Britain’s 'safe access zones' around abortion clinics ban all protest activity—including silent vigils and prayer—within designated areas. Violators can face criminal penalties, marking a shift from regulating disruptive conduct to criminalizing even nonverbal, non‑disruptive expression.
— It sharpens the debate over whether UK speech law is drifting from policing behavior toward policing thought, with knock‑on effects for how other speech codes may be drafted and enforced.
Giles Fraser
2025.12.03
85% relevant
Both the Quebec bill reported here and the UK 'safe access zone' policies concretely restrict devotional acts in public by criminalising forms of non‑disruptive religious expression; the Quebec case extends that logic to general public prayer (C$1,000 fine) and follows protest contexts, making it a near‑direct parallel about how states regulate religion in shared spaces.
Tyler Cowen
2025.11.29
60% relevant
Cowen links to reporting on Quebec limiting public religious displays, which is the same governance pattern as the UK 'safe access' restrictions that ban even silent vigils near clinics; both are state actions that reframe freedom of religious expression as a public‑order/child‑protection problem and so belong to the same litigation and policy debate.
Adam Tomkins
2025.10.06
100% relevant
The article cites JD Vance’s criticism that UK abortion‑zone rules prohibit even 'silent vigil and prayer,' treating breach as a criminal offence.