About Us

Established in 2020, The Article 11 Trust is a UK-based charitable organisation working to defend and advance the rights to freedom of assembly and association under Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). 

For many years, grassroots groups in the UK have worked tirelessly to advance and defend the rights of individuals and movements to protest. Right now, this work is needed more urgently than ever, but the groups undertaking it have found it increasingly hard to access the resources they need. 

To rise to these challenges, members of long-standing protest rights groups have come together to form the Article 11 Trust. Together with our partners and allies in the movement, The Article 11 Trust works to drive forward priority research and education projects, support grassroots groups to secure much-needed charitable funding, and raise public awareness around protest rights issues.

We help legal support groups to ensure people at protests know their rights. We facilitate ground-breaking research and education projects to push threats to protest rights into the spotlight. We help to empower the public to push for social justice through exercising their rights.

Current funding priorities

We have identified three key areas of particular focus over the next 12 months. These are: 

  • Research and education work related to the factors surrounding disproportionate and heavy-handed protest policing experienced by black communities and other marginalised communities. 
  • Research and education work that looks at the changing legal and social context of protest in the UK post-COVID environment. 
  • The provision of direct legal guidance and training to people who attend protests with a particular focus to adapting to the post-COVID environment.