Police misunderstanding the scope of public order powers in Northern Ireland

Abstract

It is a common feature of public order legislation throughout the UK that those who organise public processions must give the police advance notification that they are to be held, and that it is a criminal offence to fail to do so. Whilst the European Court of Human Rights has accepted that such a requirement is not necessarily incompatible with the Article 11 freedom to peacefully assemble, recent litigation concerning the policing of the ‘flag protests’ in Belfast suggests that the officers in charge were mistaken as to the scope of their powers under the relevant legislation, the Public Processions (Northern Ireland) Act 1998, and that they failed to appreciate that the protection afforded to protestors by Article 11 has important limits.