ONE PERSON'S FREEDOM

The funeral of Margaret Thatcher will take place tomorrow.  In her lifetime, as Prime Minister, she managed to divide the country.  People with firm opinions and uncompromising stances usually do encourage strong views one way or the other.  Since she won three consecutive elections and is still Britain's longest serving Prime Minister for over 100 years, those divisions clearly did not split the country into two equal parts, but the minority that opposed her of course became the most vociferous and violent.

The same will no doubt be the case during her funeral tomorrow.  There are those who still hate her and will go out of their way to show it tomorrow. But those that make the loudest noise, as ever, will not necessarily be right.  Maybe they are incapable of rational argument or perhaps after all this time (Thatcher resigned in 1990) their ineffectual resentment has still not evaporated or maybe they are just hateful, but demonstrating at a funeral will not endear them to anyone, nor elicit support for their views.  Any violence will no doubt be condemned by all political parties.  So such protesters will simply be dismissed as outside normal society.

But a separate debate has arisen which is much more interesting, and important, than whether you still like or dislike Thatcher.  The police have said that, in policing the funeral, they are determined not to prevent freedom of speech.  In this country, I'm pleased to say, dissent is allowed, even in public.  But what is the limit of that dissent?  To what extent is freedom of speech, or freedom of expression, or freedom of movement, restricted by public order legislation?

I am quite firm that freedom of speech should be permitted unconditionally.  At any time, in any place.  If someone wishes to stand up in church and say that religion is poppycock, that's fine by me.  If they want to shout tomorrow that Thatcher was an evil woman, that's OK too.  But they can't expect that theirs will be the only view expressed.  And this is where demonstrations can run into legal difficulties.  Holding up a banner is fine.  Chanting what's on the banner is also fine.  But when have you seen two opposing groups of demonstrators simply standing together chanting their opposing views?  When one group seems to be chanting louder, insults will be bandied, jostling will begin and one group will no doubt soon physically attack the other.  So where does the public order offence begin - when the chanting starts?  When the chanting takes on an aggressive tone?  When physical contact occurs?  When the fighting starts?  And which group committed the public order offence?

We can easily accept that a public order offence may have occurred when we hear a Muslim cleric preaching against the West.  But what of a group dishonouring Margaret Thatcher and preaching against her?  At what stage does freedom of speech spill over into an illegal act?  A public order offence may well have occurred if a milk bottle is thrown at her coffin.  But what if just the milk is thrown?  Or what about holding up a placard covered in hate filled words and chanting hatred against her?  Is this incitement to violence?  Or maybe it's libel, legally punishable defamation?  But at what stage would you be inhibiting a person's freedom of speech - when you take away their placard or when you move them along or when you arrest them?

There have been attempts to quantify freedom of speech for the purposes of demonstrating tomorrow. As usual it all sounds silly.  It's a bit like a contract for behaviour on a date.  This is OK, but that isn't.  In the end, it will depend on the personal judgement of one police officer.  And I suspect it will not be placards or chanting or turning one's back or singing, 'Ding dong - the Queen is dead' or even throwing milk that leads to arrest.

I sincerely hope violence doesn't arise.  And, on the other hand, I hope too that the police will get it right.  If many are arrested, far from turning in her grave, I suspect  that Thatcher will be smiling.  She had no time for trouble makers then and would certainly not have now.

So, even in death she arouses strong views.  But, in the debate over freedoms in British society and the rights of the individual, I think I know where she would have drawn her uncompromising line. 

TEARS APART

If we were still having a drought, it would have ended anyway now with all the crying that has been going on at the Olympics.  Even Sir Chris Hoy, six time gold medal winner and that model of coolth and steely resolve, had his blubber moment as the National Anthem played.  As for me, I'm on my second box of tissues.  And I'm only a spectator. 

Of course the steely resolve from the years of training and self-denial required to win an Olympic gold has to evaporate as the ultimate goal is achieved.  The relief would lead anyone to tears.  I was quite shocked though that even our gold medal clay pigeon shooter collapsed from the stress and tension after he had won.  You wouldn't think it on a par with cycling half a dozen laps of the velodrome at 70kms an hour, would you.  But it seems to be the same for almost all athletes. 

The dedication, not just the strength and fitness, needed to reach world standard is incomprehensible.  Some of the stories that are emerging now, make it very clear (if we didn't already suspect it) that winning is not just luck on the day.  Katherine Grainger for example, our double scull gold medal winner, has won silver medals at three previous Games, and explained that she has been training for 15 years to reach a good enough standard to take the gold medal.  15 years!  No wonder she cried.

I have written two posts before about Jessica Ennis, so it would be churlish of me not to highlight her again, now that she has finally won her Olympic gold medal.  She too has done little else for years but to train for this moment.  She is so little and so sweet that it hardly seems possible that she could compete against the other athletes in the competition.  Yet she pulled out personal bests in three of the seven heptathlon events and her time for the 100m hurdles equalled the 2008 Beijing gold medal winning time for the individual womens 100m hurdles event.  No one could ask more of her.  Her winning points total was a new British and Commonwealth record.  What a golden girl!  What pressure she faced to win on her home soil!  But she is so normal and cool that she seemed to acknowledge her achievement with a smile and a wave and without a tear in her eye (until the last moment, when her lip quivered a little).  Lucky I was making up for it or we'd soon be back on that hosepipe ban.

Perhaps the greatest achievement though was that of double gold medal cyclist, Laura Trott.  She was born with a collapsed lung, subsequently developed asthma, and then decided to try cycling to build up her strength.  She still suffers from a vomiting condition which requires her to have a bucket on hand when training and usually throws up after a race (and famously threw up on live TV at the World Championships last year).  Yet, since competing for the first time last year, at the age of 19, she has never lost a race.  Double world champion and now double Olympic champion.  Wow!  Makes complaining about a bit of a stomach ache seem really wimpish.

But, in amongst a slew of remarkable Olympic champions and even in the midst of extraordinary cycling success, I feel I have to pluck out Ben Ainslie as my British champion of champions.  Ben has just won sailing gold in his fourth successive Olympics (he only made silver in 1996).  OK, I know he hasn't run or jumped or peddled or lifted any heavy objects, but how can one sailor be so obviously better than the rest of the world for so long with identical boats, identical water and identical wind to his rivals?  I don't know anything about sailing, but his achievement seems way above all the others.  He's not sure he'll be at Rio, but why not?  I want to see him one more time!  And he didn't cry when he won either.