Britons Say Making Improper Use of Communications Is a Crime
Almost half of respondents say the punishment for a student who incited racial hatred on Twitter was adequate.
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(05/08/12) -
A large majority of people in Britain agree with current guidelines to deal with the improper use of public electronic communications, a new Angus Reid Public Opinion poll has found.
In the online survey of a representative sample of 2,604 British adults, only 13 per cent of respondents say they followed the recent trial of Liam Stacey “very closely” or “moderately closely”—a proportion that reaches 20 per cent among Britons aged 18-to-34.
Stacey—a Swansea University student—was sentenced to nearly two months in jail for posting offensive comments on Twitter. Stacey was found to have incited racial hatred on the online social networking and microblogging service moments after Bolton Wanderers footballer Fabrice Muamba collapsed during a match.
Almost half of respondents (45%) think the punishment is about right, while one-in-four (23%) deem it too harsh. In addition, 14 per cent believe the sentence for Stacey was too lenient—including one-in-five respondents over the age of 55 (20%).
Respondents endorse two components of Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003, which are related to the improper use of public electronic communications network. Almost nine-in-ten Britons (87%) believe a person is guilty of an offence if he/she sends by means of a public electronic communications network a message or other matter that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character. A similarly high proportion of respondents (85%) believe a person is guilty of an offence if, for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety to another, he/she sends by means of a public electronic communications network, a message that he/she knows to be false.
Two-in-five respondents (40%) are content with existing regulations in the UK to deal with racially or religiously aggravated offences. However, one-in-four Britons (26%) think these regulations do not go far enough, and 18 per cent believe they are excessive.
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Full Report, Detailed Tables and Methodology (PDF)
CONTACT:
Mario Canseco, Vice President, Angus Reid Public Opinion
+877 730 3570
mario.canseco@angus-reid.com
Methodology: From April 9 to April 11, 2012, Angus Reid Public Opinion conducted an online survey among 2,604 randomly selected British adults who are Springboard UK panelists. The margin of error—which measures sampling variability—is +/- 1.9%. The results have been statistically weighted according to the most current education, age, gender and region data to ensure samples representative of the entire adult population of Great Britain. Discrepancies in or between totals are due to rounding.
