And Who Am I To Disagree?

Peter Hitchens writes:

Liberty fought tyranny in the High Court in London last week, in what I believe is one of the most important court cases of our time. The issues were simple. Is it permissible to disagree publicly with the British Government's foreign policy?

If not, how much do you have to disagree with it to be in trouble? And can you then be severely punished without a proper trial?

I have a strong personal interest in this, since I often (in fact, almost always) disagree with British foreign policy. This frequently seems to have been made by bomb-happy teenagers who have never looked at a map, opened a history book or done any proper travel.

These are surely huge issues for any country. Apart from anything else, if foreign policy cannot be criticised, how long before domestic policy is protected in the same way?

Yet this titanic and principled struggle has been taking place all but unnoticed in one of the smaller courtrooms at the Royal Courts of Justice.

The case dates back to July 2022 when the Foreign Office imposed sanctions on a video blogger called Graham Phillips, pictured, a UK citizen and former civil servant living in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine.

Described in Parliament as a 'pro-Russian propagandist', Mr Phillips was made the subject of an 'asset freeze' and is challenging the sanctions decision.

Although most people would find his views repellent and believe he has behaved badly in other ways, as the great US Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter once said: 'The safeguards of liberty have frequently been forged in controversies involving not very nice people.'

The High Court heard how sanctions mean Mr Phillips is 'experiencing hardship'. He cannot be paid for work, pay bills or his mortgage on a London house or even his Council Tax. Although he can apply for licences to be allowed to do so, he refuses on principle to live by Government permission.

Unable to afford a lawyer, a young barrister, Joshua Hitchens (no relation to me) believes the principles behind the case are so important he has taken it on without a fee.

During last week's two-day hearing before Mr Justice Swift, lawyers for the Foreign Office argued that some material produced by Mr Phillips, which has been widely shared on social media, was created in collaboration with Russia. They also pointed to an interview with Aiden Aslin, a UK national captured by Russians after travelling to Ukraine to join the fight against Russia.

Joshua Hitchens told the court that the UK Government's action was an unlawful encroachment on the right to free speech.

He argued it is an unprecedented power with serious implications for free speech and that the sanctions could not fulfil their stated aim, which is 'to prevent Russian attempts to destabilise Ukraine and undermine its territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence'.

Lawyers for the Foreign Secretary argued that the 2019 Russia (Sanctions) Regulations specified a broad range of activities. This could include speech or communication, such as propaganda or disinformation, that supported Russia's war aims.

Joshua Hitchens was arguing for liberty, with a solitary solicitor to help him. On the other side, a large and costly Foreign Office team was headed by a distinguished KC, Maya Lester. Behind her sat three other barristers, supported by about half a dozen assorted aides and assistants.

Graham Phillips (at one point accompanied by a black and white cat) watched via video link from his home somewhere in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine.

His lawyer had a simple but big point. Does the UK Government have the power it has used to punish Mr Phillips? And, if it does, is that power lawful, or does it breach the fundamental rights to free expression? The sanctions against him are a punishment, a 'draconian measure which prevents a person from living his life'.

They are penalising Mr Phillips, it was argued, for exercising his freedom of speech and they discourage him and others from exercising that right in future. It is impossible to know, Mr Phillips' barrister argued, if such rules will, in future, be applied to others. There is also no telling when they might end if they are applied. They are not like a fine or a prison sentence which, once paid or served, are over and done with.

Ms Lester had lots of small points. She argued that the expression of support for ('glorifying') the Russian invasion, of which Mr Phillips is accused, was itself some sort of material help to Russia or did damage to Ukraine.

She did not accept Mr Phillips's lawyer's point that the expression of an individual view was utterly different from the paid-for pushing of propaganda out of an official broadcasting station or pro-government newspaper. This was linked to Mr Phillips' opinions on Ukrainian military action in its eastern districts, and his attacks on neo-Nazis in Ukraine.

Mr Phillips is also accused of having been present at battles, observing them from the Russian side.

Well, this is certainly unusual. But, during the 1930s Spanish Civil War, in which Britain also did not take a direct part, British journalists covered it from both the government and rebel sides.

The BBC has reported on neo-Nazis in Ukraine, who very much exist. And Russian-speaking Ukrainian citizens have suffered at the hands of Ukrainian troops.

Ms Lester is plainly a fine lawyer with a brilliant mind, but does she know much about the history of Ukraine? Does anyone in the FO? What did they think they were doing when they sanctioned Mr Phillips, who is probably unknown to anyone important in Moscow?

Ms Lester argued that he had received payments from the Russian state broadcaster RT, (which very few people watch) but did not mention anything very recent.

The real point of the case, in which the judgment has been reserved until a later date, is this: If a British subject chooses to say things which could be said to be 'destabilising' or otherwise upsetting the Republic of Ukraine, so exactly what?

If Britain was at war with Russia in alliance with Ukraine, then no doubt such statements might be deemed some sort of treason.

But the UK, for whatever reason, has not declared war on Russia. The British Government supports Ukraine and even I, who think this policy is mad, deplore the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

But Graham Phillips is entitled to disagree with the British Government and with me.

We may not like this, or like him. But if the British Government has the power to ruin people's lives merely for disagreeing with their opinions, or for sympathising with a country it does not like, then we are not free and our own cause is polluted.

We should all be hugely grateful to barrister Joshua Hitchens for taking on this unpopular case.

In the long run, our liberty depends on people like him.

And:

Some of you will have seen the Channel 4 TV series Banged Up, in which I appeared in a simulated jail. The final two episodes were shown last week.

I do not complain about the various tricks played on me by the Left-wing makers. I expected them to do what they could to ridicule me. If I couldn't take a joke, I shouldn't have joined.

There were genuinely moving moments despite their decision to go for showbiz melodrama rather than serious thought. But I am genuinely angry about their decision to include (from long hours of recording) a short and unrepresentative clip of my cellmate, Tom Roberts, saying he was bored by the Bible. Tom actually asked me to read the Bible to him, and sometimes urged me to continue when I wanted to stop.

All the minor celebrities who took part in this programme were greatly moved by the experience of sharing our lives with former criminals we would normally have crossed the street to avoid. They'd been asked to behave as they would have done in real prison and put their hearts into it, but in several cases they also showed us great kindness and generosity which I shall not forget.

I learned much by talking through the night, often very personally indeed, with my two successive cellmates, Tom and Akhi Ayman (now a very serious Muslim), whose lives were so utterly unlike mine that we might have been from different galaxies. Akhi and I ended up praying alongside each other, I with Christian prayers and he with Muslim ones. But Channel 4 thought a former EastEnders actor taking part in a joke escape would make better TV, and who am I to disagree?