UNITED KINGDOM: Civicus Monitor Update – November 2026
This alert originally appeared on CIVICUS Monitor
Introduction
Civic space in the United Kingdom remained under pressure in 2026, and the country is rated ‘Obstructed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor. Although the Starmer government committed to protecting civil society through a new Civil Society Covenant, launched on 17th July 2025, concerns persisted over increasingly restrictive protest legislation, the use of counter-terrorism powers against activists, the expansion of surveillance technologies, restrictions on public participation and an increasingly hostile environment for migrants, minorities and civil society organisations (CSOs).
The Crime and Policing Act 2026 imposed further restrictions on peaceful protest, while the proscription of Palestine Action under counter-terrorism legislation continued to significantly affect people’s ability to exercise their fundamental freedoms. Police forces also continued to expand their use of facial recognition technology, even though no comprehensive legal framework governs its use. At the same time, the growing hostility towards migrants, Muslim communities and other minorities further restricted civic participation. CSOs reported intimidation, threats and disruption to their work, and anti-migrant sentiment continued to fuel demonstrations and violence, including attacks on migrants’ homes and businesses and on charities that support vulnerable communities.
The government also pursued measures that would reduce the ability of the public and civil society to take part in consultations and decision-making. In March 2026, the Starmer administration announced plans to ‘rip up consultation culture’, presenting this as a way to cut unnecessary bureaucracy. In September, the new Chancellor, John Healey, said the government would take an axe to consultation, litigation and administration, including further limits on judicial review for critical infrastructure projects. This rhetoric raised concerns about the ability of individuals and CSOs to take part in decision-making, challenge government action and hold decision-makers to account.
Freedom of Association
Proscription of Palestine Action and the use of counter-terrorism powers
The UK government’s proscription of the direct action solidarity group Palestine Action continued to have significant implications for freedom of association in 2026. The group was proscribed on 5th July 2025 following its actions against companies supplying Israel’s arms industry. The order designated Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation, making it a criminal offence under the Terrorism Act to belong to the group, express support for it, or publicly wear clothing or carry items associated with it, with penalties of up to 14 years in prison. The ban drew criticism from international human rights bodies. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, described the decision as a misuse of counter-terrorism legislation, warning that it risked hindering the legitimate exercise of fundamental freedoms across the UK. The broad definition of terrorism in UK law, which includes ‘serious damage to property’, goes beyond international standards and risks a wider chilling effect on fundamental freedoms.
In November 2025, the Independent Commission on UK Counter-Terrorism Law, Policy and Practice found that the official definition of terrorism was too broad and created ‘uncertainty and overreach in its application’. Its report called for the definition to be tightened and recommended that, in cases involving property damage, it should apply only to acts that create a serious risk to life, national security or public safety, or that involve arson, explosives or firearms. The report also stated that powers used to ban groups such as Palestine Action should be used only to protect the public from terrorism, and that proscription orders should lapse after five years unless renewed.
On 12th June 2026, a judge sentenced four Palestine Action activists as terrorists after a jury found them guilty of criminal damage for destroying equipment at the UK subsidiary of an Israeli arms manufacturer. The so-called ‘Filton 4’ received combined sentences of more than 20 years in prison. The judge ruled that the offences had a ‘terrorist connection’ because the group’s actions were intended to influence the government and advance an ideological cause. As a result of being sentenced under terrorism legislation, the four activists must serve at least two-thirds of their prison terms and will each be subject to strict monitoring and notification requirements for 15 years. Human rights groups warned that the sentences marked an unprecedented move against the right to protest and were intended to deter others from engaging in civil disobedience.
On 15th June 2026, the Court of Appeal ruled that the government’s decision to proscribe Palestine Action was lawful. This overturned a High Court ruling from February 2026, which had found that the Home Secretary had not followed her own policy, that proscription significantly interfered with the rights to freedom of expression and association, and that the decision could not be justified when ordinary criminal law was available to deal with the incidents in question. On 30th July 2026, the Supreme Court confirmed that Palestine Action’s co-founder had been granted permission to appeal against the ban on human rights grounds.
