Category Archives: Left Wing

Kelly calls for ‘real leadership’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Ruth_KellyCommunities Secretary Ruth Kelly has urged council leaders to raise their game in the fight against extremism as she called on Muslim leaders to demonstrate “real leadership”.

After talks with 17 local authorities and police chiefs, she said everybody had a part to play in responding to the extremist threat. “We have a shared responsibility and must all raise our efforts to a new level – central government, local government, community organisations and individual communities themselves,” she said.

Councils will be required to present strategies within the coming weeks setting out how they intend to prevent radicalisation in their communities.

Ms Kelly also refused to back down on moves to withdraw Government support for Muslim groups that failed to take a leading role in tackling extremism.

She said the Government was “absolutely committed” to working with Muslim organisations with a “genuine commitment” to pluralism. “I am determined to raise to a new level our partnership with these Muslim organisations who are showing real leadership on these issues,” she said. “We will provide them more support.”

In a letter to Muhammad Abdul Bari, the head of the Muslim Council of Britain, Ms Kelly rejected claims that ministers would not work with those who disagreed with Government policy.

But she added: “I don’t accept that those in leadership positions can be passive in tackling extremism and yet expect government support. The question the public are not unreasonably asking is why should any organisation object to taking a leadership role in tacking extremism?”

Her letter to Dr Bari followed his criticism that ministers were “marginalising” Muslims with recent comments, including Jack Straw’s suggestion that Muslim women should remove their veils.

Metro, 15 October 2006

Ministers ‘are Islamophobic’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Dr BariMuslim leaders have accused ministers of “stigmatising an entire community” and launching a “relentless barrage” against Islamic Britons.

Muhammad Abdul Bari, secretary-general of the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), has written to Ruth Kelly, the communities secretary, accusing her of pandering to an “Islamophobic” agenda.

The letter follows Kelly’s announcement last week that the government was cutting funding and official ties with the MCB, which until now has been the main body representing British Muslims. One senior Muslim source said: “The government is pandering to a far-right neocon agenda which is promoting Islamophobia.”

The MCB says in the letter: “In recent months there has been a drip-feed of ministerial statements stigmatising an entire community. We have seen ministers’ tours and even legislation being proposed on the premise that ‘mosques are a problem’.”

The council is understood to be particularly concerned by comments by Jack Straw, the Commons leader, about Muslim women wearing full veils. They are also concerned by the level of stop-and-search by police of Muslim suspects. According to a poll by Yougov, Straw’s popularity has jumped 15 percentage points since he made his comments.

Sunday Times, 15 October 2006

See also “MCB responds to Ruth Kelly’s speech”, MCB press release, 15 October 2006

Read the MCB’s letter to Ruth Kelly here.

Update:  See “Kelly calls for ‘real leadership'”, Metro, 15 October 2006

CRE head says Straw ‘completely right’ over veil

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Trevor PhillipsBritain’s race watchdog has said Jack Straw was “completely right” to express his concerns about Muslim women wearing veils. Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, also gave his full support to schools that ban girls from wearing veils in lessons.

With the row intensifying over Muslim dress, Mr Phillips told MPs he believed that Mr Straw, the Leader of the Commons, had taken a “perfectly reasonable” stance last week. “I think it’s right for him to say ‘would you mind not making me feel uncomfortable’ in this case, as long as it is clearly understood the answer to that can be ‘no’.” He added: “Jack Straw was completely right to raise this. It is not a question of public policy, but a question of social etiquette and manners.”

Mr Phillips also said he believed the wearing of veils for religious reasons should not override school-uniform policies, providing they have been “arrived at properly”. “If I were the headteacher in a school, I would probably say veils should not be worn in the classroom,” he told the Commons Education and Skills Committee.

