Now a met police officer recently threatened to arrest and fine a Christian preacher who was accused of a hate crime coming just weeks after a gospel singer was threatened also with arrest over singing religious songs the evangelists can be heard protesting with the police in the video so why don’t we
Have a quick watch of that now there is a public we structure speaking you’re speaking you’re speaking at the same time right now you’re speaking over her is she speaking or you speaking yes you do both there is an element but as long as you’re not you’re
Not preaching over the theone you just mention you sir for yourselves for for example that does not fit under the public space protection order even under the religious category for being able for freedom of speech but obviously a crime has been committed we need to investigate or do you want a100 fine
Because if you don’t want that we can deal with it in custody I’m not trying to be rude I just want to ask one question you are try I question thank you officer can I ask you the question not I’m not ask you the question okay
But you’re aware that I can find you for that verify who you are if you do not I will arrest you for public do you have identification well four coppers sent to harass a preacher try and find a copper when you get mugged or robbed in London
Well now I can speak with the consultant lawyer to the Christian legal center Michael Phillips Michael welcome to the show can we start before we get into the absurdity of this um about the actual allegations the homophobic incident they say the missionary claims he was simply
Reading out a chapter of the Bible John 3: 16 well there’s no offense there I mean the problem is this is that police officers that I meet day in day a they’re often extremely ill informed about the public order act and I watched a little bit more of that video before
And what the officer said is you commit an offense if Harris alarm and the stress has cause and that is just not what the law says what actually the law says is that if you threaten somebody if you abuse somebody and it may have that resolved then you may have committed an
Offense and once again if you’re not exercising your right to freedom of speech but the officers always take this Topsy Turvy um approach to the law whereby they say if somebody’s upset then there’s a crime and that is not the case it is not the law and and
Unfortunately this is just a systemic problem it’s it’s not just this is Oxbridge we see it in Liverpool we see it in Yorkshire we see it across the country and Mike a lot of people watching this might start to think that there’s one rule for Christians and one
Rule for other faiths after all we often hear people shouting obscene things at Pro Palestine Marchers the police simply turn a blind eye they couldn’t care less and yet routinely now Michael it seems Christians are specifically being singled out it’s it’s an extremely sad thing because what we’re seeing is is
That Harmony London is a client of ours and that a couple of weeks or so ago she was told you cannot sing church songs outside the church without a license it’s complete and utter rubbish but yet um on that bit of Oxford Street which is very near my office where she often
Plays her music and people absolutely love it then there are some people of other religions who are usually there on a very regular basis who are not singing songs they’re not producing wonderful harmonies and they’ve never been interfered with whatsoever and one has to ask the question why is this
Discriminatory Behavior going on and it has to stop because people are afraid you know she was just going out there she’s singing These wonderful songs you know trying to lift people’s spirits and she gets harassed and bullied by these police officers for not just for a
Couple of minutes that we see on the video but it goes on and on and on in fact I think her encounter was 45 minutes these preachers the other day it went on for quite some time and eventually what happens is somebody gets arrested and put in to prison or B maybe
Only for 24 hours and it it sends a chilling effect to everybody else other people who maybe slightly um maybe weaker disposition think I’m not going to be doing that because if if you go out and you even sing a song a police officer who may be ill informed doesn’t
Know the law is going to put me in a police sale overnight and I just don’t want to do that okay Michael Phillips consultant lawyer for the Christian Legal Center thank you very much for joining us I don’t know about you out there folks but it certainly feels to me that we are
Looking at two-tier policing here why is it they’re clamping down on Christians and yet turning a Blind Eye For example to those from the Muslim faith when they’re shouting Stu on our street so please just seem to stand by how does that make you feel please send me your
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