An open letter of complaint to Lady Cosgrove, Co Chair of UK Lawyers for Israel

I publish my letter of complaint here because I think it is important to be open and transparent about such activities.

I wrote about my serious concerns about the actions of UK Lawyers for Israel here and I publish my letter of complaint below because I think it is very important in these very troubling times to be open and transparent about such activities. I have not committed any criminal offence in anything I publish on line; it is outrageous to suggest I have and even more troubling that a serious attempt was made to persuade by regulator to ‘investigate’ me on the basis of such a false and baseless assertion.

Dear Lady Cosgrove

I am writing on 12^th July 2024 to make a formal complaint about the behaviour of UK Lawyers for Israel of which you are Co Chair and specifically the behaviour of your Director Caroline Turner.

What happened.

On March 16^th 2024 Ms Turner submitted a complaint to my regulator the Bar Standards Board (BSB) on behalf of UKLFI. I attach a copy of that and the reply of the BSB to this complaint. It alleged variously that from my postings on the social media site X I had committed a variety of criminal offences, including a breach of the Terrorism Act 2000 and called for the BSB to ‘investigate me’. The BSB replied quite properly to say that nothing I had published was a regulatory offence. I was not acting as a barrister but exercising my Article 10 rights to political speech which attracted the highest protection at law.

I received notification of the BSB decision and your complaint on June 18^th 2024 and was immediately concerned by what I read. It seems clear to me, and confirmed by the BSB, that there was nothing I had published which could come close to a regulatory offence. And hence was highly unlikely to cross the threshold for criminal prosecution. I am troubled by how such a complaint came to be drafted which is ignorant of, or uncaring about recent authorities which have underscored the high bar required for offensive speech to be considered either a regulatory or a criminal breach – Scottow, Miller and Holbrook - and also the revised Parliamentary Code of Practice for the recording of non crime hate incidents, following the Court of Appeal decision in Miller [2021].

I was further concerned to note the dates of my publications. One is wrongly asserted to be 2023 – it is in fact 2019. Some date prior to 2023. All these publications prior to 2022 have already been reported by others to the police and the BSB. In 2022 Wiltshire police conceded in the face of my application for judicial review that they had recorded a non crime hate incident against me unlawfully, removed the recordings and paid my costs. The BSB investigated thoroughly and conceded no case to answer following Jon Holbrook’s successful appeal.

Either UKLFI has kept me under surveillance for the last five years – a troubling thought in itself – or you have been provided these screen shots by someone motivated by malice towards me who knew full well that they had already been investigated and found to be neither a criminal nor a regulatory offence and the police had acted unlawfully in designating and recording them as ‘hate’.

Further, I asked on June 18^th to what police force you had reported me. I took the view that if your organisation was genuine in its descriptions of my behaviour as criminal then it is inconceivable that it would fail to inform the police. Your organisation has failed to respond to this question and the police have not contacted me, which leads me to assume that no criminal complaint has been made. I repeat my request for this information as a matter of urgency.

All this sadly leads me to conclude that your complaint to the BSB was motivated by malice rather than simple incompetence. You hoped to frighten the BSB into ‘investigating’ me by maliciously exaggerating the nature of my behaviour.

Given the seriousness of such an allegation I thought it sensible to request from you copies of my personal data pursuant to a Data Subject Access Request so that I might better understand your thought processes. Ms Turner informed me that I would receive this information within a month from June 18^th. However today she emailed to assert that an exemption was claimed in accordance with Data Protection Act 2018 Schedule 2 par 2 in that the personal data was processed for the purpose of the prevention or detection of crime and / or the apprehension or prosecution of offenders.

I find this astonishing and will now make formal complaint to the ICO about your organisation’s refusal to comply with my Data Subject Access Request.

What remedy do I seek

Within 7 days, i.e. Friday 19^th July 2024 you inform me to which police force you have made report about my alleged criminal activities.

Within 28 days, i.e. by Friday 9^th August 2024 I ask you to

·       apologise to me for making a vexatious complaint, which was done without any or any proper consideration of the applicable law. This has caused distress and anxiety to me and wasted my time.

·       reassure me that your organisation will take proper steps to remedy this deficiency of understanding regarding the parameters of Article 10 ECHR, so that you do not subject any other person to this process. I would be very happy to offer your organisation training at no charge if you do not have an available resource.

Final remarks

Your organisation is entitled to find what I say and how I say it offensive. It and its members are entitled to refuse to instruct or refuse to have any other dealings with me. But it is not entitled to make vexatious complaints to a regulatory body, relying on a claimed legitimacy at criminal law which it does not has and must have known it did not have. I do not know what your organisation hoped to achieve with this complaint, other than to cause distress to me.

I am sorry that no one within your organisation felt able to approach me prior to making the complaint. I cannot promise if you had done so, that I would change my views or my manner of speaking but I would certainly have been willing to listen, reflect and discuss. All you have achieved is to make me view your organisation with considerable distrust and some contempt. I hope you will give my complaint genuine and serious consideration so that trust may be restored.

I am going to publish this letter on my Substack because I suspect I am not the only person who has been at the receiving end of this kind of treatment from your organisation and I would like others to know that I consider it unacceptable, counter productive and contemptuous of the rule of law.

One thing that I have always known from an early age, is that it is always important to stand up to bullies.

Regards

SP

UPDATE 15 July 2024

Lady Cosgrove replied very speedily on Monday 15th July to inform me that she had fully investigated and fully exonerated her organisation. She also confirmed they had reported me to the police. I await my arrest and interview with interest.

Here is my reply.

Thank you for your response. Now that you have confirmed you have indeed reported me to the police, please will you confirm the identity of the police force so I can contact them.

If they have recorded a non crime hate incident against me, I will require its removal as unlawful. I am supposed to be hosting a Ukranian refugee as of 4^Th August 2024, if an unlawfully recorded NCHI is shared on an enhanced DBS check, then the actions of your organisation risk making this young women potentially homeless or forced to take emergency accommodation.

I confirm I have complained to the ICO about your organisation’s refusal to respond to my DSAR. I do not understand what you are saying re point 3. The assertion was a reply within a month from June 18. Your organisation now refuses to answer at all.

I assume from your response that you intend to offer me no apology. So be it. I will view the activities of your organisation henceforth with considerable suspicion and will make sure that this is publicly known.

I shall look forward to any contact from the police with regard to your complaint and I will have much to say. However, I assume that since I have heard nothing since March 10^th, they do not consider it compelling.

Frankly, shame on you.