Liberty (UK)
 |
|
| Formation | 1 January 1934 |
|---|---|
| Type | Political pressure group |
| Legal status | Trust |
| Purpose | Human rights |
| Headquarters | London, England |
|
Director
|
Martha Spurrier |
| Website | www |
Liberty, formerly and still formally called the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), is an advocacy group based in the United Kingdom, which campaigns to protect civil liberties and promote human rights – through the courts, in Parliament and in the wider community.
The NCCL was founded in 1934 by Ronald Kidd and Sylvia Crowther-Smith (later Scaffardi). In 2009, the organisation celebrated its 75th anniversary.
Liberty's aim is to not only protect civil liberties but also to engender a "rights culture" within British society. Liberty announced Martha Spurrier as its new director on 31 March 2016.
The immediate spur to the organisation's formation was the National Hunger March 1932. The first Secretary was Ronald Kidd, and first President E. M. Forster; Vice-Presidents were the politician and author A. P. Herbert and the journalist Kingsley Martin of the New Statesman. H. G. Wells, Vera Brittain, Clement Attlee, Rebecca West, Edith Summerskill and Harold Laski were also founder members.
The National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL) was founded in 1934. The inaugural meeting took place in the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields in London on 22 February. A letter published in The Times and The Guardian newspapers announced the formations of the group, citing "the general and alarming tendency to encroachment on the liberty of the citizen" as the reason for its establishment. The first campaign was against the criminalisation of pacifist or anti-war literature. Under the proposed Incitement to Disaffection Bill, commonly known as the 'Sedition Bill', it would have been a criminal offence to possess pacifist literature, for example anti-war pamphlets. Although the Bill became law as the Incitement to Disaffection Act 1934, NCCL succeeded in watering it down. Other prominent early themes included campaigning against fascists, against film censorship and support for striking miners in Nottinghamshire.
...
Wikipedia