Met police accused of ‘assault on right to protest’ after tenfold rise in nuisance law arrests

FoI requests also reveal that since 2019 less than 3% of those held under law in London were prosecuted

Police in London have been accused of abusing their powers to curb protest after research found that less than 3% of arrests for conspiracy to cause a public nuisance in the past five years resulted in a prosecution.

The research also found an almost tenfold rise in the number of arrests in the capital for the offence, most commonly used to target activists, since 2019 when Extinction Rebellion set off a wave of climate activism.