Protection from Harassment Act 1997
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| Citation | 1997 c 40 |
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| Dates | |
| Royal assent | 21 March 1997 |
| Commencement | Except for sections 1 to 12, the Act came into force on 21 March 1997. Sections 1 to 3(2) and 4 to 12 came into force on 16 June 1997. Sections 3(3) to (9) came into force on 1 September 1998. |
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Status: Amended
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| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
| Revised text of statute as amended | |
The Protection from Harassment Act 1997 (c 40) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. On introducing the Bill's second reading in the House of Lords the then Lord Chancellor, Lord Mackay of Clashfern said "The aim of this Bill is to protect the victims of harassment. It will protect all such victims whatever the source of the harassment—so-called stalking behaviour, racial harassment, or anti-social behaviour by neighbours." Home Office guidance on the Act says "The legislation was always intended to tackle stalking, but the offences were drafted to tackle any form of persistent conduct which causes another person alarm or distress."
Infield and Platford described the Act as "controversial".
This section prohibits a person from pursuing "a course of conduct" which "amounts to harassment of another" and which "he knows or ought to know amounts to harassment of the other". A person is taken to know that conduct is harassment if "a reasonable person in possession of the same information would think the course of conduct amounted to harassment of the other".
The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 inserted the offence of stalking in relation to this section and is defined to include things like monitoring a person online, contacting a person, loitering in a public or private place, interfering with property or spying/watching a person.
Section 1(1A) was inserted by section 125(2)(a) of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005. It prohibits a person from pursuing a course of conduct "which involves harassment of two or more persons" with the intention of persuading any person (not necessarily one of the persons harassed) to do or refrain from doing something they are lawfully entitled to do or not do.
According to Baroness Scotland of Ashall, promoting the Bill in the House of Lords, this provision and the associated provisions of section 3A were intended to strengthen "the protection afforded to the bioscience industry, and those who work in it" including by "making it an offence to protest outside a person's home in a way that causes harassment, alarm or distress to the residents of that home."
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