Reform UK language ban threatens BSL campaigners with prison
The Scottish Greens have warned against Reform UK’s amendment to criminalise campaign videos published solely in British Sign Language, threatening them with up to six months in prison.
The Westminster proposal would cut-off vital accessibility for voters who speak other languages such as Polish, Punjabi, Urdu, Arabic and Ukrainian.
Scottish Greens co-leader, and someone who has hearing loss, Gillian Mackay MSP has called out the amendment as discriminatory.
Reform UK’s amendment would require election material to be published only in English or Welsh, with no exemption for British Sign Language, and criminalising Gaelic, Scots, Doric, Cornish, and even going as far as criminalising Latin and Klingon.
Scottish Greens co-leader Gillian Mackay MSP said:
“I was proud to join Hannah Spencer on the campaign trail in Gorton and Denton earlier this year, because she treated everyone as worth speaking and listening to - but Reform UK attacked her for that inclusivity, and now they are trying to write those prejudices into law.
“Reform UK’s dangerously broad amendment would criminalise campaign videos in British Sign Language, as well as election material in Gaelic, Scots and other languages.Their Westminster proposal contains no exemption for British Sign Language, putting people in prison simply for publishing a political campaign video in sign language.
“As someone who has hearing loss, I know from personal experience how important accessible communication is. Making elections accessible should be a basic principle of our democracy, but Reform UK wants to do the opposite by putting up barriers and excluding people from political debate.”
Gillian added:
“For a party that claims to defend freedom of speech, using censorship to control the languages people can use in political campaigns says everything about Reform UK’s real priorities, especially whilst Nigel Farage has forced a by-election against Count Binface in an attempt to escape scrutiny.
“The amendment would criminalise publishing election material in Gaelic, Scots and even Latin. It is so absurdly broad that it would criminalise and jail producers of campaign leaflets written in Klingon from Star Trek.
“Threatening people with prison over Klingon is clearly not a serious or sensible use of Parliament’s time, and is the kind of lawmaking Westminster produces when it is left to London to decide.
“Scotland should have the right to choose its own future and build an inclusive democracy that welcomes people in, respects the languages spoken and signed in our communities, and never treats accessibility as a crime.”