ONLINE racists WILL be banned from footie matches after more than a million Brits demanded they be punished, Boris Johnson announced today.
Putting trolls on notice, the PM warned: “You will not be going to the match. No ifs, no buts, no exceptions, no excuses.”
Fans have rallied round three black England stars who were sent sick messages and monkey emojis on social media after their penalty misses.
A million people signed a petition in just two days demanding vile trolls be barred from games as punishment.
Current football banning orders do not extend to abuse spouted on social media – giving racists free rein to attack players online.
But as part of a crackdown on the “Wild West of the internet” the Government will go after trolls and slap them with bans.
Banning orders range from three to 10 years and can require culprits to surrender their passports ahead of overseas fixtures.
Government will launch a 12-week consultation to thrash out the details wrapping it into the Online Harms Bill.
Announcing the move at PMQs Mr Johnson said: “What we’re doing is today taking practical steps to ensure that the football batting order regime is changed.
“So that if you are guilty of speaking racist views online you will not be going to the match, no ifs, no buts, no exceptions, no excuses.”
It comes as:
Labour called for football banning orders to extend to online abuse yesterday.
A subsequent petition says: “We are calling for the Football Association and the government to work together now to ban all those who have carried out racist abuse, online or offline, from all football matches in England for life.
“Our England team stood up for all of us – now we must stand up for them.”
Fans Shaista Aziz, Amna Abdullatif and Huda Jawad set up the petition just two days ago.
They said they feel “validated in our resistance to racism and that what we have been able to articulate is the sentiment that is held nationwide”.
Last week Mr Johnson told racists to “crawl back under the rock from which they emerged”.
Today he added: “I utterly condemn and abhor the racist outpourings that we saw on Sunday night.”
But the Government is feeling the heat after Euros star Tyrone Mings lashed out at Priti Patel for branding Gareth Southgate’s squad’s decision to take the knee as “gesture politics”.
The Home Secretary shirked a Commons grilling on the matter this afternoon and instead sent one of her junior ministers.
In his first interview since the tournament, Harry Maguire exclusively told The Sun the racist cowards would never have had the guts to step forward for a penalty themselves.
Maguire, who scored in the shootout, said: “When I was 19 or 20, I would have been standing there saying ‘I don’t want to take one’.
“There is no chance I would have been putting my hand up at their age.
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“So look at the courage and bravery of these young lads, look at the age of Bukayo, Jadon and Marcus.”
And he said big tech companies must take responsibility for getting rid of racist language.
He said the law must be changed so companies have to link accounts to a person’s real identity — making it easier for police to track down and arrest those spewing hateful messages.
“Something needs to be done. The companies need to verify every account,” he said.
“It is too easy to troll and abuse. To be racist is just too easy to be done and get away with.”
Meanwhile, Rashford said he was near tears after support from fans.
It comes after thousands of people in his childhood hometown of Withington visited his defaced mural – and covered it with notes and tributes to a “role model” instead.
The ace said: “I can take critique of my performance all day long, my penalty wasn’t good enough, it should have gone in.
“But I will never apologise for who I am and where I came from.
“I’ve felt no prouder moment than wearing these three lions on my chest and seeing my family cheer me in a crowd of tens of thousands.
“The messages I’ve received today have been positively overwhelming and seeing the response in Withington had me on the verge of tears.”
‘RACIST COWARDS WOULD NEVER BE SO BRAVE’
Cops in London are probing the racist abuse posted on social media.
One comedian has seen a string of shows cancelled after tweeting: “I’m sorry that black guys are bad at penalties.”
And firm Savills has suspended a worker after racist abuse was sent from his Twitter account.
A post from Andrew Bone’s Twitter account branded the players the N-word and claimed the England stars had “ruined it for us” after the loss.
But Bone’s family claimed to The Sun his account had been hacked – and he had reported the matter to police.
Cyber security expert Zak Doffman told the Sun it’s “not difficult” for social media platforms to stop racist comments.
“These are blatant messages of hatred and racism and it would absolutely be the easiest thing in the world for social media platforms to put in place protections that stopped that kind of message from being published,” he said.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
