Clause 1 - Hatred against persons on racial or religious grounds
Racial and Religious Hatred Bill
10:45 am
Alistair Carmichael (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Orkney and Shetland, Liberal Democrat)
There will be other supporting evidence, and one would consider the circumstances in which such a comment was made. For example, was it made on a street at 2 o’clock in the morning when bricks and bottles were being thrown as part of a wider racially motivated incident, or was it perhaps made outside a mosque? The courts would be entitled to consider all the circumstances, and that means exactly that: all the circumstances. They would even be entitled to look at the way in which the person who made the comment was dressed—in full skinhead gear, for example, or with swastikas on their clothing—or whether they were putting up posters that were racially abusive or incited racial abuse.