LAWS giving police greater powers to detain protesters must be repealed, an anti-monarchy campaigner has demanded after his arrest alongside other demonstrators at the coronation. 

Graham Smith, the leader of campaign group Republic, was one of 64 people who were arrested by the Met Police on Saturday’s protest.

He said police used the new Public Order Act laws in “a deliberate attempt to disrupt and diminish our protest” and called for the laws to be revoked.

Anger over the Met Police action has mounted since Saturday’s event saw republicans, animal welfare activists and environmental campaigners arrested and removed from the streets hours before the coronation of Charles Windsor was due to start.

Mr Smith, who wants the monarchy replaced by an elected head of state, said: “They stopped us because the law was introduced, rushed in last week, to give them the powers to stop us on any flimsy pretext.

“That law means we no longer in this country have the right to protest, we only have the freedom to protest contingent on the permission of senior police officers and politicians and it’s my view that those senior police officers were under immense pressure from politicians.”

He accused police of being “intimidating, heavy-handed, not willing to listen, not willing to co-operate or to engage” and said the police should “hang their heads in shame.”

Mr Smith, who was arrested hours before the coronation was due to start when he was unloading “Not My King” placards from a van, said: “I understand the Labour Party said they wouldn’t repeal this law, which is pretty disgraceful if true, this law needs to be repealed.”

The comment came after Labour’s health minister Andrew Gwynne declined to commit the party to repealing the Public Order Act if elected.

He said supporters of the monarchy should have “drowned out” protesters.

Anger also grew over the arrest of three women volunteers working as part of a Westminster Council initiative to protect vulnerable women by giving them rape alarms. 

Police tried to justify the arrests by saying the alarms, which they confiscated, could have been used to disrupt the coronation.

Caroline Russell of the Green Party, who chairs London Assembly’s police and crime committee, said the arrests were “worrying” and that the police have questions to answer.

She said: “It seems absolutely extraordinary that those people who were volunteering, they were out there handing out flip-flops to people who could no longer walk in their high heels because they’d had a bit too much to drink and handing out rape alarms. 

“It just seems extraordinary that they got caught up in the Met’s safety net. How? It just feels very odd.”

Ms Russell said police would be questioned about the arrests.

She said: “The police and crime committee, we question the mayor, Mopac (Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime) and the Metropolitan Police, we meet every fortnight, so of course we will be questioning this because I’m sure members of all parties will want to have their questions answered.”

Metropolitan Police Commander Karen Findlay acknowledged concerns about the arrest of protesters but defended Scotland Yard’s actions, saying: “Our duty is to do so in a proportionate manner in line with relevant legislation.”

Of the 64 people arrested on Saturday only four people have so far been charged with any offence, including one suspect accused of a religiously aggravated public order offence and two others accused of possession of class A drugs.

Saturday’s police action follows a crackdown on protesters at public events involving the Windsor family, including one man who was arrested after shouting at Andrew Windsor, notorious for his links to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein: “You’re a sick old man.”