Warning From Top Judge

Coronavirus Rules are 'Hysterical Slide Into a Police State'

The former Supreme Court justice Lord Sumption hit out at the heavy-handed measures taken by Derbyshire Police

Nicola Bartlett
Daily Mirror

A former Supreme Court justice has warned that the public are displaying "collective hysteria" over coronavirus.  Lord Sumption, who retired as a justice at the UK's highest court in 2018, hit out at the way that some police forces are interpreting the new rules.

He said: "The pressure on politicians has come from the public; they want action. They don't pause to ask whether the action will work, they don't ask themselves whether the cost will be worth paying - they want action anyway.

Lord Sumption told Radio 4's The World At One:"Anyone who has studied history will recognise here the classic symptoms of collective hysteria, which is infectious.  We are working ourselves up into a lather in which we exaggerate the threat and stop asking ourselves whether the cure may be worse than the disease."

He added: "Yes, this is serious, and, yes, it's understandable that people cry out to the Government, but the real question is, is this serious enough to warrant putting most of our population into house imprisonment, wrecking our economy for an indefinite period, destroying businesses that honest and hard-working people have taken years to build up, saddling future generations with debt?

"Depressions, stress, heart attacks, suicides and unbelievable stress inflicted on millions of people who are not especially vulnerable and will suffer only mild symptoms or none at all like the Health Secretary and the Prime Minister."

The police force caused controversy when they used drones to deter people from breaking the lockdown rules by travelling to remote areas for their daily exercise.
  They showed footage shaming people walking dogs in the Peak District.  Officers also dyed Buxton's blue lagoon black to discourage people from visiting the beauty spot.

He added: "The tradition of policing in this country is that policemen are citizens in uniform, they are not members of a disciplined hierarchy operating just at the Government's command.

"Yet in some parts of the country the police have been trying to stop people from doing things like travelling to take exercise in the open country which are not contrary to the regulations simply because ministers have said that they would prefer us not to.

"The police have no power to enforce ministers' preferences but only legal regulations which don't go anything like as far as the Government's guidance.

"I have to say that the behaviour of Derbyshire Police in trying to shame people in using their undoubted right to travel to take exercise in the country and wrecking beauty spots in the fells so people don't want to go there is frankly disgraceful.

"This is what a police state is like. It's a state in which the Government can issue orders or express preferences with no legal authority and the police will enforce ministers' wishes."