An Old Firm game on the horizon. A feast of football? Perhaps, although nothing about either team suggests that it’s likely. An hour and a half of foul language directed by each set of supporters towards the other? A guaranteed certainty. A plethora of crimes committed under the OBFA? I suppose that depends upon the police.

And therein lies one of the many issues with the Act. It was, as with so much of Scottish legislation these days, an act designed to be a “hit” with the public. It was not so much legislation designed to deal with a problem but one to show action was being taken. A government of doers, not thinkers. Its evolution was a particular Old Firm game and the headlines for the Act were it was to tackle sectarianism-as if that was only present at football matches.

There is no logical argument against the suggestion that sectarian chanting has nothing to do with football. However what the Act does is seek to criminalise only a particular section of the community namely the football supporter. As the High Court of Justiciary explained in PF Dingwall v Cairns in 2013 “Parliament created a criminal offence with an extremely long
reach”. The same case goes on to explain in terms of the Act that behaviour is likely to incite public disorder if it would be likely to occur but for the fact that there is no one there to be incited. Logically therefore if you are the only person in the ground you still commit an offence if singing The Roll of Honour. Whichever side one is on, or no side at all, that is preposterous. What is that law achieving in relation to sectarianism or offensive behaviour?

The Act turns the police from being the custodians of public order to officers looking to discover the crime of offensive behaviour. Body cameras pointed at sections of the support were for a period at least the done thing, the sole purpose being to try and find something offensive to arrest someone for.

The Act is capricious. Who knows how many hundreds (maybe even thousands) of people were singing the offensive lyrics in Dingwall yet only Mr. Cairns is prosecuted. At the last Old Firm semi final one side in particular were heard singing supposed banned songs. I do not understand there to have been any prosecutions as a result. What is the criteria for
who/how many are to be apprehended? Where is the justice in that approach?

It is an Act which invites people to be offended and tells them what it is they are to be offended by. The laws which existed before the Act adequately covered any situation where the peace was indeed likely to be breached. The Act is unfair, unnecessary and unworkable.