It seems the Labour government – like the Tories before them – believes ministers, not judges, must be the final arbiters of the law.

The government is continuing to push anti-protest measures already ruled unlawful by two courts, prompting this question: if politicians can override court rulings whenever it’s convenient for them, why have courts at all?

This isn’t a minor legal disagreement. It’s a direct challenge to the rule of law – the foundational principle that even governments must obey legal limits.

Twice now, UK courts have ruled that the former Tory government acted unlawfully when it expanded police powers over public protests by redefining “serious disruption” as merely “more than minor.”

This gave police vast new authority to arrest people for protest actions previously considered legal – and Parliament had already rejected the idea.

Yet ministers, under both Suella Braverman and her successors, pressed ahead anyway.

Now, the Court of Appeal has reaffirmed what civil liberties campaigners have said all along: that the government cannot unilaterally rewrite the law simply because it didn’t have its way in Parliament.

This matters because it’s not just a theoretical power grab. People have already been jailed under this overreach.

Climate protesters from groups like Just Stop Oil and Insulate Britain have received prison sentences for blocking roads or staging slow marches—tactics that have long been part of the UK’s rich protest tradition.

Under the new definition of “serious disruption,” those same actions suddenly became criminal on a much larger scale.

Police were able to arrest, detain, and charge people far more aggressively, simply because ministers had moved the goalposts.

Similarly, pro-Palestine demonstrators—especially in the wake of Israel’s war on Gaza—have faced mounting pressure, surveillance, and threats of crackdown under these new rules.

The Home Office had signalled a desire to curtail these protests, using public order as a pretext.

That desire is now bumping up against the courts’ clear insistence that the government cannot just make it up as it goes along.

The Liberty legal team, which brought the challenge, rightly called the judgment a victory for democracy.

But it leaves an uncomfortable question hanging: will the government accept the limits imposed by the law, or simply try again by another route?

Labour, now in government, seems determined to continue to challenge the courts’ rulings, although no decision on whether the Appeal Court’s decision will be taken higher or fresh legislation will be introduced has yet been announced.

The courts should be heeded and the expansion of police powers should be scrapped.

Let’s be honest: this isn’t about protest being “too disruptive.”

It’s about protest being politically inconvenient.

And a government that fears protest fears accountability.

The judiciary exists to ensure that no government—no matter its party colour—can suppress dissent through brute force and legal sleight of hand.

The court has spoken.

Now the government must decide whether it still believes in the rule of law, or only in the rule of ministers.