Are YOU about to be silenced? Five recommendations from Home Office report that has sparked free speech fears

Reinstating non-crime hate Incidents (NCHIs)

Restrictions on the use of “non-crime hate incidents” brought in by the last government should be “reversed,” the Sprint report recommends.

The report suggests that any changes would “encompass all five protected characteristics”, which includes hate based on race, disability, sexual orientation or gender reassignment.

This would, if taken forward, breach promises made by No10 after the row two months ago over police investigating a tweet by the Telegraph columnist, Allison Pearson, who was visited by police after one of her social media posts was flagged as an NCHI, added fuel to the ongoing debate about the balance between safety and free speech.

NCHI refers to an incident where a person perceives that they have been targeted due to their race, religion, sexual orientation, disability, or gender identity, but no criminal behaviour is involved.

The concept of NCHIs was first introduced in the UK in the early 2000s by the Home Office, following recommendations from the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry (1999), which investigated the police's handling of the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence in 1993.

One of the key findings of the inquiry was that there was a widespread lack of understanding and action around racially motivated incidents that didn’t necessarily rise to the level of a crime. The inquiry suggested that the police should record such incidents to better understand and address prejudice and discrimination.

Despite not being criminal, these incidents are still reported to the police and recorded, as they are considered to potentially reflect underlying discriminatory attitudes or prejudices in society.

Make 'harmful communications' a crime 

A new criminal offence of making “harmful communications” on social media is floated in the report. This was rejected by the previous Government because, in the Sprint’s own words, it risked “criminalising speech on the basis that it had caused someone offence”.

The proposed offence would criminalise online speech or behaviour that causes psychological harm or offends others, even if the communication does not amount to a criminal act like harassment or a threat.

Psychological harm is defined as the emotional or mental distress caused by a communication, whether it's bullying, targeted harassment, or exposure to harmful material.

Offence is outlined as anything that someone perceives to be deeply offensive or hurtful, even if it doesn't necessarily meet the threshold for criminal conduct like incitement to violence or hate speech.

The report pushes for this category of offense to include harmful messages targeting individuals, communities, or groups, including messages that could be perceived as offensive or psychologically distressing.

The idea is that by making harmful communications a criminal offense, law enforcement can intervene more directly in managing online behavior that causes harm but does not necessarily break existing laws (such as harassment, threats, or defamation).

The Policy Exchange authors point out that inclusion of "psychological harm" and "offence" makes this recommendation particularly broad and subjective, leading to concerns that a wide range of online speech could be caught under this law.

Another recommendation linked to this is increased monitoring of online activity and enhanced powers to track harmful behaviour, especially low-level extremism or offensive material that might not rise to the level of illegal activity but still causes significant distress or psychological harm.

Broadening the definition of extremism

The report recommends expanding the definition of extremism to include ideologies such as conspiracy theorists and extreme misogyny.

As the Policy Exchange authors point out, Sprint’s “understand” paper devotes the same amount of space – one page – to Islamist extremism as to “conspiracy theories”, “proKhalistan extremism” (the movement for an independent Sikh state), "extreme misogyny,” and “environmental extremism”, which also get a page each but has between them since 1999 in Great Britain caused no terrorist deaths.

This is despite Islamic extremism being responsible for 94 per cent of all terrorist deaths in Britain since 1999.

The paper’s section on “extreme misogyny” and the “manosphere” concedes that “not all individuals or groups associated with the manosphere… promote extreme views” and “it is challenging to identify the extent to which misogyny is explicitly and consciously (or unconsciously) operationalised among violent extremists”.

The authors take particular umbrage with the focus on misogyny at the cost of other salient variables, noting that there is "little reference to the grooming gangs which so blighted the lives of girls and young women in scores of towns and cities. It is hard to see how progress can be made on reducing violence against women, and public confidence assured, unless countering grooming gangs, and the difficult questions that necessarily involves, are part of the programme".

Free speech advocates worry that broadening the definition of extremism could potentially lead to the suppression of lawful expression and debate while letting the worst abusers slip through the net by not addressing the root cause issues.

Since the leaked report came out, Yvette Cooper has rejected internal Home Office advice to potentially widen the definition of extremism to include violent misogyny and conspiracy theorists, choosing instead to continue focusing the government’s anti-terror efforts on Islamist and far-right extremism.

UK extremism approach should be based on behaviours, not ideologies

Sprint recommends that extremism be understood and addressed through the lens of observable actions and harmful behaviours, rather than trying to label and target individuals based on their ideological beliefs or political views.

At first glance, this would appear to placate concerns over the policing of thoughts and beliefs in favour of actual conduct that poses a threat to national security or social cohesion.

For example, rather than targeting someone for expressing extreme views or beliefs, the government would focus on whether their actions—such as inciting violence, supporting terrorism, or engaging in illegal activities—pose a real risk to society.

However, free speech advocates worry that this could lead to perverse outcomes and fail to address the core issues.

In addition to downplaying the role that Islamism plays in fuelling extremist activity, Stott and Gilligan point out that it again throws up complex questions about what constitutes harmful behaviour and that it glosses over the systemic causes of extremism.

The “understand” paper, in particular, treats extremism largely as a problem of individuals, or at least individuals radicalised online.

While this is a significant route into extremism, the Sprint largely ignores the roles of institutions in spreading and incubating extremism and particularly ignores the significant power of institutions in Islamist extremism, the Policy Exchange authors write.

They add that the "new approach risks swamping already stretched counter-extremism interveners and counter-terror police with tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of new cases, making it more likely that dangerous people will be missed".

Labelling two-tier ‘two-tier’ police claims an ‘extreme right-wing narrative'

The report identifies assertions of 'two-tier policing'— where law enforcement allegedly treats groups differently for similar behaviours — as part of a "right-wing extremist narrative".

This refers to the viral hashtag following the summer riots, where scores of people were arrested, some of whom had not directly participated in the riots but expressed incendiary views about what fuelled them on social media.

The fear here is that labelling accusations of two-tier policing as a right-wing talking point could suppress legitimate criticism of policing practices, deterring public discourse on potential biases within law enforcement. Experts caution that such labelling might curtail legitimate political debates.

The Policy Exchange authors rhetorically ask: "Once accepted within Government, how will the suggestion that ‘two-tier policing’ is a 'right-wing extremist narrative' be weaponised at the local and national level by civil servants, senior police and counter extremism practitioners?

"There is an obvious risk here of tarring significant swathes of the public as far-right."