City of London police have been cracking down hard on religious intolerance this week and on one four letter word in particular – CULT. And when does the word cult become illegal? Curiously only when it’s applied to the Church of Scientology (CoS) - and in the Square Mile.

Around two-hundred anti-Scientology protesters gathered outside the CoS London base on Queen Victoria Street last Saturday as part of a day of action. Sporting Guy Fawkes masks, many carried signs accusing the organisation of being a cult. They were greeted by a number of City of London Police.

At 11.20, two officers approached one 15-year-old who was wearing a huge-nosed mask and holding a sign saying “Scientology is not a religion – it is a dangerous cult”. He was handed a pre-printed warning by a WPC stating, “The sign you are displaying commits an offence under Section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986 .. you are strongly advised to remove the sign with immediate effect”. He riposted with a verbatim quote from a verdict given by Justice Latey in 1984 “Some might regard this as an extension of the entertaining science fiction which Hubbard used to write before he invented and founded the cult . . Scientology is both immoral and socially obnoxious.”

One cop (A747) told SchNEWS’ man on the scene that, “the idea is that if somebody gets prosecuted there will be a test case” Police were clearly out to protect CoS’s reputation with one officer telling us, “Our solicitors at the Crown Prosecution Service have advised us that any signs saying ‘Scientology is a cult’ could be deemed offensive.” He added “They are being treated as a religious organisation for the purposes of today”.

Ten minutes later and the cops returned. The youth was chased up an alleyway and then forced to hand over his details for a court summons.

So why the sudden desire to defend Scientology so strenuously? One explanation is that a lifetime’s exposure to masonic ceremony has made London’s top cops a little more suggestible than the rest of us. Might they now be being sucked in by cult founder L. Ron Hubbard’s daffy load of old cobblers?

CRUISE CONTROL?

A more mundane explanation is that CoS has been very generous to our friends in blue. They’re not short of a few quid - after all Hubbard himself pointed out “If a man really wants to make a million dollars he should start his own religion.” Basic introductory sessions for Scientology cost up to £80. the next costs £300 etc etc. In October, a £24 million Scientology centre opened in the heart of London’s Square Mile, one of 30 “missions” in the country, including a massive HQ in East Grinstead. Up to 20 officers in the City of London Police - from constables to superintendents - have accepted hospitality worth thousands from CoS, including invites to a £500-a-head charity dinner where the guest of honour was Tom Cruise. One senior police officer appeared in a Church of Scientology video and another, Chief Superintendent Kevin Hurley, spoke at the opening of the new “mission” saying the cult was “raising the spiritual wealth of society”.

Two hours later, a similar demo was held, but this time outside the City Police’s jurisdiction. A bunch of ‘cults’ on signs were evident but the Met, perhaps as yet unconverted, had no corresponding mind-yer-language problem.

Whatever the dubious nature of the hand-in-glove relations between the City cops and the cranks, their pre-meditated use of police powers to crackdown on freedom of speech at demos fails to reflect the ‘inalienable rights to expression’ or brotherhoodly love preached by the cultists...

* For more from the shadowy ‘Anonymous’ group keen to help out by bringing down the dodgy sect, see www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCbKv9yiLiQ