evidence Act 1984 when it entered into force in 1986).

The Terrorism Act 2000 does allow police, Human Rights Act challenges notwithstanding, to arrest en masse protesters. The power, albeit in the old Prevention of Terrorism Act, was used to arrest all Kurds after their occupation of the Greek embassy when Ocalan was captured. I find it interesting they don't want to use this power much at this time. See  http://go.to/ta2000 for more on this.

The news item mentioned the new Dutch laws of Criminal Association which allows police to arrest you if you go to a violent demonstration even if you have not been violent yourself. This does suggest a gradual harmonisation of the most oppressive laws throughout the EU.

I am currently researching this area and plan to write an article shortly, though not in the next month. Some information can be found in the legal section of my website where any article will end up.