It is time for an investigation into Islamophobia in the Conservative Party

As a young Muslim, who has faced Islamophobic abuse online, I believe the Tories must confront Islamophobia in their party – and yet when I raised it with my MP, I was called ‘frankly idiotic’

Boris Johnson compared Muslim women who wear the niqab to ‘bank robbers’ and ‘letter boxes’  (Getty Images)

Last week, an Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) report confirmed that there were “serious failings” in the way the Labour Party addressed antisemitism and that there was “political interference” by former leader Jeremy Corbyn’s office in the antisemitism complaints process. The Labour Party now has a statutory duty to eradicate the evil plague of antisemitism.

As a young Labour Party member, I was both relieved and filled with shame upon reading the findings of the report. It brought much comfort to the Jewish community and forced many members to open their eyes to the truth. But I was also appalled to be a member of a party that had failed to take effective measures to stop “antisemitic conduct” from taking place.

After all, it was my party that brought in the Equal Pay Act, the Sex Discrimination Act, the Equality Act, the minimum wage and introduced Sure Start. So many progressive pieces of equality legislation have been delivered by the Labour Party. And yet it was my party that failed the Jewish community.

It was also disheartening, however, that Conservative MPs, such as Michael Gove, had the audacity to talk about antisemitism in the Labour Party, while refusing to talk about Islamophobia in their own party. As a young Muslim, who has faced Islamophobic abuse online and in person, I felt truly undermined.

For years, the Muslim Council of Britain has been shining a light on Islamophobia in the Conservative Party. Despite being a registered charity and remaining impartial in elections, the MCB has been accused of pursuing partisan views. But do you honestly expect the MCB to be pro-Tory when the party doesn’t seem to have any respect for millions of Muslims across the UK?  

It is more than 500 days since Boris Johnson promised an inquiry into Islamophobia. An inquiry is now taking place but it is internal and I am concerned that there are no checks in place to ensure it remains impartial. This inquiry will look at the effectiveness of the party’s procedures for dealing with complaints of racism – equivalent to an internal complaint’s assessment. This report could, then, be every bit as frivolous as the report Baroness Shami Chakrabarti conducted into antisemitism in the Labour Party.

There is strong evidence that the Conservative Party is rife with Islamophobia. A YouGov poll for anti-racism charity Hope Not Hate found that 40 per cent of Conservative members want to reduce the number of Muslims coming to Britain, nearly half would prefer not to have a Muslim prime minister, 54 per cent believe Islam is a threat to the British way of life, and two thirds of members believe the far-right conspiracy theory that parts of UK are under Sharia law. A spokesperson for the MCB said: “[This is] evidence of how institutional, systemic and embedded in the culture of the Conservative Party this is.”

Even more troubling is that prominent Conservative MPs have been Islamophobic, including the prime minster, when he compared Muslim women who wear the niqab to “bank robbers” and “letter boxes”, which led to Islamophobic incidents rising by 375 per cent. 

The MCB has made repeated calls on the Equality and Human Rights Commission to investigate the Conservative Party over Islamophobia. In March 2020, the MCB resubmitted its complaint to the Commission with an updated dossier of over 300 cases, including allegations against prominent MPs and special advisers. Disappointingly, these calls have been trivialised. The EHRC has said that, because of the Conservative Party’s own investigation, it did not need to investigate at present, but will revisit that decision if it is not satisfied with the investigation’s progress. Sadly, there seems to be an unwillingness to give this matter the treatment and attention it requires. This is deeply frustrating and makes me feel trivialised.

At the age of 14, I got in touch with my local MP Philip Davies about the rise of Islamophobia in the Conservative Party. I pointed to incidents, such as the time Michael Fabricant posted a cartoon with the head of Sadiq Khan on an inflatable balloon engaged in a sex act with a pig. I also made him aware that two Tory candidates for the local election had shared inflammatory Facebook posts, featuring Islamophobic material, one describing Muslims as “bin bag wearing individuals”, another branding the Quran an “evil book”.

I pushed Davies on what the Tories would do about Islamophobia. He simply deflected any allegations by referring to antisemitism in the Labour Party. I was called “frankly idiotic” for suggesting that the Tory party had an issue with Islamophobia, and was told that I have a “desire to smear the Conservative Party” for raising such an important issue.  

Apart from anything else, Islamophobia in the Conservative Party is also electorally damaging. In the 2019 election it is estimated Labour won the votes of 64 per of all Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) voters. Muslims who might otherwise be voting Conservative are voting Labour due to the Islamophobia in the Tory Party.

The Labour Party needed to have an EHRC investigation into antisemitism. It’s just as important for the Conservative Party to launch one into Islamophobia. It is something the Muslim community deserves.