The Stage

Censorship fears eased in Terrorism Bill rewrite

Published Tuesday 24 January 2006 at 14:55 by Nuala Calvi

Peers have voted to remove those sections of the Government’s controversial Terrorism Bill that the theatre industry had feared would threaten freedom of artistic expression.

Members of the House of Lords have agreed to take out parts of the bill referring to “glorification” of terrorist acts, which many in the industry believed would have led to artists being prosecuted for work dealing with controversial subjects. The recent Out of Joint production of Talking to Terrorists was one play that opponents to the legislation thought could have been affected. Campaigners will now lobby MPs to ensure the bill is accepted in its amended form in the Commons.

Speaking during the parliamentary debate, Lord Goodhart said: “The whole question of glorification is simply going to confuse and trouble the courts. The definition is amazingly wide… If one is looking at past acts of terrorism within the very wide definition of terrorism in the [Terrorism Act 2000], the War of American Independence is a terrorist act. When one then looks at glorification, it includes celebration, so that act of terrorism is celebrated every July 4 on Independence Day.”

The National Campaign for the Arts, one of the groups which lobbied for the change, said the wording of the bill was now clearer.

Director Victoria Todd added: “When the bill started out it was hopelessly vague. Now it should be very hard to prosecute someone who, for example, puts on a play about terrorism.

“There had been a lack of clarity about what was prosecutable and what wasn’t, which meant theatre directors might say: ‘I don’t want to get involved in this’.”

The NCA had also campaigned for the concept of “recklessness” to be removed from the bill. While that has not happened, the government has provided assurances that the test will be whether or not someone knew that they were being reckless in producing material that could encourage terrorism.