Hogan-Howe was criticised in the wake of the 2015 Sousse attacks , after a father and his young daughter paraded at Parliament Square with the flag of ISIS ( ISIL ) . Hogan-Howe supported his officers after they had refused to arrest the pair , and said that carrying an ISIS flag is ' not necessarily the worst thing in the world ' and should not lead to an automatic arrest . This was contrary to an earlier statement by the then Prime Minister , who had written that " The position is clear . If people are walking around with ISIL flags or trying to recruit people to their terrorist cause , they will be arrested and their materials will be seized . " Hogan-Howe was later supported by the Mayor of London , Boris Johnson , who said that ' we live in a free country ' and that he did not support the banning of iconography associated with the extremist group
2015 Sousse attacks
2015 Sousse attacks
Bernard Hogan-Howe, Baron Hogan-Howe