Insulate Britain ruling weighs protestor rights against disruption risk

Last week Mr Justice Morris agreed to Transport for London’s (TfL) request for a five-year injunction to stop more than 100 members of the protest group from blocking roads and surrounding areas at 34 locations in the city, including bridges and junctions along the A4 and North Circular.

Mr Justice Morris said he had taken into account the sincerity of the protesters’ views on climate change but concluded that "ensuing harm" from future protests could be "grave and irreparable". He ordered that the injunction against Insulate Britain be reviewed annually.

Climate litigation expert Michael Fenn of Pinsent Masons said the decision was particularly important because of its conclusion that articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) did not provide a lawful reason for the behaviour of the protestors. He added: “This is yet another example of injunctive relief being granted to prevent protestor activity on the public highway, notwithstanding the decision in the Ziegler case.”

In that ruling, four protestors charged with wilful obstruction of a highway contrary to the 1980 Highways Act were acquitted at trial in 2017. The district judge held that the police’s interference with the protestors’ Article 10 and 11 rights under the ECHR, which protect the expression of opinions in the form of protest, was not proportionate. The UK Supreme Court later ruled that the trial court had made no error or flaw in its reasoning.

Addressing the issue of the Insulate Britain protestors’ ECHR rights, Mr Justice Roberts said there was evidence that the group’s protests had caused “considerable disruption and a risk to safety” in the past. He added that preventing the danger caused by the protests was “sufficiently important to justify the interference” with the protestors’ article 10 and 11 rights.

The Judge held that there was “no less restrictive or alternative means to achieve the aim” of allowing “road users to exercise their right to use the road system”, and that the injunction did not prevent Insulate Britain protestors from “continuing to express their views at other locations”. Protestors who break the new injunction could be found to be in contempt of court, although prosecutions can sometimes take several months to begin.

Fenn said: “Although the balancing exercise which judges must carry out means that each case will turn on its facts, this case and others like it highlight that organisations whose operations are repeatedly disrupted by protestors have legal options open to them. The Supreme Court’s decision in Ziegler does not give carte blanche for unfettered protesting activity.”

TfL has now launched a similar bid to secure a final injunction against several named Just Stop Oil protesters to prevent them from disrupting and blocking major roads in the capital.