Independent, 12 October 2006

Phillips, of course, was recently appointed by Ruth Kelly as chair of the new Commission for Equality and Human Rights, despite widespread opposition. As the Mayor of London commented at the time: “… what Trevor is doing is trying to move the race agenda away from a celebration of multi-culturalism and pandering to the Right, and I have to say it’s absolutely disgraceful.”

Marginalising the MCB – ‘certainly a step in the right direction’ says Mad Mel

Posted on by Bob Pitt

madmelMelanie Phillips welcomes Ruth Kelly’s speech implying that the Muslim Council of Britain is to be sidelined by the government:

“… a rethink has undoubtedly taken place within the government about its strategy for combating Islamic extremism in Britain. The refusal by the Muslim Council of Britain to attend the Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration ceremony shocked ministers rigid and opened their eyes to the MCB’s extremism (John Ware’s fine Panorama programme on BBC1 undoubtedly helped, too). Then the debacle over the farcical committees set up after 7/7 to advise the Prime Minister on how to tackle Islamic extremism – which the Home Office promptly stuffed with Islamic extremists – helped them realise the blindingly obvious fact that Muslim so-called representative institutions were virtually all radicalised….

“It’s welcome news that the government will henceforth be marginalising groups like the MCB. This is certainly a step in the right direction. From all that I hear and read, I think there’s undoubtedly a realisation by government that its strategy so far has failed. And indeed, it can hardly be unaware of the widespread public fury and anxiety about all this. But – as I set out in Londonistan – this strategy of appeasement goes far wider and deeper than kowtowing to extremist representative institutions. I’ll only believe something significant is happening when I see the removal of Islamist advisers from Whitehall and a ‘fundamental rebalancing’ of the brains of the Metropolitan Police.”

Melanie Phillips’s Diary, 11 October 2006

Abolish Muslim veils, says Harman

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The strongest condemnation yet of the Muslim veil from a Government minister was made today by Harriet Harman.

She called for a campaign to abolish it because it kept women down and “hid” them from society. “How can you [live an equal life] if you can’t get a driving licence or a passport,” she said. “The veil is an obstacle to women’s participation, on equal terms, in society.”

The Constitutional Affairs Minister went further than Commons Leader Jack Straw who said the veil made him feel uncomfortable. She told the New Statesman: “If you want equality, you have to be in society, not hidden away from it.”

Ms Harman – who is bidding to become Labour’s deputy leader with a strong pitch for women’s votes – said she was dismayed to see “the young women whose mothers fought against the veil, and who now see their daughters taking it up as a symbol of commitment to their religion”. She said she wished the abolition debate was being led by Muslim women – but there were none in the Commons.

Ms Harman defended Mr Straw’s intervention but said it was “depressing” that some people had accused Mr Straw of speaking out for electoral gain.

Evening Standard, 12 October 2006

Brown backs Straw over veil

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Gordon BrownGordon Brown threw his weight behind Jack Straw last night and declared that it would be better for Britain if fewer Muslim women wore veils.

The Chancellor broke ranks to become the first Cabinet minister publicly to endorse Mr Straw’s call for women to discard the veil, which he described as a symbol of separation.

Tony Blair broke his silence on the issue too, but he stressed that women must be free to choose what they wear. In contrast, Mr Brown threw his weight behind the Leader of the Commons.

Asked by the BBC if Mr Straw had been right to say it would help integration if Muslim women did not wear the veil, he said: “Yes, but I think he is not proposing new laws, he is proposing a debate about the cultural changes that might have to take place in Britain. I would emphasis the importance of what we do to integrate people into our country including the language, history and curriculum.”

Pressed to say if he thought it would be “better for Britain” if fewer Muslim women wore veils, Mr Brown replied: “That is what Jack Straw has said and I support. But I think the important thing is that we have a debate on this.”

Daily Telegraph, 11 October 2006

Rammell backs university’s Muslim veil ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Bill Rammell, the higher education minister, today weighed into the debate over Muslim women wearing the veil by offering his support to universities that banned the full-face veil.