The National Security (State Threats) Act, a restrictive law fast-tracked through Parliament in June and July, poses a further threat to civic space on national security grounds. Introduced as a bill on 9th June 2026, it received Royal Assent on 8th July 2026. The Act gives the Home Secretary broad powers to designate state-backed organisations considered a threat to the UK’s security, and anyone who ‘support[s], assist[s] and obtain[s] material benefits’, including information, from such an organisation faces up to 14 years in prison. Watchdogs have warned that the law contains no safeguards for journalists or NGOs, potentially exposing foreign correspondents and humanitarian workers to imprisonment for carrying out their normal, lawful work.
Restrictions on civil society and a hostile environment for charities
In July 2025, the government signed a Civil Society Covenant that promised to respect the independence of civil society, including its right to hold the government to account, and committed to promoting partnership working between government and civil society as well as democratic participation. Despite this, concerns persisted over the treatment of charities and CSOs.
In several cases, politically motivated complaints were made to the Charity Commission about charities including the National Trust, Barnardo’s, the Runnymede Trust and City of Sanctuary UK, all of which the Commission subsequently cleared. On 7th April 2026, for example, the Commission cleared City of Sanctuary UK of wrongdoing after investigating allegations that its schools programme encouraged pupils to send Valentine’s Day cards to adult asylum seekers. The allegations had been raised in a complaint by Conservative MP Gavin Williamson and amplified online, and the watchdog found them to be false and misleading. It confirmed that while schools had displayed heart-shaped messages welcoming refugees, pupils had not written cards to individual adult asylum seekers. The allegations nevertheless triggered online attacks and threats against the charity’s staff and trustees, and City of Sanctuary UK said the misinformation campaign had significantly affected its team and the schools taking part.
In June 2026, Cambridge Circus Research published Breaking the Blob: A Study and Antidote to British Ungovernability, which portrayed parts of the UK’s NGO, charity, foundation and public-interest litigation sector as a coordinated political force that frustrates elected policy without equivalent democratic accountability. The report named and described a wide range of charities and charitable foundations, adding to concerns about the delegitimisation and stigmatisation of civil society.
Rising anti-migrant hostility and its impact on civic space
Throughout 2026, anti-migrant rhetoric, sentiment and attacks continued to grow across the UK, creating an increasingly hostile environment for the CSOs that support migrants and affecting their ability to operate. In December 2025, members of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations reported a pervasive and tangible sense of fear affecting the daily lives of staff and volunteers, particularly those from global majority backgrounds. Organisations described operational disruption and being forced into invisibility, including cancelling community events, reducing their online presence and scaling back public activities in response to direct threats or security concerns. They also reported being directly targeted and abused, including through intimidating emails and other forms of harassment. In September 2026, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) was forced to temporarily close a station in Poole after anti-migrant demonstrators threatened its volunteers, some of whose names and photographs had been published online.
On 16th May 2026, tens of thousands of people attended rival demonstrations in central London: a rally organised by far-right activist Tommy Robinson, and a pro-Palestinian march marking the Nakba, the displacement of Palestinians in 1948–49. The Metropolitan Police deployed more than 4,000 officers in a £4.5 million operation, setting up a buffer zone with metal barriers to keep the two groups apart, and used live facial recognition cameras at two railway stations. By the evening, according to the BBC, 43 people had been arrested, including 20 linked to Robinson’s rally and 12 to the Nakba march. Eleven of the arrests related to alleged hate crimes, nine of them involving Robinson’s rally and two the pro-Palestinian march. The police operation largely prevented clashes between the groups.
