Inside Policy Talks7 Aug 2025

Toby Young: Defending free speech in Canada and the UK

Free speech was once considered a bedrock democratic value. Now it's become one of the most contested issues in our culture-shaping institutions. Over the past decade, debates about what can and can’t be said have intensified across universities, schools, newsrooms, and corporate boardrooms. In many Western democracies, including Canada, speech codes, cancel campaigns, and ideological conformity have become flashpoints in a deeper cultural and political struggle. It's a similar story on the other side of the Atlantic. The United Kingdom has moved from a beacon of free expression to one of the most censorious countries in the western world – with people now being arrested for what are known as “non-crime hate incidents.” To unpack this, Toby Young, founder and director of the Free Speech Union, joins Inside Policy Talks. A well-known journalist, commentator, and author, Toby has been at the forefront of the UK’s free speech movement—defending individuals facing ideological persecution, advocating for legislative reform, and helping shape the public debate. He tells Peter Copeland, deputy director of domestic policy at MLI, that he believes rising attempts to restrict expression are driven by political and cultural elites who have “lost their faith” in liberal ideology and its associated policies, like mass immigration. “They don’t want to be forced to defend it,” says Young, because they “wouldn’t really know how to go about defending it in the pubic square.” Instead, he suggests, they want to “pretend that their particular political position doesn’t require a political defence.”

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