As you may have seen from some of yesterday’s headlines it was widely reported that Conor McGregor is under investigation for incitement to hatred in connection to a number of tweets the UFC star sent in relation to the Dublin riots last week.
The Irish Independent reported that McGregor “is one of a large number of people who are being investigated by gardaí for alleged incitement to hatred, in relation to last Thursday’s riots in Dublin city centre.”
It was also reported that the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation (NBCI) “commenced a major investigation into incitement of hatred over the violence that broke out. There have been no arrests yet in this strand of the investigation.” last Friday.
Yesterday, after an initial denial that an investigation was underway “in respect of any individual, or group of individuals at this time.” An Garda Síochána updated its position saying that it would not confirm or deny whether an investigation was underway.
If indeed Conor McGregor is being investigated, then he must be being investigated under the auspices of the exciting Prohibition of Incitement To Hatred Act, 1989, which the government would have us believe is ‘unfit for purpose’.
The Gardaí say they are “aware of a large volume of commentary and posts on a variety of social media platforms and messaging apps by a number of different individual accounts.” and that they are monitoring “comments, posts and messages related to the riot to assess any potential breaches of criminal legislation.”
Last July Minister for Justice Helen McEntee claimed that “we do not have hate speech laws in this county” in an exchange with Gript’s Ben Scallan despite legislation being on the books since 1989.
Leo Varadkar stated in the Dáil this week that the 1989 law is ineffective at targeting online rhetoric and yet, as I said above, the Gardaí are currently monitoring just that in order to detect breaches of legislation.
Speaking to Gript, Free Speech Ireland said “Justice Minister Helen McEntee has argued that the Prohibition of Incitement to Hatred Act 1989 is “ineffective and limited”.
However it appears to be the legislation for which investigations of McGregor, or anyone else being charged with incitement, would apply.”
Free Speech Ireland says it has “held the opinion that we have a law fit for purpose regarding public order with regard to incitement to violence.”
“Application of the 1989 Act against individuals with opinions making statements like “we are a war” as McGregor has, is unprecedented and excessive.” it said.
Unsurprising. Clear prima facie case of incitement to hatred and violence under section 2 of the Prohibition of Incitement to Hatred Act 1989. No one is above the law. https://t.co/VQorpKrWym
— Joe Brolly (@JoeBrolly1993) November 28, 2023
Free Speech Ireland previously told Gript about their reservations regarding the bill, saying they are ‘deeply concerned’ about the lack of definition of terms in the legislation which they say could lead to people being prosecuted for sharing information on social media.
Senator Sharon Keogan flagged what she said was the “chilling” effect the proposed legislation would have on freedom of speech in Ireland saying that the law unamended would give Gardaí powers to remove personal devices from not only named individuals but also anyone sharing an address with them for an ‘unspecified’ amount of time in cases of a suspected breach of the act.
Senator Rónán Mullen pointed to Garda statistics saying that there were only 74 ‘non-criminal hate incidents’ in 2022, “bearing in mind that the threshold for Gardaí to become involved is very low,”
He emphasised that for Gardaí to become involved there only needed to exist a “perception” of hateful conduct, and that people’s freedom was being ‘endangered on the back of very low figures’ noting that
the legitimacy of the registered complaints was unclear and describing the situation as “problematic”.
Gript’s Gary Kavanagh reported on how Irish Network Against Racism (INAR) data does not hold water and how their data collection method known as iReport simply allows anyone to submit allegations of racism and does not require complainants to log personal details, or leave a contact method, before allowing them to submit a report.
Kavanagh also noted that there “doesn’t appear to be any security or verification system in place which would catch false reports or stop a single bad actor from submitting multiple spurious reports.”
So why is the government continually pushing for this deeply unpopular legislation and how can Helen McEntee continually insist on the necessity of the Criminal Justice (Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences) Bill 2022 when it would appear that the existing law works just fine – when they want it to.