In June 2026, violent protests broke out following the murder of Henry Novak by a Sikh man. The same month, racist riots broke out across Northern Ireland following a knife attack by an African refugee, during which migrants’ homes and businesses were attacked and set alight, creating a climate of fear. In September 2026, masked men in Dover and crowds in Portsmouth, mobilised by far-right agitator Danny Thomas, blocked roads in protest against irregular migration. On 22nd September 2026, hundreds of anti-migrant protesters gathered at Gosport marina in Hampshire in response to calls from Thomas to disrupt the expected arrival of asylum seekers by boat. Protesters, some wearing face coverings, chanted ‘send them back’, but the Border Force vessels carrying the asylum seekers landed in Dover instead. Police arrested six people: two men on suspicion of aggravated trespass, and two men and two women on suspicion of assaulting an emergency worker. One of the men was also arrested on suspicion of careless driving.
Freedom of Peaceful Assembly
Mass arrests for supporting Palestine Action and the chilling effect on civil society
As previously reported by the CIVICUS Monitor, thousands of people have been arrested since the proscription of Palestine Action took effect in July 2025, as part of a civil disobedience campaign opposing the ban. Arrests continued across the UK throughout 2026. According to Defend Our Juries, which organises the campaign, more than 3,850 people had been arrested for publicly supporting the group as of October 2026. Most were detained for holding signs reading ‘I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.’
The proscription and the solidarity actions that followed led to a sharp rise in terrorism-related arrests in the UK. According to official government data, there were 3,061 terrorism-related arrests in the year ending 31st March 2026, an increase of 1,186% on the previous year. Of these, 2,819 arrests, or 92%, were linked to support for Palestine Action. The arrests also changed the profile of those detained on suspicion of terrorism-related activity: the average terrorism suspect is now a white person in their 50s, and 51% of those arrested on suspicion of supporting Palestine Action were women.
The year’s largest action took place in Trafalgar Square on 11th April, where the Metropolitan Police confirmed 523 arrests of people aged between 18 and 87. The action came weeks after the force resumed arrests, which it had paused after the High Court ruled the ban unlawful in February. As noted above under Freedom of Association, the Court of Appeal overturned that ruling on 15th June, keeping the proscription in place.
Other actions also led to mass arrests. In January, 86 people were arrested for aggravated trespass outside Wormwood Scrubs prison during a protest in support of an imprisoned Palestine Action activist on hunger strike. On 30th July, a protest outside Westminster Magistrates’ Court led to more arrests, with 152 people detained, of which 134 were arrested under the Terrorism Act, according to a statement by the Metropolitan Police. Campaigners said police arrested even those who did not break the law by showing or stating support for the group; some people were detained simply for standing nearby. On 27th September, police in Liverpool arrested 82 protesters outside the Labour Party conference, among them 94-year-old human rights barrister Margaret Owen.
Further confrontation is expected: Defend Our Juries has called for a protest outside the US embassy in London on 31st October, and the Metropolitan Police has warned that it will make arrests. Days later, on 4th and 5th November, the Supreme Court will hear Palestine Action co-founder Huda Ammori’s challenge to the ban.
Opposition to the ban continues to grow in spite of the mass arrests. In late October 2026, actors Paul Mescal, Jessie Buckley and Susan Sarandon and broadcaster Gary Lineker were among the signatories of an open letter published on the cover of the New Statesman, urging Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s government to drop the ‘draconian’ legislation. Also in October, Irish novelist Sally Rooney announced that the ban had effectively halted the sale of her books in the UK, as her public support for the group meant she could no longer receive royalties from UK sales. In September 2025, she was prevented from collecting a literary award over concerns that she may be arrested if she enters the country.
On 17th October, when the author Sarah Helm, wife of National Security Adviser Jonathan Powell, publicly declared her support for the group on social media, the Metropolitan Police took no action, which Defend Our Juries said showed that the ban could not be enforced evenly. Shami Chakrabarti, a senior Labour figure and former shadow attorney general, also urged the Home Secretary to lift the ban. Speaking to LBC, she said it ‘makes a mockery’ of counter-terrorism law and argued that the power to proscribe should be exceptional and kept under constant review.
