United Kingdom Prime Minister David Cameron ordered police to record “hate crimes” against Muslims in the same way as anti-semitic attacks on Jews as part of a drive to tackle extremism.
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It will provide the first accurate picture of the extent of anti-Muslim hate crime in England and Wales.
The Prime Minister’s new Community Engagement Forum also meets for the first time today to discuss ways to combat religious intolerance.
“Our Counter-Extremism Strategy will be published later this month and will introduce a wide range of measures to defeat all forms of extremism”. The meeting will also consider what more the authorities can do to help support young British Muslims.
Police in England and Wales recorded 52,528 hate crimes in 2014/15 – an increase of 18% on the previous year.
Cameron said earlier: “We all have a role to play in confronting extremism”.
Home Secretary Theresa May addressed the issue of hate crime late Monday, saying that it had “no place in Britain”.
This brings together representatives of faiths including Islam from around the country, and is aimed at providing Mr Cameron with a chance to hear directly from those battling extremism in the community.
Policies to be brought forward as part of the counter-extremism strategy include: encouraging broadcasters to give more airtime to moderate Muslim voices; cracking down on radicalisation in prisons; incentivising schools to integrate pupils better; challenging extremist preachers at universities; enabling parents to cancel their children’s passports if they are anxious they might try to join Isis and pressuring IT companies to remove swiftly any Isis propaganda.
“Working with police to provide a breakdown in religious-based hate crime data will help forces to build community trust, target their resources and enable the public to hold them to account”, she added.
“I want British Muslims to know we will back them to stand against those who spread hate and to counter the narrative which says Muslims do not feel British”, Cameron said.
Under a table separating hate crimes by ethnic groups, the Home Office report says that “Muslim adults or those whose religion was coded as “other” were more likely to be a victim of racially motivated hate crime (1.2%) than other adults (for example, 0.1% of Christian adults with no religion)”.
The Home Office report suggests that the increase in racial and religious hate crimes could have been triggered by specific events.
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It comes after a Birmingham study revealed details of sickening hate crimes, including an incident when passengers on a train watched on as a Muslim woman was showered in alcohol in a violent assault.
