As reported across the media (BBC, Express, Guido, Telegraph), the FSU has succeeded in getting a non-crime hate incident (NCHI) previously recorded against Tory MP and Deputy Party Chair for Women Rachel Maclean deleted from her record.
NCHIs are where a hate complaint is filed by police, despite no crime being committed. As FSU General Secretary Toby Young pointed out in the Spectator recently, some 120,000 people had NCHIs recorded against them in England and Wales between 2014 and 2019, including children. Particularly troubling is the fact that they show up in enhanced criminal records checks that candidates are often asked to undertake when applying for certain jobs, such as a teacher.
Writing on X last December, Ms Maclean said the Green Party “don’t know what a woman is” when they selected Melissa Poulton, a trans woman, to stand in a neighbouring Worcester constituency.
The MP for Redditch and the Villages had been responding to a tweet by X user Genevieve Gluck who, in reference to Poulton’s candidacy, had written: “A man who wears a wig and calls himself a ‘proud lesbian’ has been supported as a candidate for the Green Party. This is an insult to women…”. Reposting this tweet, Maclean had added: “While the Greens don’t know what a woman is, my Worcestershire neighbours the people of Bromsgrove certainly do.”
That same day, a complaint was received by West Mercia Police, and a crime report was created recording Maclean’s post as a NCHI. In accordance with the Code of Practice on the Recording and Retention of Personal Data (the Code) for police forces in England and Wales, she was then notified of the NCHI record.
West Mercia Police’s intervention came despite the Code, which was issued last year by the then Home Secretary Suella Braverman, clearly indicating that NCHIs should no longer be recorded simply because someone is merely offended, but only in circumstances where an incident is “clearly motivated by intentional hostility”, and where there is a “real risk of escalation causing significant harm or a criminal offence”.
In this context it’s perhaps unsurprising that when Ms Maclean challenged the recording of the NCHI on grounds of non-compliance with the Code, West Mercia Police Inspector Richard Field quickly conceded the point:
“West Mercia Police can confirm that you are entitled to freedom of expression, thought and opinion under Article 10 ECHR and we shouldn’t have recorded you’re [sic] details on the NCHI report itself. This is partly as the code is relatively new, is very subjective in parts and was completed in good faith by the officers in question. From reflecting on your views, reviewing the actual post you made on X and your rights under Article 10 ECHR, we will be removing your details from the report or any reference to you.
“Please take this as a personal apology on our incorrect recording of the matter which I wanted to front off myself having been involved in this case,” he added, decently.
So, good news – but alas, not quite good enough. Because as we pointed out while responding to this letter on Ms Maclean’s behalf, given that her NCHI record should not have been created in the first place, the only measure open to West Mercia Police in response to her complaint was not selective deletion of personal data, but deletion of the entire record.
Under section 60 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, West Mercia Police must have regard to the Code in processing personal data relating to a hate incident, with a failure to do so likely to be unlawful by virtue of the Force’s failure as a public body to take account of a relevant consideration.
We also pointed out that failure to delete the record may also be a breach of section 6 of the Human Rights Act 1998 as interpreted in accordance with the decision of the Court of Appeal in Miller v College of Policing, and in light of the requirements of the Code.
No doubt feeling that this was all getting a bit above his paygrade, Inspector Field passed our letter on to West Mercia’s Deputy Chief Constable Richard Cooper. Earlier this week, he responded as follows:
“Having sought the advice from the Legal Department and Force Crime and Incidence Registrar, it has been determined that the incident did not meet the definition of an ‘incident’ as defined by the National Standard for Incident Recording. As a result, the ‘hate incident’ and indeed the personal details have now been removed from the West Mercia Police systems.”
As Ms Maclean’s case demonstrates, the defining factor in the case of a non-crime hate incident is the complainant’s entirely subjective perception of what happened. You only have to glance at the FSU’s case files to see that what activists ‘perceive’ as ‘hateful’ is often little more than the expression of perfectly lawful views that they happen to disagree with for purely ideological reasons.
If you’re resident in Scotland and worried about having a ‘non-crime hate incident’ recorded against you following the activation of the Scottish Hate Crime Act on April 1st, join the FSU today – we’ll do everything we can to get it scrubbed from the record.
