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Rhian Graham, 30, Milo Ponsford, 26, Sage Willoughby, 22, and Jake Skuse, 33, were acquitted after the jury was urged “to be on the right side of history”.

But Transport Secretary Grant Shapps claimed new powers in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will stiffen sanctions for people who damage memorials.

He said: “It will perhaps close a potential loophole and mean you can’t just go round and cause vandalism, destroy the public realm and then essentially not be prosecuted.

“I would say we’re not in a country where destroying public property can ever be acceptable.”

Currently, criminal damage can attract a jail sentence of up to 10 years but is limited by the cost of damage. Where it is less than £5,000, the maximum sentence is three months and a £2,500 fine.

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But the new Bill, being scrutinised by Parliament, would allow courts to consider the “emotional or wider distress” caused by damage to public property. It raises the maximum sentence to 10 years regardless of cost.

This would extend to flowers or wreaths at memorials, such as on a gravestone or at the Cenotaph.

Human rights barrister Adam Wagner said that while the Colston verdict was unusual it did not set a precedent as it was a jury decision.

He added: “Anyone damaging property in future would have no way of knowing if a jury would convict or acquit them.”

But he warned: “Criminalising protests you don’t approve of, as is happening through the Policing Bill, will have the opposite effect…more unlikely acquittals”.

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