An evangelical church in Colchester, Essex, is challenging a ban on its street preaching loudspeakers and an order preventing "intimidating behaviour" after members reportedly told passers-by they were destined for hell.
The Bread of Life Community Church is appealing the Community Protection Notice (CPN), issued in March by the Safer Colchester Partnership, which operates under Colchester City Council. Breaching such an order constitutes a criminal offence.
Michael Phillips, for appellants Bread of Life Community Church, told a hearing at Colchester Magistrates’ Court on Friday that the CPN “imposed a number of requirements”.
He said these included “to stop using amplification or loudspeaker” and to “stop intimidating behaviour”.
He said he believed this was the “first attempt by a local authority to control the speech” of a group.
“This was preaching which took place in public as it has done for millennia,” he said.
“You may not like what’s been said but there’s free speech in this country.”
He said that “it seems, unfortunately, that the council took a view on this matter without engaging with the local interested parties”.
“There was simply the imposition of this notice which, if you breach the notice, it’s a criminal offence,” said Mr Phillips.
Laura Austin, for respondents Colchester City Council, said: “This wasn’t an attempt by a state body to censure a local religious group.
“There’s no bar on this group or any group preaching in a manner which expresses lawful religious grievance.”
She said a “vulnerable man” who was being assisted by his carer had “found the noise of the amplification too loud”.
She said the man “put his hands over his ears and was told as he had put his hands over his ears he was going to hell”.
She said there had also been allegations of “homophobic comments and chants to members of the public”.
“It’s important to point out there have been attempts to engage with this group but they have not been successful,” she said.
A two-day hearing has been set down for the appeal, with the first day on October 22 at Southend Magistrates’ Court and the second day on October 29 at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court.
A case management hearing is due to take place at Colchester Magistrates’ Court on August 21.
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