The fiend… the monster…. killing’s too good for him…. This man is dangerous and should only be tackled by highly trained security professionals…
Walter Wolfgang, 82, first of all heckled the foreign secretary, Jack Straw, when he started talking nonsense about Iraq.
‘Nonsense!’, he said.
The heavies came out and removed him. Mr Wolfgang may not have been too co-operative so, maybe, a little firmness was required. Anyway, eventually they ejected him.
Mr Wolfgang tried to re-enter the hall, but was refused permission under Section 44 of the Prevention of Terrorism Act. His conference pass was also confiscated.
It didn’t stop with Mr Wolfgang - a member of the Labour Party for more than half a century:
Steve Forrest, a constituency party chairman from Erith and Thamesmead in south-east London, was also ejected after complaining about Mr Wolfgang’s treatment. Mr Wolfgang, a party member for 57 years, told the BBC 2’s Daily Conference Live programme: “I shouted ‘nonsense’. That’s all I said. Then these two toughies manhandled me out.”
And this is where it all starts to get a little frightening. Exactly how extensive is the Prevention of Terrorism Act that it can bar a person for heckling? Which area of our lives is the Act not able to intrude? This from the ACPO site gives a rough plain English description of Section 44 and most of my tea-break Googling reveals the section to be mostly concerned with stop and search of potential terrorist suspects.
It’s worth noting that this behaviour is being meted out on Labour’s own supporters at their own televised conference. If that’s how they treat their own then how will they treat the rest of us?
With the disdain and contempt that they always have treated us, no doubt…