Concerns have been raised that the ambiguity of the law and the severity of its application have had a wider chilling effect on the freedoms of association, peaceful assembly and expression. Confusion over what constitutes support for a proscribed organisation has led to reports of wrongful arrests, with different police forces applying different policies. In one case in July 2025, a man was arrested for holding a copy of a cartoon about the proscription published in the satirical magazine Private Eye. He was held for six hours before being released and told he would face no further action.
Following the Court of Appeal ruling in June 2026, activists began deliberately inviting support for Palestine Action, a more serious offence than expressing support. This led to counter-terrorism police raiding people’s homes to search for and seize evidence. In August 2026, activists across the UK reported intrusive raids after publishing videos encouraging support for the group. Around 19 people, many of them elderly, had their homes raided following a Defend Our Juries campaign. Activists told Middle East Eye that police searched their homes, confiscated electronic devices and Palestinian flags, and read personal diaries. Some said they had been handcuffed and held for several hours before being released without charge. A 63-year-old former government worker said officers seized his laptops, phones and hard drives, while another activist said police searched his wife’s teenage diary.
Restrictions on Palestine solidarity protests
Demonstrations in solidarity with the Palestinian people continued to face disproportionate restrictions in 2026, amid growing political debate about the relationship between protest, antisemitism and public order.
In March 2026, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood banned the annual Al-Quds Day march through London in support of Palestinian rights, saying the ban was necessary to prevent serious public disorder. It was the first time a protest march had been banned since 2012, although a static protest was permitted. The Islamic Human Rights Commission, one of the organisers, strongly condemned the decision, saying that it undermined the right to protest and that there was no evidence to justify it.
The ban came amid increasing political focus on alleged links between Palestine solidarity marches and hate speech. Some politicians and public figures claimed that the protests had created a permissive environment for antisemitism. In May 2026, following an antisemitic attack on two Jewish men in London, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch called for a moratorium on Palestine solidarity marches. Then Prime Minister Keir Starmer also suggested that there might be a case for banning some protests, citing concern about the effect of repeated marches on the Jewish community.
The same month, the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association called on the UK government to refrain from stigmatising and banning Palestine solidarity protests in the name of preventing antisemitism. She also expressed concern that the government’s approach appeared to subject protests associated predominantly with Muslim communities to heightened security scrutiny, while not applying the same scrutiny to other forms of protest directly linked to antisemitic and racist incidents.
Increasingly restrictive protest legislation
The UK government continued to restrict the right to peaceful protest in 2026. Since the passage of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and the Public Order Act 2023, the legal framework has increasingly criminalised certain forms of protest and expanded police powers to restrict demonstrations. In practice, protests have regularly been subject to police restrictions. This reflects a shift away from a presumption in favour of facilitating protest towards an approach in which disruptive or persistent protest is treated as a security threat to be pre-empted and deterred.
The Crime and Policing Act 2026, which came into force in April, introduced further restrictions. These include police powers to designate areas where face coverings are banned and to prohibit protests near places of worship, as well as a requirement for officers to consider ‘cumulative disruption’ when deciding whether to impose conditions on a protest, even where previous protests were organised by different groups or concerned different issues. The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) and several human rights organisations raised concerns about the legislation while it was going through Parliament. UN Special Rapporteur Gina Romero also criticised the Act, saying that it contained provisions fundamentally incompatible with the UK’s international human rights obligations on peaceful assembly, association and expression, as well as the right to participate in public affairs. Romero expressed particular concern about the vague concept of ‘cumulative disruption’, which she said gave law enforcement excessive discretion to restrict assemblies and disregarded the principle that peaceful protest inherently involves a degree of disruption that must be accommodated.
