More than 50 held at Palestine Action solidarity protest outside Labour conference

More than 50 people were detained in Liverpool after a protest outside the Labour Party's annual conference in support of the banned group Palestine Action, according to Merseyside Police. Officers began making arrests after telling demonstrators that displaying signs backing a proscribed organisation was a criminal offence, with some protesters told they were being held under powers of the Terrorism Act.

The demonstration, organised under the banner of the campaign group Defend Our Juries, drew several hundred people to the streets around the conference centre. According to reports from the scene, more than 250 protesters sat down outside the venue, a substantial number of them holding home-made placards carrying a single line of text: "I support Palestine Action". The banners — many of them clearly assembled for the day rather than printed by any organisation — were at the centre of the police response.

Scores of officers were positioned around the gathering before moving in. Police warned participants that holding signs in support of a proscribed group was illegal, and asked them whether they intended to continue displaying them. When demonstrators declined to put the placards away, officers began leading individuals away, telling them they were being arrested under the Terrorism Act. Photographs from the protest show officers in high-visibility jackets physically removing supporters while a crowd watched on.

Merseyside Police said more than 50 people had been detained by the time of its statement, adding that officers were still in the process of making arrests on suspicion of wearing or carrying an article supporting a proscribed organisation — the wording used for the placards held by the crowd. A force spokesperson said the department respected everyone's right to protest lawfully while also seeking to keep the peace and protect the public. The force said it produces "detailed and co-ordinated plans ahead of such events to ensure it can apply this consistently, fairly and proportionately", and stressed that not everyone present at the protest had been committing an offence.

On the ground, the mood was one of defiance rather than despair. Demonstrators reportedly cheered each time a protester was carried off by police, treating the arrests as part of the demonstration's purpose. Among those detained was Margaret Owen, a 94-year-old human rights barrister, whose presence undercut any suggestion that the gathering consisted solely of those prepared for confrontation.

Defend Our Juries said it had hoped the incoming administration would repeal the ban. A spokesperson said the group had "hoped the new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, would do the sensible thing and bin the ban on Palestine Action given the weight of public pressure to do so and the escalating amount of resources required in enforcing it." The same spokesperson argued that continuing the group's proscription was "illogical, unsustainable and immoral" — a formulation suggesting the group sees the ban not as a durable legal measure but as one whose costs have outgrown its justification.

Amnesty International criticised the arrests, with Kerry Moscogiuri, chief executive of Amnesty International UK, calling the suppression of a peaceful demonstration a "shameful attack on freedom of speech". Moscogiuri framed the arrests within a longer trend, saying protesting remains one of the most effective tools people have to make their leaders listen, but that successive governments have progressively restricted the right to use it. She pointed to the range of those detained — "the arrests of grandparents, teenagers and everyone in between for holding placards outside the Labour Party conference" — as evidence that the rules are being applied to a broad cross-section of the public rather than to identified threats.

Moscogiuri turned directly to the new prime minister, arguing that the law could be reformed so that communities are better able to come together and demonstrate on issues that matter to them. Her question to Burnham was blunt: "Will he do so?" The intervention marks the first significant direct appeal to the new administration for a review of a flagship counter-terrorism measure, and it places the arrests squarely at the centre of the government's early political agenda.

The legal position remains unsettled. The ban on Palestine Action came into force in July 2025, proscribing the group as a terrorist organisation. In July, the Supreme Court confirmed that the proscription would be reviewed, having granted the group's co-founder permission to appeal. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said at the time that the government would "robustly defend" any appeal, signalling that ministers intend to uphold the designation rather than revisit it.

The Home Office has consistently argued that the ban is not about protest or support for Palestinian causes, and that it was necessary because the group's activities were causing significant criminal damage to legitimate businesses. That distinction is at the heart of the controversy: the organisation's proscription means that displaying a sign in its support is treated as an offence in its own right, rather than as evidence of criminality attaching to some other act.

Judges have divided on precisely that point. Both the High Court and the Court of Appeal have found that Palestine Action's activities have included criminal acts, but the appellate judges were not unanimous on whether those incidents were serious enough to justify using terrorism legislation against a group. The Court of Appeal nonetheless ruled in June that the ban itself was lawful.

The Liverpool arrests will add fuel to that argument. Demonstrating that more than 50 people — including a 94-year-old barrister — can be arrested on suspicion of holding a sign raises fresh questions about the threshold for the use of terrorism powers against speech, and about whether the criminal damage cited by the Home Office is being pursued through the most appropriate legal mechanism. BBC News has asked the Ministry of Justice to comment.