From Press Freedom to Women's Rights: Why Defending Free Speech Matters

DATE: Friday 20th September, 2024

TIME: Doors and bar open 6.30pm. Panel with Q & A, 7.30pm until 9pm, followed by social.

VENUE: Lanyon Suite, Crumlin Road Gaol, Belfast.

TICKETS: £6 for FSU members, £10 for non-members, £3 for students.

Join us at the historic Crumlin Road Gaol for the Free Speech Union’s second Northern Ireland Speakeasy and the launch of its new Northern Ireland Advisory Council.

On Friday 20th September we will discuss how we can best help people in the region defend their rights to freedom of expression. We will be monitoring closely and responding to any developments in hate crime legislation - having already been the primary organisation challenging similar law enacted in Scotland. We are supporting two cases where women's rights activists have been targeted for their opinions, but we will now be stepping up our capacity to defend free speech in Northern Ireland.

At a time of rising social tensions, it is more important than ever that people can come together to raise the issues that concern them and to debate solutions.

We need you to tell us more about what is going on so that we can respond with our proven expertise in fighting cancel culture, built up over four years and more than 2,000 cases, with a membership now exceeding 14,000 across the United Kingdom.

The evening is your chance to hear from great speakers, to get your voice heard on free speech issues and to meet other free speech enthusiasts.

SPEAKERS

Heather Binning, Director of Women's Rights Network

Simon Chambers, solicitor in the 'TERFed Out' case and 'Sara Morrison vs Belfast Film Festival'

Ruth Dudley Edwards, journalist, historian and crime novelist

Toby Young, general secretary of the Free Speech Union

About our speakers

Heather Binning was born in Scotland and began her career in the Foreign & Commonwealth Office where she held a number of overseas postings in places such as Washington DC to Kuwait. An experienced businesswoman, she went on to establish the first public internet access across the UK before becoming an economic development consultant for a range of organisations. Heather took up the baton of women’s rights in July 2021, bringing together a number of local women’s groups which grew to become the (entirely voluntary) Women’s Rights Network. The Network already connects thousands of women, and continues to grow with more than 60 groups right across the UK.

Simon Chambers has been practising as a litigation specialist and “problem solver” for nearly 25 years and is based just outside Belfast in Newtownards at Russell and Company Solicitors. Simon also practises in Family and Criminal law, conveyancing and commercial matters. He is a member of the Law Society Council. Simon is currently pursuing two gender-critical discrimination cases in NI in both the Employment Tribunal and County Court.

Ruth Dudley Edwards is an historian, crime novelist, political commentator and an enthusiast for truth-telling. She runs a free speech Facebook page and ignores libelous bile on Twitter/X. Members of Sinn Fein have made unsuccessful efforts to silence her with legal threats. Index on Censorship filed a media freedom alert to the Council of Europe over a libel case taken against her by senior Sinn Fein ex-IRA figure Gerry Kelly as having ‘several characteristics of strategic lawsuits against public participation’. In March 2024, he had to pay her costs in his failed suit.

Toby Young is the general secretary of the Free Speech Union, a non-partisan, mass membership public interest body that stands up for the speech rights of its members. He co-founded the West London Free School and is the author of four books, the best known of which is How to Lose Friends & Alienate People. He is an associate editor of the Spectator, where he’s written a weekly column since 1998. He also runs a blog called DailySceptic.org that has received over 40 million page views.

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