If you had to guess a scenario that got a man kicked off the sidelines at a girls’ football match in Wales, you’d probably think of something involving a drink too many, a punch-up with the referee, or possibly an impromptu lecture on the offside rule that turned violent.

What you probably wouldn’t guess is posting a Facebook video expressing anger after a triple child murder, followed by being found unanimously not guilty of inciting racial hatred.

But that is precisely what happened to Jamie Michael, a 47-year-old Royal Marine veteran from Penygraig, Rhondda Valley.

Until very recently, he coached his daughter’s football team, ran the local boys and girls club, and passed all the enhanced DBS checks required to be around children.

Then one day, he made the mistake of saying something the government didn’t like.

It started with the Southport stabbings. Three children murdered. Blood on the floor of a dance class. A country in shock. Jamie did what many people do in moments of horror: he went on Facebook and ranted.

Criminal? According to the Crown, yes. According to twelve actual human beings with common sense on a jury, absolutely not. They took just 17 minutes to clear him.

So, job done, right? Cleared by the courts. Innocent in the eyes of the law. Time to get back to normal life, coach some football, and cheer on his daughter. Wrong.

Because while the court may have delivered a verdict, the Labour-run safeguarding board in his area had other ideas. And in true Kafkaesque style, they didn’t need a trial. Or evidence. Or, inconveniently, to have even watched the video that got him arrested in the first place.

Instead, they met in secret, waved a wand, and poof: Jamie Michael, father of two, Iraq War veteran, community volunteer, is now “unsuitable” to be around children.

Not because he harmed one. Not because he shouted at one. Not because he so much as looked at one sideways. But because someone said his political views were “radical.”

Even though Jamie was officially banned from coaching, he was told he could still watch his daughter play. But his “behavior would be monitored.”

“It’s a horrible feeling to have to tell people I am banned from coaching a girls’ football team,” Jamie said to the Telegraph. “What comes to people’s minds is that I must be a pervert or I’ve done something violent to children.”

Now, let’s take a moment to appreciate the genius of the modern British bureaucracy.

The Free Speech Union, which is now helping Jamie sue for £25,000 ($33K), says they’ve seen over a dozen similar cases: teachers, charity workers, volunteers. All are accused of having “extreme” or “patriotic” views. It’s as if patriotism itself has been shoved into the same filing cabinet as hate speech, next to “things that make Guardian columnists uncomfortable.”

Lord Young of Acton, the FSU’s founder, calls it what it is: “a scandalous abuse of the system.” He’s right. Safeguarding protocols were meant to stop kids being abused, not to stage a political cleansing of the touchlines.

The spectrum of acceptable opinion in Britain is getting narrower. And in Jamie’s case, the hammer dropped hard. Arrested at work, denied bail, thrown in jail for 17 days, and now effectively labeled a child risk. All this for a video that wasn’t even shown to the board that banned him.

Oh, and let’s not forget. All of this was triggered by a Labour Party staffer who wrote in to complain that Jamie was a “disgrace.”

The current Labour government is no fan of free speech.

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