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Trevor Phillips dismayed at Labour suspension over Muslim comments Sayeeda Warsi chides Trevor Phillips over Muslim comments
(about 7 hours later)
Former head of EHRC defends view that UK Muslim population is ‘different’ Former Tory party chair says ex-equalities chief’s views on race and integration are flawed
Trevor Phillips, the former head of the equalities watchdog, has condemned Labour’s decision to suspend him from the party over alleged Islamophobia, while defending his view that the UK Muslim population is “different”. Sayeeda Warsi has accused Trevor Phillips of having a flawed view of race and integration after he was suspended from the Labour party over alleged Islamophobia.
Phillips, a pioneering anti-racism campaigner who previously chaired the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), has been suspended from Labour pending an investigation and could be expelled. Phillips, an anti-racism campaigner who previously chaired the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), has been suspended pending an investigation and could be expelled.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Phillips said he was surprised and dismayed at the move, and defended his comments about British Muslims. None of the Labour leadership candidates have commented on his temporary ban or the investigation.
“I’m kind of surprised that what is and always has been an open and democratic party decides that its members cannot have a healthy debate about how we address differences of values and outlook,” Phillips said. Writing in the Guardian, Lady Warsi, a former Conservative party chair, said: “Phillips’ understanding of race, racism and the barriers to integration has sadly been flawed for many years.
“They say I am accusing Muslims of being different. Well actually, that’s true. The point is Muslims are different. And in many ways I think that’s admirable.” “Anti-racism campaigners have over the years become increasingly bemused at his pronouncements, given he was once chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Asked about his warning in 2016 that Muslims were becoming a “nation within a nation” being adopted by the far-right anti-Muslim campaigner Tommy Robinson, Phillips said he had not heard about this, adding: “As my grandmother says, just because the devil picks up a tune doesn’t mean it is a bad tune.” “But one thing is clear: Phillips cannot treat Muslims as a homogenised group when it suits him, then later deny they are racialised. Whatever the outcome of Labour’s inquiry into his Islamophobia, there’s no denying he has a case to answer.”
But critics said that they were concerned over some of Phillips statements, with Miqdaad Versi, a spokesman for the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), saying that he found the comments “seriously problematic”. Phillips released a copy of the letter announcing his suspension, in which Labour cited prior statements including his reference to UK Muslims being “a nation within a nation” and comments observing how few wore Remembrance Day poppies.
Versi told Today his organisation had not made a complaint to Labour, but added: “What we can say very clearly is that the statements he has made on a number of different things would not be statements that he would make against other communities,” Versi said. “He keeps on cherry-picking information to create this narrative that Muslims are different from everyone else.” He has condemned the suspension, which he claimed was a form of political gangsterism from the party under Jeremy Corbyn. Phillips has been severely critical of the Labour leader in the past, particularly on his handling of antisemitism in the party.
Phillips rejected the contention that comments such as his “nation within a nation” remark amounted to sweeping generalisations about a disparate population of around 3 million Britons. Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Phillips said he was surprised and dismayed by the move, and defended his comments about British Muslims.
“There’s all sorts of differences in our society, and the central point of my pamphlet was to say we cannot continue simply to say that differences won’t matter,” he said. “In my view it’s a form of disrespect to say to people: ‘Oh, don’t worry, the differences of values that they have, the beliefs that this or that group have, they’ll get over it.’” “I’m kind of surprised that what is and always has been an open and democratic party decides that its members cannot have a healthy debate about how we address differences of values and outlook,” he said.
It was correct for Muslims to be judged collectively, he argued. “You keep saying that I make these generalisations. But the truth is, if you do belong to a group, whether it is a church, or a football club, you identify with a particular set of values, and you stand for it. And frankly you are judged by that.” “They say I am accusing Muslims of being different. Well, actually, that’s true. The point is Muslims are different. And in many ways I think that’s admirable.”
