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<\/p>\nBritain will face social unrest and a perception of a two-tier society if the government pushes ahead with plans to come up with a formal definition of Islamophobia, the head of a new campaign group has warned.<\/p>\n
Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister, has set up a working group to provide recommendations to the government on \u201cappropriate and sensitive language\u201d to describe \u201cunacceptable treatment, prejudice and discrimination against Muslims\u201d.<\/p>\n
Fiyaz Mughal, the founder of the Tell Mama organisation which monitors anti-Muslim hate incidents, is leading a campaign against the definition, which he believes risks having a \u201cchilling effect\u201d on free speech and creating a \u201cblasphemy law by the back door\u201d. The campaign is called Keep the Law Equal.<\/p>\n
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Fiyaz Mughal said the definition could curtail public discourse about the grooming scandals<\/p>\n
ALAMY<\/p>\n
While the definition will not be legally binding, Mughal raised concerns that the police, prosecutors other public authorities and employers would adopt it and that criticism of any practices associated with the Muslim faith would effectively become an offence.<\/p>\n
He suggested it could curtail public discourse about the grooming scandals amid concerns that a disproportionate number of Asian men have been responsible. He also said that it could discourage legitimate debate about the hijab, the niqab and sharia courts.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are seeing a sense of people being very unhappy about two-tier application of the law, two-tier society,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe same narrative is being potentially, I\u2019m hearing, it\u2019s being used around this definition. Why are Muslims getting extra protection? Why do they have to have more laws?<\/p>\n
\u2022 Sonia Sodha: Hate-crime definitions risk making things worse<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI worked with the police. We have seen the systems work really well. We need proper enforcement of existing laws, not additional definitions which in fairness given that the world has also changed, given our country and the dynamics has changed, any definition that marks out one community is going to cause major social divisions. and it\u2019s happening in our society. We don\u2019t need social divisions. We need the implementation of existing laws which are more than sufficient.<\/p>\n \u201cIt will raise community tensions and it will just add to the narrative that actually one community is getting a better deal than another. And that just leads to local anger.\u201d<\/p>\n He said it would have a \u201cchilling effect\u201d on free speech. \u201cIt creates a sense of a deeply chilling effect, where people are scared to raise things about religion, which can be used against them, and where digital traces can be placed online that are difficult to remove,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt creates a vastly, deeply problematic element of a chilling effect in society. It doesn\u2019t matter whether it\u2019s statutory or non-statutory. Defence and prosecutors, defence solicitors and prosecutors could use this in legal argument. Now the judges could say, actually, I\u2019m not going to listen to this because it\u2019s non-statutory. But some judges may well listen to it.\u201d<\/p>\n