Firstly, the Home Office spokesman said they all believed that the bill had no
chance of becoming law, as it contravened too many EU human rights regulations regarding
free expression, and was fundamentally flawed. Their legal advisors had been consulted
already on the matter.The spokesman was then asked about other general censorship issues. He said that the
Obscene Publications Act didn't need amending, because it should be flexible enough to
accommodate just about everything which was legal in Europe, and in time there would be a
degree of liberalisation. We are simply behind, he said.
He continued to say that Customs, and Excise are no longer prosecuting or seizing
explicit imported non violent adult material and that they were only concerned with
bestiality, very violent porn, and child pornography being imported, and they were coming
down heavily especially on the latter. (Alas this statement has not
proven to be the case, Customs are still thieving adult consensual porn).
It was also stated that the police are no longer prosecuting adult porn dealers in
London, but they sometimes do elsewhere, but rarely get convictions in jury trials.
He said that it is a common misconception that the Home Office nor any other government
department set such guidelines for the purposes of determining obscenity.
He was asked if one would get into trouble by ordering an explicit adult DVD from
Europe and he said that it would be very unlikely as customs were not seizing them
anymore. Suspecting that Customs are not quite so liberal as suggested he was then asked
if adult porn were to be seized, could Customs be taken to court on the grounds of a
breach in Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights (Restriction is only
justified in proportion to the likely harm caused). He replied that indeed they could, and
that unless liberalisation occurred quickly they were expecting test cases along these
lines.