He repeated the views he expressed on EducationGuardian.co.uk last month after a year of visits to university campuses to talk to Muslim students. Muslim students were entitled to ask for tolerance and consideration but there were limits to what they could and should ask for, argued Mr Rammell.

He said that Imperial College was wrong to attempt to ban women students from wearing the hijab, which covers their heads. The university’s proposed code was amended after protests. But Imperial was right to insist on banning the niqab which covers the face, argued Mr Rammell.

Today he told the Evening Standard newspaper: “I’m not dictating hard and fast rules, as dress codes are a matter for university authorities. But Imperial College recently banned the face veil and I think that this is arguably the best decision. Many teachers would feel very uncomfortable about their ability to teach students who were covering their faces.”

Mr Rammell added: “And I doubt many students would feel it was acceptable to be taught by someone who had chosen to veil their face.”

The National Union of Students (NUS) condemned Mr Rammell’s comments as “unproductive”.

Ruqaayah Collector, the NUS’s black students officer, said Imperial was considered a bad example of how to tackle the issue among other universities. “As a Muslim woman who wears the hijab, I’m worried the debate will go the same way as in France and other countries in Europe. It starts off with this and could move onto other forms of clothing.

“We need the Muslim community on board if we are going to fight extremism. Muslims should feel comfortable going to their MP, however they want to dress. It’s important to respect personal choices. It is a woman’s right to choose how they dress and not be told by men,” said Ms Collector.

Guardian, 11 October 2006

Matgamna gets it (partly) right

Posted on by Bob Pitt

This site has had some harsh words to say about the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty in the past, but happily we’ve found an article, by Sean Matgamna on the veil controversy, at least some of which we can agree with. Of course, you have to put up with the usual denunciations of “Muslim bigots, and their kitsch-left and invertebrate-liberal toadies”, but the core of Matgamna’s article is correct:

“To do what Straw has just done, in the atmosphere in Britain right now, is to light a match in a gas-filled room. It is to pour petrol on a fire. Inevitably Straw has given the green light to people who want to have a go at Muslims, who are not at all concerned to have a reasonable discussion about Muslim women, or with Muslims….

“Dark-skinned Muslim people are victims in this society. They are easy targets. Straw has shown just how easy a target they are. Shamelessly racist newspapers, like the Express – one of a number of similar headlines: ‘Muslims pledge to ruin Straw’! – have weighed-in to turn his words into denunciation, blame-mongering, thinly disguised hate-mongering against identifiable Muslims.”

Workers’ Liberty, 9 October 2006

However, it’s difficult to square this argument with other positions taken by the AWL. Only a couple of weeks ago Matgamna came out in support of the pope – a stance that won him the admiration of Melanie Phillips – and earlier this year the AWL reproduced the Jyllands-Posten cartoons on their website on the basis of defending freedom of expression.

But, surely, the same argument applied in those cases. If freedom of expression is exercised in such a way that it incites bigotry and hatred against a minority community, in circumstances where that community is already under siege – by associating Islam with “things only evil and inhuman”, or by portraying the Prophet Mohammed as a terrorist bomber – then anyone with any progressive principles should condemn this. Time for the AWL to have a rethink, perhaps.

Women who wear the veil can be ‘frightening and intimidating’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Phil WoolasMuslim women who cover their faces with veils can be “frightening and intimidating”, says Britain’s Race Minister Phil Woolas. Mr Woolas has raised the stakes with a warning that Muslim veils could increase racial tensions in Britain.

The minister, who has a large Muslim population in his Oldham constituency, backs Mr Straw for starting a national debate. But he warns Muslims must do more to avoid alienating people of other races and faiths.

Writing in the Sunday Mirror today, he says: “Muslim women have every right to wear a veil covering their face. But they must realise that other people who don’t understand their culture can find it frightening and intimidating.”

Sunday Mirror, 8 October 2006

See also BBC News, 7 October 2006