She also warned that criminalising face coverings was especially problematic at a time of intensified surveillance, as anonymity is often essential to protect privacy and prevent a chilling effect. In addition, she said that restrictions on protests near places of worship risked creating ‘no-go zones’ for dissent and undermined the state’s duty to facilitate assemblies within sight and sound of their target audience. The Special Rapporteur has requested permission to make an official visit to the UK in November and December 2026, but the government has not yet responded to the request.
Increasing use of surveillance technology and its chilling effect on protest
The UK authorities continued to use police powers and surveillance technologies to restrict demonstrations, despite the absence of a dedicated legal framework. In January 2026, the government announced plans to expand police use of facial recognition technology across England and Wales, including increasing the number of live facial recognition vans available to police forces from 10 to 50. The technology has already been deployed in South Wales and London. The human rights organisation Liberty criticised the plans, saying they undermined public trust and showed disregard for people’s fundamental rights.
The Metropolitan Police has also been rapidly expanding its use of live facial recognition. A pilot of fixed cameras in Croydon, which ran from October 2025 to January 2026, led to more than 100 arrests. In June 2026, the force announced that it would begin using static live facial recognition cameras in London’s West End and Soho, and in August it was reported that fixed cameras would also be installed on Oxford Street, the UK’s busiest shopping street. Liberty raised concerns about the implications of increased surveillance for privacy, civic freedoms and the right to peaceful assembly, particularly where people may be deterred from attending protests for fear of being identified or arrested.
The expansion of live facial recognition has also raised concerns among civil society groups and privacy experts about wrongful identification, racial bias and inconsistent compliance with data protection law. In January 2026, Alvi Choudhury was arrested following a false match by a retrospective facial recognition system in connection with a burglary 100 miles away. Choudhury said the suspect was visibly younger and from a different ethnic background. He also described police officers laughing while he was held in a cell, and said they had acknowledged that the suspect did not look like him. In March, Essex Police paused its use of live facial recognition after a study found significant racial bias. In August, a report by the Information Commissioner’s Office found that data protection compliance was inconsistent among police forces using the technology.
Following a consultation launched in December 2025, the government announced in the King’s Speech in May 2026 that it would bring forward proposals for a legal framework governing law enforcement use of facial recognition and similar technologies as part of the Police Reform Bill. The proposals include a single expert regulatory body to provide independent advice and oversight. However, as of October 2026, the government had yet to publish its response to the consultation, which had been expected in May.
Freedom of Expression
“Free speech crisis”: More restrictive legislation introduced
Freedom of expression remained under pressure in 2026, particularly for people who expressed support for Palestine Action or took part in Palestine solidarity protests. The proscription of Palestine Action made it a criminal offence to express support for the group, to be a member of it, or to display certain items associated with it in public. The large number of arrests linked to support for Palestine Action, combined with uncertainty about what counts as support, raised concerns about a chilling effect on political expression. In September 2026, a report by Big Brother Watch warned that the UK was experiencing a ‘free speech crisis’. It pointed to inconsistent police enforcement, unnecessary arrests and what it described as a postcode lottery in how the relevant laws were applied.
The implementation of the Online Safety Act, in force since 2025, continued to raise concerns about freedom of expression, privacy and access to information. The Act requires online platforms to introduce age verification to protect children from harmful content, including pornography and material promoting violence, self-harm and eating disorders. Under threat of significant fines, platforms must verify users’ ages before allowing access to such content, using methods that can include facial recognition, credit card checks, scans of photo identification and artificial intelligence systems that scan communications. BBC Verify found that the rules were preventing users from accessing a wide range of public-interest and politically sensitive content unless they handed over biometric data or access to their communications. Social media platforms including X and Reddit had blocked content such as footage of the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, UK parliamentary debates and classical art under the new rules.
In September 2026, the government announced plans for a new law requiring technology companies to prevent children from taking or sharing nude images online. The proposals would require client-side scanning so that nude images could be blocked, and adults would have to verify that they were over 18 to bypass the restrictions and avoid having their private images scanned by default. The plans raised further concerns about privacy, the security of private communications and freedom of expression.
