Britain does not need an Islamophobia law, existing rules work
I am speaking as someone who has many years of practical experience of combatting anti-Muslim hate. This is something that cannot be said of all the members of the Labour-appointed Working Group on Islamophobia.
How the group defines anti-Muslim hate will have profound ramifications. Its recommendations risk strengthening bad actors within Muslim communities who want to create a chilling effect on free speech.
I know full well that existing laws are robust enough to prosecute genuine Islamophobes. They are used effectively by police forces up and down this country. What is needed is better enforcement of existing laws, not new speech codes.
The Working Group on Islamophobia will have you believe that its work is similar to that of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism produced by academics, legal scholars and representatives of Jewish organisations.
But it is not. The IHRA definition was not handed down by a government, but was a grassroots initiative developed by non-governmental organisations.
The reason for the current Islamophobia drive is simple. Labour is trying to provide a symbolic sop to British Muslim communities after suffering significant electoral losses in some strongly Muslim seats at the last election.
Members of the Working Group have suggested that anti-Muslim hate is racialised. This is only part of the picture. Tell MAMA data, covering the last 13 years, demonstrate that this is not true in the majority of cases, although it certainly is in some.
I know that campaigning groups have been calling for Islamophobia to be recognised and recorded as being both racially and religiously aggravated, thereby melding the two separate aggravating factors.
But the law is clear – Sikhs and Jews can be regarded as both a racial and religious group. This is simply not the case with Muslims since they do not constitute a single racial group and come from across the world.
When we drill down into the laws on incitement to racial hatred, it is clear that racially aggravated offences are deemed different from religiously aggravated ones.
The CPS guidance is unambiguous on this. If there are no racially aggravating comments, materials or actions, then the case should not be classed as such.
Whatever definition Dominic Grieve and his group come up with will be caveated in a long report that will more than likely make the argument that many cases of Islamophobia or anti-Muslim hate have a racial hatred component to them. But since Muslims are not a race this, by definition, cannot be the case.
With a sleight of the hand, they will seek to confuse and project the view that race and religion both automatically play a part in the targeting of Muslims.
We must call them out on this, and the CPS must push back on the claim with some vigour.
If we, as the public, do not wake up, we may be looking at more people being cancelled or even criminalised in the future. We cannot allow that to happen.
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