Policing bill is a grave threat to our right to protest | Letters

Guardian readers on the police, crime, sentencing and courts bill and the threat it poses to civil liberties

Your leader (The Guardian view on policing dissent: Johnson plays politics with protest, 15 March) rightly notes: Whatever pieties the government cloaks its proposals in, a partisan systematic reduction in civil liberties is a very dangerous thing for democracies." Indeed, the words used by the home secretary and government spokesperson in defence of the police, crime, sentencing and courts bill, and of police action at the vigil, come straight from the PR coaching manual used by President Putin and his like in Hungary, Hong Kong, Myanmar and far too many places round the world.
Frank Land
Totnes, Devon

The government's welcoming of Hongkongers fleeing a repressive regime now seems rather ironic. They may be a little surprised to find that they have no right to protest here either.
Rachel Meredith
Long Marston, North Yorkshire