Labour has been urged to ban controversial "non-crime hate incidents" following a series of high-profile "Orwellian" encounters with Britain's police.
Kemi Badenoch's Tories are set to table an amendment to the Government's Crime and Policing Bill to bar officers from recording NCHIs in all but a few cases.
And the party leader herself has warned that police are "trawling social media for things someone might find offensive" rather than "fighting crime and protecting families".
"Keir Starmer needs to stop hiding behind weasel words. Stand up, show some courage, and back real policing over political correctness," she blasted.
'Keir Starmer needs to stop hiding behind weasel words,' Badenoch said
PA"If Labour were serious about the violence in our towns and cities, they'd back our amendment and fix this."
NCHIs were first brought into force in 2014, having been recommended by the 1999 inquiry into Stephen Lawrence's death in 1993.
Today is the anniversary of his death - and one Tory official told Politico that the timing was not intentional.
And Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp, who was Policing Minister when the new guidelines were introduced, said: "Our amendment will stop police forces from wasting time on this Orwellian nonsense and get them back to doing the job the public expects: fighting real crime.
"The Conservative Party will always stand up for free speech and common sense."
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'If Labour were serious about the violence in our towns and cities, they'd back our amendment and fix this,' Badenoch said
PABut Labour has hit back - Policing Minister Diana Johnson, responding to the Conservatives' NCHI proposals, said: "The Tories are all over the place.
"They had 14 years in charge of policing to set priorities or make policy changes in this area, and failed to do so.
"The Shadow Home Secretary was the policing minister who said just two years ago that 'if someone is targeted because of hostility or prejudice towards their race, religion, sexual orientation, disability or transgender identity the incident can and should be recorded as a non-crime hate incident'.
"Instead of introducing unworkable and half-baked measures which would prevent the police monitoring serious antisemitism and other racist incidents, the Tories should support the Labour Government's prioritisation of neighbourhood policing and serious violence."
Allison Pearson had police turn up at her door over her online activity
GETTYBadenoch's call follows a "Kafkaesque" incident in which journalist Allison Pearson was subjected to police officers turning up at her door on Remembrance Sunday to tell her that she was under investigation for a tweet she made a year earlier.
Pearson claimed she felt "bullied and threatened" when officers visited her Essex home - and her case was later dropped.
And in another "Kafkaesque" police visit, Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine were detained in front of their nine-year-old daughter by six officers and held in a cell for eight hours after complaining about Cowley Hill Primary School on a WhatsApp group.
From June 2023 to June 2024, over 13,200 non-crime hate incidents were recorded across the UK, it later emerged.