In March 2026, the government announced changes to police guidance on when to record non-crime hate incidents (NCHIs). Civil society groups welcomed the changes, as the recording of such incidents had restricted freedom of expression. However, concerns persisted about the boundaries between lawful expression, hate speech and public order. The same month, the government published its social cohesion and integration action plan, Protecting What Matters, which prompted widespread debate and concerns about free speech and how hate is defined.
Concerns about freedom of expression also extended to the ability of CSOs and individuals to challenge government decisions and take part in public debate. In December 2025, the government announced its intention to abolish the right to elect a jury trial for offences carrying a sentence of three years or less. The change could affect cases involving protesters, and it drew strong criticism from legal experts and civil society, who stressed the importance of jury trials for freedom of expression, progressive causes and political advocacy. In September 2026, the new Burnham government announced that it would soften some of the proposed restrictions on jury trials, although the details remained unclear.
In May 2026, a barrister representing Palestine Action defendants successfully challenged a finding that they had been in contempt of court for referring to the defendants’ motivations during their trial. The case raised questions about whether defendants are able to explain the political motivations behind their actions in court.
Press freedom alerts on the Council of Europe platform
The Council of Europe’s Platform for the Protection of Journalism and Safety of Journalists published several alerts concerning the UK in 2026.
On 18th February 2026, the platform published an alert on US President Donald Trump’s defamation lawsuit against the BBC, which seeks more than US$10 billion in damages over the editing of a 2024 Panorama programme about his presidential campaign. The programme included excerpts from Trump’s speech of 6th January 2021, edited together in a way that the BBC later acknowledged gave the misleading impression that he had directly called for violence. The broadcaster apologised but refused to pay compensation, and is seeking to have the Florida lawsuit dismissed on the grounds that the court lacks jurisdiction and that the programme did not harm Trump. Several press freedom organisations condemned the lawsuit as a threat to media freedom.
On 23rd February 2026, the platform published an alert over uncertainty about funding for the BBC World Service, warning of potential consequences for media freedom. The Service’s funding agreement with the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) was due to expire at the end of March, and future funding had not been confirmed at the time. Its budget had already fallen by 21% in real terms between 2021–22 and 2025–26. BBC Director-General Tim Davie warned that the uncertainty threatened international reporting at a time of growing disinformation and state-backed propaganda.
An alert published on 21st April 2026 concerned legal threats against The Londoner, a local news outlet owned by the Mill Media group, and journalist Cormac Kehoe over a 2025 investigation into alleged property rental fraud by Claudio Di Giovanni. Di Giovanni threatened the journalist, the outlet and three of its sources with civil and criminal proceedings, including possible imprisonment, and demanded that the article be removed and its sources disclosed. In an update published on 16th June, the platform reported that, following a hearing on 21st April, a High Court judge had struck out the County Court claim as an abuse of process and ruled that the High Court had no jurisdiction over the case. The platform called on the UK to introduce stronger safeguards against strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs). This echoes a systemic alert published in September 2024, which warned that journalists in the UK lack adequate protection against SLAPPs. It noted that high legal costs and claimant-friendly procedures, particularly in England and Wales, allow powerful actors to intimidate journalists and discourage public-interest reporting, and called for stronger and more accessible safeguards against abusive litigation.
A further alert, published on 30th April 2026, concerned an arson attack on the London studios of the Persian-language broadcaster Iran International. On 15th April, incendiary devices were thrown into the broadcaster’s car park shortly after a suspicious vehicle had been refused entry to its premises. No damage was reported. Three people, aged 16, 19 and 21, were arrested on suspicion of arson and endangering life. The broadcaster said its journalists had faced increasing harassment, including cyberattacks, threats and pressure on their relatives in Iran, and that 63 of its journalists had been included on a list of Iranian citizens abroad whose assets had been seized by Tehran. The platform called for a thorough investigation and additional protection for exiled Iranian journalists.