More than a week after the arrival of police at the front door of the Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson regarding a tweet she had written in 2023, debate rumbles on. Was this a threat to free speech and an example of police overreach? Or was it a legitimate enquiry into the publication of content which may have had real-world consequences?
In November 2023, Pearson posted a photograph of police officers posing next to two men of colour holding a Pakistani political party’s flag. The picture had no connection to any of the protests in the wake of the 7 October attacks and Israel’s response. In a caption she labelled the men “Jew haters”. The tweet was later deleted.
On 10 November this year officers from Essex Police arrived at Pearson’s home asking if she would attend a voluntary interview. Pearson, outraged, wrote that she was being investigated over a “non-crime hate incident”. Essex Police said there was body-cam footage which showed officers had described it not as a “non-crime” issue but as the potential offence of inciting racial hatred online. Essex Police have complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation about Pearson’s allegation.
Boris Johnson called the police’s visit “appalling”, Elon Musk labelled it “deeply sinister”, the Spectator “dystopian”. They are right that we must not have police banging on journalists’ doors questioning what they have written. To move beyond widespread mistrust in politics, media, police and other institutions, which is such fertile ground for populism, we need journalism to fly free.
But was Allison Pearson’s “Jew haters” tweet really journalism? Objectivity may not be expected of a commentator, but truth and accuracy remain paramount. Pearson’s tweet had neither. At the Telegraph her opinion would have been read by an editor, sub-editors and lawyers, who hopefully would have spotted the inaccuracy. If published, a correction may have later been printed, or the piece could have been referred to the regulator.
Spewing out ill-informed words on social media is a very different pastime. The complainant (who wasn’t in the picture) told the Guardian: “Each time an influential person makes negative comments about people of colour I, as a person of colour, see an uptick in racist abuse towards me and the days after that tweet are no different.”
Keir Starmer has walked a tightrope, saying police should “concentrate on what matters most to their communities”. In many areas, investigating burglary or car theft might “matter most”. Yet if your child is subject to Islamophobic or anti-Semitic abuse on their way to school, I’m fairly certain this is what would matter most.
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