Leicester Secular Society condemn the police raid on the Quaker Meeting House

 

Leicester Secular Society condemn the police raid on the Quaker Meeting House (27/3/25) which is a direct result of stricter protest laws that remove virtually all routes to challenge the status quo. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and the Public Order Act 2023 have gone too far in criminalising many forms of protest and allowing the police to halt actions simply deemed to be disruptive. These need to be repealed or amended to remove these restrictions on freedom of expression.

One of the principal aims of Leicester Secular Society is "Defending rationalism and free speech. We believe people should be free to express and publish their beliefs, however controversial, without fear of prosecution, persecution, or physical harm, as long as they accord the same rights to others." Indeed Leicester Secular Hall was established to enable radical speakers to set out their ideas. Kropotkin and H.M. Hyndman, the Marxist founder of the Social Democratic Federation, spoke in the Hall. The Society was one of the earliest to offer its platform to the Fabians and the "Fabian Essays", originally given in London, were later re-delivered at the Hall. George Bernard Shaw and William Morris (whose 'Art and Socialism' was delivered for the first time in Leicester Secular Hall) were early radical speakers.