If you’re wondering what authoritarianism looks like in a Labour government, start with a pensioner in Kensington arrested for carrying a leaflet. Or a 65-year-old man in Brighton-le-Sands. Or a woman in Truro detained under terrorism legislation. The alleged offence? Displaying material in support of Palestine Action, a campaign group proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Yvette Cooper in June.
Yes, that Yvette Cooper. Labour’s Home Secretary. One-time leadership hopeful. A Blairite to her bones. Now the architect of one of the most chilling crackdowns on protest in modern British history.
Across the weekend, more than 100 people were arrested for doing what would have been entirely legal just weeks ago: holding a placard, standing in solidarity, criticising genocide. The pretext? “Support for a banned group.” The reality? Dissent is being criminalised, one protest at a time.
While the Labour government criminalises protest, it continues to look away from the genocide unfolding in Gaza. Almost 60,000 Palestinians are now dead. Whole families erased. Hospitals bombed. Journalists targeted. Children mutilated by Western-made weapons. Yet not once has Yvette Cooper, or Keir Starmer for that matter, used the word. They tiptoe around the facts, defer to Israel’s “right to defend itself,” and then turn their full authoritarian arsenal on those who dare to say what they won’t: that a genocide is taking place, funded and armed in part by Britain. That is the obscenity of this moment, not just repression, but repression in the service of silence.
Let’s not sugarcoat it. Cooper’s decision to proscribe Palestine Action opened the door to mass arrests under the Terrorism Act 2000. Not because of any imminent threat to life, but because activists allegedly damaged £7m worth of military aircraft at RAF Brize Norton. The military was left red-faced, two Voyager jets breached on home soil, in broad daylight, exposing just how brittle Britain’s war machine really is. But instead of scrutiny or accountability, the state reached for the Terrorism Act. Call it sabotage if you want, but terrorism? That stretches the word beyond all meaning. It’s not a legal category anymore. It’s a political label, wielded for political ends.
It’s not stopping there. Banks are freezing accounts of peaceful solidarity groups (Manchester Friends of Palestine, Scottish PSC) because they once linked to Palestine Action or simply have “Palestine” in the name. No court orders. No charges. Just financial blacklisting, outsourced censorship, and bureaucratic strangulation. You can protest for Gaza, so long as you don’t say the wrong name, carry the wrong banner, or donate to the wrong charity. Otherwise, you risk arrest or losing access to your funds.
Is the Home Secretary embarrassed yet?
Because she should be. Not just for allowing this crackdown, but for orchestrating it with cold, bureaucratic efficiency. For branding civil disobedience as terrorism. For helping turn Britain into a place where conscience makes you a terrorist, where solidarity can get you 14 years.
This is what state overreach looks like in 2025: not tanks on the street, but a 74-year-old woman in a police station. Not jackboots, but banks and terror laws weaponised against campaigners. The aim is not security. The aim is deterrence. To make people scared to speak, march, donate, or even care.
Let’s be honest: it’s working.
How many people now will think twice before waving a flag or sharing a petition? How many groups will dilute their messaging, scrub their websites, or go quiet altogether? That is the chilling effect Yvette Cooper has introduced under the banner of “keeping Britain safe.”
But safe for whom?
Safe for Elbit Systems, the weapons manufacturer targeted by Palestine Action? Safe for arms deals with Israel? Safe for a Labour government desperate to prove it is “tough” on protest?
Cooper is not protecting the public. She is protecting power. And in doing so, she is criminalising conscience.
The Home Secretary may be many things. But embarrassed? Not yet.
It’s up to us to change that.
