Steve Bray, a British activist, carries a sign and speaks into the megaphone as he participates in a protest against British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in London. (Reuters/May James/File Photo)
Britain’s noisiest protester, who has been bombarding Parliament with music and anti-Brexit slogans for years, faces being silenced after a new law on decibel levels came into effect Tuesday.
Steve Bray, 53, who uses a megaphone to target Boris Johnson and other ministers from a traffic island in Westminster in central London, said he has been warned by police to move away from his standard spot, or face a large fine and the confiscation of his megaphone -- and even arrest -- under fresh powers in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act.
"This is fascism through the back door,” Bray told police officers in a video posted on Twitter. "You slap all the fines on me you like, you know what I’ll say: ‘not paying them’.” He dared the police to arrest him. Later, he said they threatened to do just that.
Bray has drawn the ire of Members of Parliament, who are bombarded by Bray’s music blasted through a speaker just meters away. He regularly plays the Italian protest song "Bella Ciao,” as well as the Soviet-era Russian national anthem, and sometimes "Bye Bye Boris” to the tune of "Bye Bye Baby” by the Bay City Rollers.
Bray -- who started his vigil in 2017 against Britain’s decision to leave the European Union -- was well known to the public as he often photo bombs in the backdrop of political interviews.
Nowadays his politics are directed against Johnson’s Conservatives. One of them, Marco Longhi, has expressed the wish that Bray would be locked in the Tower of London and forced to listen to the patriotic hymn "Land Of Hope And Glory” on repeat at maximum volume.
