NORTH WARWICKSHIRE BOROUGH COUNCIL v SHEILA SHATFORD & Ors

JUDGE KELLY: The cases of Sheila Shatford, Charlotte Kirin and Mary Adams cannot be concluded today. Ms Shatford and Ms Adams were only served with the evidence at Court today as it appears that the prison did not pass on the documents served by the claimant. Both defendants request further time to consider the evidence and their cases will be adjourned to Friday, 23 September. Ms Kirin has indicated she denies the allegation of contempt. Her case will be listed for trial on 26 September 2022 at 10.30 am.

It falls to the court to determine the remand position regarding each of the three aforementioned defendants pending the next hearings. Each of the defendants has been remanded in custody since the last hearing on 15 September. At that hearing, each of them adopted a mirror position and stated that they did not recognise the authority of the court and, if released, would breach the injunction and would not voluntarily return to court. They have each reiterated that position today. Therefore, whilst there is presumption of bail, given their stated positions there is clearly a significant risk that each would breach the injunction and/or fail to surrender to the adjourned hearing date. Ms Shatford and Ms Adams will be further remanded in custody to be produced on 23 September and Ms Kirin to 26 September 2022.

Stephen Gingell, Richard Morgan and Holly Exley, you each appear before the court having admitted breach of the injunction granted by Sweeting J on 14 April 2022, as varied by order dated 6 May 2022.

Following your arrest on 14 September 2022, you were produced before the court on 15 September. At that first hearing you were advised of your entitlement to legal representation and advice and the claimant provided you with written particulars of the alleged contempt. Each of you indicated that you did not want to obtain legal representation and have maintained that position today. I have therefore heard from each of you in person. You have each informed the court that you admit the breaching the injunction, as alleged by the claimant, on 14 September 2022.

These are civil, not criminal, proceedings. However, as contempt proceedings the court has to be satisfied to the criminal standard of proof, that is beyond reasonable doubt. In light of your admissions and having read the police witness evidence, I am so satisfied.

On 14 April 2022, Sweeting J granted a without notice interim injunction against various named defendants and persons unknown. Mr Gingell, Mr Morgan and Ms Exley were not named defendants. Persons unknown were defined as those who were:

“… organising, participating in or encouraging others to participate in protests against the production and/or use of fossil fuels, in the locality of the site known as Kingsbury oil terminal, Tamworth B78 2HA.”

A power of arrest was attached to the injunction.

The terms of the injunction were varied at an on-notice the hearing on 5 May 2022 and drawn into an order dated 6 May 2022. The relevant paragraphs of the order of 6 May 2022 are as follows:

There then follows 11 sub-paragraphs defining prohibited activities. Those relevant to the matter before the court today are:

“(iii)

obstructing of any entrance to the terminal; …

(xi)

instructing, assisting or encouraging any other person to do any act prohibited by paragraphs (b)(i) – (x) of this order."

The map referred to in paragraph 1(a) of the injunction is prepared at a scale of 1:5000 and shows a red line largely following the perimeter of the oil terminal. A private access road off the public highway falls within the red line.

The injunction was ordered to continue until the hearing of the claim unless varied or discharged by further order of the court. The final hearing of the claim has not yet occurred, and the order of 6 May 2022 has not to date been further varied or discharged.

By paragraph 5 of the injunction, Sweeting J permitted the claimant to serve the order and power of arrest by alternative means specified in schedule 2. The alternative service included the placing of the order in prominent locations along the boundary and outside the terminal, the junctions to the road leading into the zone and on various social media platforms that the claimant utilised.

I am satisfied on the evidence before me that the claimant has proved the necessary service by alternative means. The claimant took a variety of steps, not all of them immediately after the hearing in May but had nonetheless completed service before the date of your activity on 14 September 2022. The claimant posted details of the amended order on its website with links to social media on 10 May 2022 but did not immediately comply with the other requirements as to alternative service. However, on 23 August 2022 the claimant posted details on its Twitter and Facebook accounts. On 24 August 2022, 26 August 2022 and 2 September completed steps to ensure that copies of the order and power of arrest were displayed in multiple locations at, around and in the vicinity of the terminal.

On 14 September 2022 you were three of just over 50 individuals who gathered at Kingsbury Oil Terminal from approximately 11.30am to protest against the production and use of fossil fuels. You positioned yourselves on a private access road within the red boundary demarcated on the map attached to the injunction. It is accepted by the claimant that it was a purely peaceful protest but it was nonetheless one which obstructed the road. The sheer volume of protestors involved meant that when you sat down across the road you blocked vehicular access into and out of the terminal. You were accompanied by various "Just Stop Oil" banners, with many of you wearing hi-vis jackets marked with the Just Stop Oil logo.

