Free Speech and No Platforming Bill

A bill to safeguard the civil right to freedom of expression and freedom of speech, thought and conscience especially within universities and to safeguard against no platforming.
Bill ID B083
Author(s) The Rt Hon. Sir Charles Gladstone OOBC MP
Amended by TBC
First reading 2021 May 30
Royal assent TBC
Commencement TBC
Affected legislation N/A

Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

1 Definitions

No platforming is defined as the withdrawal of an invitation to speak without a legal justification, due to outside pressure or other cultural pressures or disagreements with the speaker.

2 No platforming regulations

  1. The withdrawal of an invitation tendered under an external pressure which is not defined by a legal characteristic or dimension is now punishable by fine, payable by the university, if they fail to reprimand the society for doing so.
  2. Under no account shall pressure from the student body by a reason to withdraw an invitation from a speaker, unless the figure has been tied to criminal hate speech or other criminal activities.

3 Breadth of exposure

  1. Instructs universities to ensure that students can go to a wide range of events from across the ideological spectrum and to make the need for diversity clear to students and student societies.
  2. Encourages university curriculum to carry broad ranges of ideological perspectives in subjects where that is relevant.

4 Free Speech Commissioner

  1. Establishes a permanent Free Speech Commissioner, accountable to the home secretary, to report and advise on these matters:
    1. The emergence of online echo chambers and cancel culture
    2. Cancel culture and ideological pressure within universities
    3. Racism, especially anti-Semitism, within universities
    4. Whether students receive a broad range of opinions through their studies
    5. Harassment and intimidation of students who do not share the common view or perspectives

5 Social Media

  1. Commissions a government report into reforming social media and adding new regulations into preventing the ‘echo chamber’ effect
  2. Forbids the exposure of the subscriber count beyond 2 significant figures (e.g., someone with 567,524 can only display the figure 570,000) to avoid the real time tracking of loss of subscriber counts, which has already been implemented on youtube), and forbids the updating of this information except for every fortnight to avoid snowballing of cancel culture

6 Short title, Commencement and Extent

  1. This Act may be cited as the Free Speech and No Platforming Act 2021
  2. This Act shall come into effect upon receiving royal assent.
  3. Section 5 extends to Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The rest of the Act extends to England.
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