POLICE ABANDON 'ORWELLIAN' CHARGES AGAINST FIREFIGHTER
A firefighter is suing the police after they used “Orwellian” powers to arrest and silence him after he criticised his bosses on social media.
Robert Moss, 57, claimed he endured a “living nightmare” after police were “weaponised” and used to raid his home in July because he had posted messages critical of Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service.
For six months, the former union official was on bail, but now Staffordshire Police have dropped the case against him amid claims the investigation was launched to “silence and intimidate” him.
The force even told him his right to “freedom of expression” had to be “limited to maintain public safety and order” because of his “malicious communications”.
But magistrates overturned the “gagging clause” – which stopped him telling people he had been arrested – after the court heard officers were acting as if they were in a police state.
Mr Moss, a former union official, claimed his legal team established that fire service bosses at the centre of his “anodyne” online criticism had contacted police chiefs, possibly triggering the investigation.
Speaking from his home in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffs, he said: “To me, this is a clear manifestation of a two-tier justice system, where powerful people can speak to other powerful people to shut up little people.
“It stinks of an abuse of power and a chilling attack on free speech,” he said, adding that the public “had a right to challenge people in power”.
He said: “It has felt as though my life has been on hold for the last six months, in what has been a living nightmare. I’m now instructing lawyers to sue the police for wrongful arrest.”
Mr Moss believes there was a concerted effort to gag him because his online comments about Rob Barber, the Staffordshire fire chief officer, and Glynn Luznyj, his deputy, came at a time when the service was preparing to recruit a new boss.
‘Where’s their common sense?’
Lord Young of Acton, general secretary of the Free Speech Union, which supported Mr Moss, said: “The police are allowing themselves to be enlisted by senior public sector officials to arrest anyone who criticises them, however mildly.
“It invariably ends with the police being sued for wrongful arrest. They must stop getting involved in these disputes.
“Where’s their common sense? In this country, criticising senior public officials is not and never has been against the law.”
Mr Moss had worked for the Staffordshire fire service for 28 years but was sacked in 2021, shortly after he became the Fire Brigade Union’s secretary for the county. Two years later, an employment tribunal found the service had unfairly dismissed him from his job.
The father of one continued to offer advice to firefighters in a private Facebook group where he made a number of comments that were critical of the fire service’s management.
In July, police raided his home seizing two phones, an iPad and a computer, leaving Mr Moss, a former councillor, feeling like a criminal, he said.
He was given bail with a series of conditions, including a ban on posting any communication, online or otherwise, relating to the county’s fire service. He was also not allowed to mention Mr Barber and Mr Luznyj in online posts nor was he to mention the police investigation.
‘We do not live in a police state’
Tom Beardsworth, his barrister, told a bail hearing in August: “We do not live in a police state and Mr Moss should have every right to speak about his arrest.
“For the police to prohibit an arrested person from speaking about their arrest is extraordinary and Orwellian, and it is not hyperbole to put it in those terms.
“This is a deep threat to the right of free expression and it engages real matters of high principle.”
A spokesman from Staffordshire Police said: “We had a report of harassment without violence, sending a communication/article of an offensive nature and knowingly/recklessly obtain or disclose personal data without the consent of a controller and arrested a 56-year-old man, from Newcastle-under-Lyme.
“Following a thorough investigation, a file was submitted to the CPS and the man was released with no further action.”
A Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service spokesman said: “Since Mr Moss’s dismissal five years ago, he has made various allegations about individuals within the service, which were presented during an employment tribunal and were dismissed by a judge.
“Continuing to respond to the frequent claims that Mr Moss makes serves as an unnecessary distraction, when our priority is to keep the communities of Staffordshire as safe as possible.”
2026-01-10T12:00:40Z