Initially you allowed some private vehicles but not oil tankers to enter and exit the terminal but after a period of time you stopped all vehicular traffic. There is evidence that one worker asked one of your number for permission to leave in their vehicle to attend an urgent medical appointment at 2.30 pm but they were not allowed vehicular egress. Mr Gingell told the court that he believes there was another entrance on the other side of the terminal site and, for the purpose of his exercise, I assume that is correct.

Vast numbers of police officers attended in light of the number of protestors in situ. They asked you each to leave, you were polite, but made it clear that you were not prepared to be move voluntarily. From about 3.50pm, the police began the considerable task of arresting all fifty-one of you.

The court has to determine the appropriate penalty for your admitted breaches of paragraphs 1(a), 1(b)(iii) and 1(b)(ix) of the injunction. I largely agree with the legal framework put forward by the claimant in its sentencing note. When determining the appropriate penalty for a contempt of contempt, I bear in mind the guidance given by the Court of Appeal in Willoughby v Solihull MBC [2013] EWCA Civ 699. There are three objectives to consider when imposing a penalty. Pitchford LJ at para 20 held:

In their report of July 2020, the Civil Justice Council looked at appropriate penalties for contempt of court arising from injunctions made under the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. Those draft guidelines, similar in style to the Sentencing Council guidelines, were adapted to reflect the lower range of penalties in the civil courts. Those guidelines have never been brought into force. I note that the Sentencing Council Definitive Guidelines state in express terms that draft guidelines should not be taken into consideration. I therefore adopt the criminal guideline as the best analogy.

The claimant has quite fairly referred the court to the decision of the Court of Appeal case of Cuadrilla Bowland Ltd and Others v Persons Unknown [2020] EWCA Civ 9. I have no doubt that had each of you been legally represented, your advocate would have relied upon the guidance in that case to support a submission for clemency. Leggatt LJ considered the approach to sentencing protestors:

“[95] Where, as in the present case, individuals not only resort to compulsion to hinder or try to stop lawful activities of others of which they disapprove, but do so in deliberate defiance of a court order, they have no reason to expect that their conscientious motives will insulate them from the sanction of imprisonment.

[96] On the other hand, courts are frequently reluctant to make orders for the immediate imprisonment of protestors who engage in deliberately disruptive but non-violent forms of direct action protest for conscientious reasons…”

The court accepts the actions of all three of you on 14 September 2022 were undertaken for conscientious reasons. At paragraph 98 of Cuadrilla Leggatt LJ discussed the reasons for showing greater clemency in response to acts of civil disobedience and at concluded at paragraph 99:

I turn to the Definitive Guideline for breach of a criminal behaviour order. Your actions on 14 September were deliberate and fall into category B culpability.

When determining the category of harm, the guideline requires consideration of the “harm that has been caused or was at risk of being caused.” The claimant submits that the harm falls into category two, falling between the highest and lowest categories. In determining the level of harm, the court has to look at the facts and circumstances of this particular protest. Your actions prevented the normal operation of the oil terminal for a minimum period of about 4.5 hours from 11.30am until the first arrests started at 3.50pm. The actual period of disruption and inconvenience was longer than that because of the period of time it took to affect the arrest of 51 protesters. During that period, whilst you stopped oil tankers accessing and egressing the terminal and for part of the period you stopped workers entering and exiting in their own vehicles. It is accepted that you continued to allow individuals to access and egress on foot. The court has not been provided with any evidence from the operators of the terminal as to the impact on their business. Therefore, other than the inconvenience that is self-evident from the blocking of the passage of oil tankers, I do not take into account any specific business impact. There is however evidence that one worker was stopped from using their vehicle to exit the site using the access road you were blocking to attend a medical appointment.

The harm also extends to the consequences of the closure of part of the public highway whilst the protests and arrests were ongoing. That will have impacted on ordinary members of the public, including in particular those living in the vicinity of the terminal, who were trying to go about their daily lives.

Your actions also caused very significant harm to the police resources in Warwickshire and beyond at a time when resources were already very stretched as a result of the unprecedented impact of the late Queen's death and the consequent period of national mourning necessitating the redeployment of Warwickshire Police officers to London. The scale of your protest meant that multiple officers from across Warwickshire had to be diverted away from their normal policing duties to attend, including firearms, traffic and dog unit specialist officers. They attended not because there was any suggestion your protest was other than peaceful but due to the sheer number of protestors that needed to be arrested and processed. The diversion of police resources clearly created a risk of very significant harm to other parts of Warwickshire that were left under resourced. Warwickshire Police had call for mutual aid from West Midlands Police and West Mercia Police, further diverting police resources from those areas. There is also evidence before the court that officers had to work long past their shifts ended to process those arrested. Inevitably that will have impacted on their welfare and resulted in the police force incurring overtime costs.

