I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
Not a quote, as many believe, from Voltaire, but by Beatrice Hall, in her 1907 book, Friends of Voltaire, writing under the pseudonym S. G. Tallentyre. Of course, it matters little who actually said it because those eighteen words, in a very real sense, form the founding principle of freedom of speech as we, in Britain, have understood it. However, over the last few years, the right to express opinion, no matter how controversial, has been severely eroded against a backdrop of intolerance and hate crime and anti-terrorist legislation.
But let's back-track for a moment. Our perception of our freedom of speech derives very much from our 'Britishness', our sense of fair play, our tradition of debate in the hallowed halls of our higher citadels of learning. It is a tradition which goes back many, many years; that we all had the right to express an opinion, but to also allow someone with a contrary opinion to disagree with us. Indeed, our very form of democratic government is based upon this very tradition within the 'Mother of Parliaments' at Westminster, where the democratic machinery demands that our Members of Parliament represent the views of the electorate in, often, heated debate, until a consensus is reached. This tradition has protected us from totalitarianistic government, or outright dictatorship, for centuries.
However, that very British tradition is being seriously undermined by other incoming cultures. It seems that one of the worst things you can do now is to express an opinion which someone else finds offensive. To offend someone who may have a differing opinion to yourself, by voicing that opinion in public, is now virtually forbidden. In particular, voicing something against a perceived ethnic minority, or minority religion, is now likely to result in possible prosecution. So the question is; Where did our freedom of speech go? The answer actually may surprise you. It has not gone anywhere because we never had that right; at least not in any legally accepted form because The United Kingdom, unlike, for instance, the USA, has no written constitution. Nowhere in law is our right to freedom of speech upheld. That is until the EU came along with the much despised and maligned Human Rights Act (HRA).
Ironically, it wasn't until the HRA came along that there was a legal definition of freedom of speech, termed in the HRA as 'Freedom of Expression'.
Human Rights Act: Article 10: Freedom of Expression
(1) Everyone has the right of freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without inference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
That sounds quite good doesn't it. By there is, of course, a caveat:
(2) The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
At the very time when it looks as though, at last, our British tradition of Freedom of Speech had been enshrined in written law, it was actually undermined in that same law which made it subject to a raft of other legislation and interpretation.
For further reading, take a look at Philip Johnston's, whatever happened to free speech?
So we find our much cherish tradition of freedom of speech is not so free after all.
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