Will lockdown affect our future civil liberties?

What did lockdowns to civil society? The restrictions introduced in 2020 curbed freedoms to an extent that had not been seen since the Second World War. Has this softened our stance and eroded our resistance towards defending our rights in future? Here’s Jon Silverman who used to be the BBC’s home affairs correspondent and is now emeritus professor of media and criminal justice at the University of Bedfordshire…

Jon - The Coronavirus Act 2020, which came in fairly soon after the pandemic became known, was probably the most draconian set of laws that this country had introduced outside of wartime. And because the virus was spread by contact through people, it really was based very much on restricting people from meeting other people, from moving around, from gathering outside in public places. And that had a wider impact, of course, in terms of businesses being shut down, restaurants, places of entertainment being closed, and people being restricted to their own household, or at various times where measures were lifted a little bit meeting people in other households. So in terms of societal impact, it was absolutely extraordinary. And of course, that did have consequences for arguments around civil liberties. I mean, in a functioning democracy such as the UK, human rights, the European Convention on Human Rights are a kind of foundational text, respecting the right to family life and private life and assembly and that kind of thing. They were basically ripped up.

Chris - Indeed. And in fact, even when some liberties were allowed, like going for a walk, it seemed almost like there was a draconian police response. One is minded of the two women who went for a walk and a coffee and were accused of having a meal together almost. I mean, there were police issuing people with drones. That seemed uncanny.

Jon - It was, and of course the police were put in a very invidious position. We don't have a national police force in this country. And what made it even more confusing was that individual regional forces imposed different interpretations of the laws. So some police chief constables were fairly laid back and tried not to intervene too forcibly. Others, as you say, were patrolling parks and arresting people and finding them for maybe having three people involved in a picnic when only two people were allowed to gather together. So this did have terrific consequences, I think, in terms of people's confidence and trust in the police, because policing by consent is a watch word of many liberal democracies such as the UK, and there was very little consent to be seen during the lockdown periods.

Chris - Were you surprised that people by and large just went along with it?

Jon - You know, if one takes a wider look at how people react in times of great fear, we've seen it during terrorist campaigns in this country during the 1990s. It was seen after 9/11 in the States when flights were grounded and people, again, were restricted in terms of movement. People are prepared to accept curtailment of individual liberties when they are scared, when the evidence that's presented to them suggests that they're going to be better off by staying in their own little bubble, and less at risk than meeting other people. I mean, that was certainly the situation early on. And I think most of the media, whether it was on the right or on the left, took the same view that protecting individual health and society's more general health was paramount. I think it was only after a time, and there were various waves of lockdown when bigger considerations came in about how civil rights are being limited during these sorts of campaigns. And people began to think, is the trade off worth it?

Chris - Obviously, the thing that concerns a lot of people who look at things like civil liberties is that once you've done it once, there's an argument that it sort of softens us up. It makes us a bit more receptive and susceptible to just accepting more of the same again or later. Because you said, well, it's a bit like what happened during the pandemic, and it almost becomes normal.

Jon - That's certainly a strong argument. I think, in this country, as I've suggested, there were certainly in the latter stages of the various lockdowns very strong cases being put forward for creating much more room for civil rights for people to be able to gather in public protests and that kind of thing. We saw a big protest over the murder of a woman called Sarah Everard, as it turns out by a police officer. And when the police intervened to prevent a big demonstration by women, they were heavily, heavily criticised. And I think, you know, in future, if there was another pandemic or a reason for locking down, I think it might even be the reverse, that there'd be less support for the kind of restrictions that we saw this time. Because I think we know an awful lot more about how lockdown restrictions can impact adversely on communities which are already marginalised in some way and make life a lot worse for those people who are discriminated against anyway. And there were far more cases of domestic abuse because people were confined to their homes. I don't think these considerations are going to go away, even if there is another overriding reason to curtail liberties. My feeling is that in this country anyway, there would be a strong resistance to the kind of measures we saw last time.