In those circumstances, the impact on policing resources arising from the timing and scale of this protest means the case falls above category 2 albeit I accept it does not fall squarely within category 1, that is to say very serious harm or distress. I therefore proceed on the basis that harm is to be assessed falling between category 1 and category 2.

A category 1 harm, culpability B matter in the criminal courts would have a starting point sentence of 1 years’ imprisonment with a range of high level community order to two years’ custody. A category 2 harm, culpability B case would have a starting point of 12 weeks’ custody with a range from a medium level community order to 1 years’ custody. The penalty for contempt of court has to reflect the lower maximum sentence of the civil court.

There are no aggravating factors in any of your cases. Each of you has no previous criminal convictions or cautions and this is your first breach of this injunction. You have each addressed the court and I accept that each of you acted on grounds of social conscious and you believe that your actions were justified by the concerns you have as to climate change. Each of you live otherwise law-abiding lives and are currently or are usually in gainful employment.

Taking into account the Definitive Guideline by analogy and aggravating and mitigating features, the contempt of court is so serious that it crosses the custody threshold. A sentence, before consideration of your admissions and time spend on remand, of 56 days’ imprisonment is appropriate.

You have each admitted the breach at the first reasonable opportunity. The Sentencing Council Guideline provides for the maximum one-third reduction from any sentence to reflect a guilty plea at the earliest opportunity. I apply that by analogy and reduce the 56 days to 37 days, rounding down in your favour.

In fixing the term of imprisonment, I have to take account of any time that you have spent on remand. Unlike in the criminal courts, the prison service cannot adjust the penalty on a civil contempt to take account of time spent on remand. You have each been in custody for a total period of 7 days, 1 day following your arrest on 14 September 2022 and a further 6 days following your remand in custody on 15 September 2022. That is the equivalent of a 14-day sentence. The term therefore further reduces to 23 days’ imprisonment.

I then consider whether the sentences can be suspended. I bear in mind the guidance of the Court of Appeal in Cuadrilla Bowland, your motivation and that this is your first breach of the injunction. I am satisfied that it is appropriate to suspend each of your terms of imprisonment. In each of your cases, the 23 day term of imprisonment will be suspended on condition of compliance for a period of 2 years from today with the terms of any interim or final injunction order made in this claim (of which the current claim number QB-2022-001236) in relation to protest activity at Kingsbury Oil Terminal. For the avoidance of doubt, the current order in force is the interim order of Mr Justice Sweeting dated 6 May 2022. I make it clear, if you fail to comply with the terms of the suspension, you must expect that the order for imprisonment would be implemented and you will be dealt with separately in relation to any future contempt.

As Mr Manning made clear when he opened the case, the injunction does not prevent you from conducting protests, even immediately outside the terminal. You have a copy of the injunction order and plan within the evidence. Mr Manning highlighted an area immediately outside the entrance to the terminal which is not within the red boundary. Subject to your actions not otherwise falling foul of paragraph 1(b) of the order, individuals can protest in that area. As Leggatt LJ made clear in Cuadrilla Bowland, in a democratic society it is the duty of responsible citizens to obey the law and respect the rights of others even when those laws are contrary to your own moral convictions.

The claimant seeks that each of the three defendants make a contribution to its costs in the sum of £320.77. The general rule is that the successful party is entitled to its costs although the court may make a different order. The claimant has succeeded in proving the contempt, and it is appropriate therefore that you make contribution to those costs. Earlier today, in the context of other similar cases, I determined that the overall figure the claimant was seeking was reasonable and proportionate for the work undertaken.

At one stage, counsel for the clamant submitted that that Mr Morgan should pay a slightly higher figure on the basis that he should have been produced from custody yesterday when, for various reasons including the attendance of a more senior solicitor, the claimant’s costs were higher. In circumstances where it was not the fault of Mr Morgan that he was not produced and he has therefore spent an extra night in custody, I propose to order him to pay the same figure of £320.77.

As to the payment of that sum, Ms Exley and Mr Gingell have told the court they have saving or can otherwise pay £320.77 in a lump sum. Each shall therefore pay the claimant a contribution to its costs in the sum of £320.77 by 31 October 2022. Mr Morgan has told the court is of more limited means and is currently looking for new employment albeit he has a job interview next week. Mr Morgan shall pay the same contribution to the claimant’s costs but by instalments of £25 a month, the first payment by 21 October and by 25^th of each month thereafter until the balance has been discharged.

Each of the three defendants has a right to appeal the order of committal. Any appeal must be made to the Court of Appeal Civil Division and must be filed within 21 days of today. I transcript of this judgment shall be obtained at public expense on an expedited basis and published on the Judiciary website.

The effect of the suspended sentence is that you will be released from custody today, subject the custodians processing the paperwork and you not being required in custody on any other unrelated matter.