Later on Monday morning the Conservative peer and anti-islamophobia campaigner Sayeeda Warsi posted a series of tweets which appeared to refer to the Phillips case, saying: “If you take a negative characteristic of an individual and impose on a whole community that’s racism... the “racialisation” of a group is how we stereotype and demonise groups/communities not whether they all share the same skin colour.” Muslims were a multiracial group “united by a faith and a belief” and as such could not be treated as a race, he told Today. He rejected the contention that his comments amounted to sweeping generalisations about a disparate population of approximately 3 million Britons.
Phillips released a copy of the letter announcing his suspension, in which Labour cited prior statements includingone observing how few UK Muslims wore Remembrance Day poppies. It was correct for Muslims to be judged collectively, he argued. “You keep saying that I make these generalisations,” he said. “But the truth is, if you do belong to a group, whether it is a church, or a football club, you identify with a particular set of values, and you stand for it. And frankly you are judged by that.”
The letter was included in a 42-page documents put out by the Policy Exchange thinktank, where Phillips is a fellow. In a statement opening the document, the Labour MP Khalid Mahmood called the suspension “so outlandish as to bring disrepute on all involved in making them”. The Labour backbencher Khalid Mahmood said the allegations against Phillips were “so outlandish as to bring disrepute on all involved in making them”.
Phillips has been a vocal opponent of moves to extend a definition of Islamophobia drawn up by an all-party parliamentary group, as now used by Labour among others. Muslims were a multiracial group “united by a faith and a belief” and could not thus be treated as a race, he told Today. But Naz Shah MP, the shadow minister for women and equalities and vice chair of the all-party parliamentary group on British Muslims, said Phillips’ remarks and the subsequent defence of him by some of her colleagues had made her extremely angry.
Phillips, who chaired the EHRC when it launched in 2006, was among 24 public figures who last year wrote to the Guardian declaring their refusal to vote for the Labour party because of its association with antisemitism. She said those who claimed his suspension was malicious should think carefully about whether they were contributing to real fears felt by Muslims in Britain.
The group said the path to a more tolerant society “must encompass Britain’s Jews with unwavering solidarity” and said Jeremy Corbyn had “a long record of embracing antisemites as comrades”. The EHRC is the organisation investigating the Labour party over alleged antisemitism. “Some of the things he has said on public record would not be acceptable to any minority community,” she said.
Referring to his 2016 comment that the centre of gravity of British Muslim opinion was “some distance away from the centre of gravity of everybody else’s”, Shah said: “What if we said that about women or another minority community? What does he mean by that?
“I’m confident the Labour party will deal with this complaint robustly as it should with any complaint.”
Miqdaad Versi, a spokesman for the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), said he found Phillips’ comments on Muslims “seriously problematic”.
Versi told Today his organisation had not made a complaint to Labour, but added: “What we can say very clearly is that the statements he has made on a number of different things would not be statements that he would make against other communities.”
Phillips, who chaired the EHRC when it launched in 2006, was among 24 public figures who wrote to the Guardian last year to declare their refusal to vote for Labour because of its association with antisemitism.
Last week, a dossier of more than 300 allegations of Islamophobia in the Conservative party was submitted to the EHRC by the MCB, increasing pressure on the watchdog to launch a formal investigation.Last week, a dossier of more than 300 allegations of Islamophobia in the Conservative party was submitted to the EHRC by the MCB, increasing pressure on the watchdog to launch a formal investigation.
Phillips has made two Channel 4 documentaries dealing with race and discrimination – 2015’s Things We Won’t Say About Race That Are True and What British Muslims Really Think, which aired the following year. He chairs Index on Censorship, a not-for-profit group that campaigns for and defends free speech. A Labour spokesperson said: “The party takes all complaints about Islamophobia extremely seriously and they are fully investigated in line with our rules and procedures, and any appropriate disciplinary action is taken.”
A Labour party spokesperson said: “The Labour party takes all complaints about Islamophobia extremely seriously and they are fully investigated in line with our rules and procedures, and any appropriate disciplinary action is taken.”