Question
The CAJ’s May 2025 report, Mapping Far Right Activity Online in Northern Ireland, calls explicitly for public authorities to “enforce existing hate crime legislation, regulate social media platforms, counter racist misinformation, and fulfil their human rights obligations to protect vulnerable communities and promote good relations”.
Simultaneously, the PSNI’s Race and Ethnicity Action Plan 2025–2030 commits to embedding the principles of the European Convention on Human Rights (in particular, Articles 2, 3, 8 and 14), into policing: ensuring fairness, transparency, accountability, and equitable treatment; enhancing community trust; eliminating bias; strengthening oversight; and providing data-driven performance evaluation through SMART objectives across key workstreams.
In light of these commitments:
1. What specific actions is the PSNI taking to address far-right online content, including monitoring, interventions, prosecutions, or enhanced hate-crime enforcement in response to the CAJ report?
2. How is the PSNI ensuring it complies with its human rights obligations—as articulated in REAP under the ECHR framework—particularly in safeguarding vulnerable and minority ethnic communities targeted by far-right misinformation or extremist material?
3. Which mechanisms or partnerships (e.g., with social media companies, regulatory bodies, and civil society) are in place—or being developed—to rapidly identify, counteract, and mitigate the spread of online racist and extremist content, aligning with both CAJ recommendations and the PSNI’s delivery frameworks outlined in the REAP workstreams?
Answer
The PSNI is at the start of a five-year journey through our Race and Ethnicity Action Plan, which is grounded in human rights and where we have committed to being an actively anti-racist organisation. We also have a dedicated hate crime strategy that focuses on broader but intersectional issues of the Race and Ethnicity Plan. We will now take a cross departmental approach in considering the CAJ’s recent report, as we strengthen our response to far-right activity and hate crime, safeguard vulnerable communities, and work with key partners where applicable to identify and counter harmful online content to ensure fair, transparent and accountable policing.
Dr. Kate Laverty