The UK government has launched its new working group tasked with defining ‘Islamophobia’. Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner calls this a ‘crucial step’ in tackling anti-Muslim hate crime and bigotry. In truth, it is laying the groundwork for an official speech code that will make it even harder to discuss some of the most important, sensitive and politically fraught issues of our time.
It was announced last week that Rayner’s working group will be chaired by former Conservative attorney general Dominic Grieve KC, who has himself admitted that defining Islamophobia while safeguarding free speech is ‘extremely difficult’. Notably, Grieve wrote the foreword to the controversial 2018 All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) report on Islamophobia, which advanced a definition that many critics argue is far too broad. His role on Rayner’s ‘Islamophobia council’ therefore raises worrying questions about where this process is heading. Should we expect Grieve’s working group to rethink the APPG’s flawed approach, or is it simply planning to repackage the APPG’s highly problematic definition? The latter seems most likely.
The APPG’s definition states that ‘Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness’. This wording has been widely criticised for equating criticism of Islamic beliefs, or indeed of anything even tangentially related to Islam, with racial discrimination. Maintaining a distinction between race and religion is crucial. Religious beliefs are not innate characteristics. They must remain open to discussion, critique and debate. Any official definition of Islamophobia, particularly one derived from the APPG’s framework, will have a chilling effect on free expression.
Britain’s grooming-gangs scandal ought to make clear what the dangers are here. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch recently told parliament that Labour’s adoption of the APPG definition for internal party matters may have stifled discussion on grooming gangs. Why? Because the APPG report explicitly lists ‘stereotypes and tropes about Islam, such [as] sexual profligacy and paedophilia or Islam and violence, and their modern-day iteration in the “Asian grooming gangs”’ as examples of Islamophobia. According to Badenoch, this has made it difficult to acknowledge the statistical overrepresentation of Pakistani-heritage men in such crimes, despite the clear evidence supporting this.
Even without a formal definition, accusations of Islamophobia helped to create a chilling effect and to silence whistleblowers. Ann Cryer, the former Labour MP for Keighley, who was one of the first politicians to speak out about the grooming-gangs scandal back in 2002, recalls being ‘shouted down as a racist’. When Sarah Champion wrote a Sun article about grooming gangs in her constituency of Rotherham in 2017, she faced such a fierce backlash that she was forced to resign from Labour’s frontbench. Andrew Norfolk, the Times journalist who exposed the Rotherham abuse scandal in 2011, was similarly accused of having an anti-Muslim agenda.
Needless to say, what motivated these figures wasn’t hatred of Muslims, but concern for the victims of some of the most horrific crimes in modern British history. If politicians, journalists and members of the public fear being accused of Islamophobia for raising legitimate concerns, then there is a real risk of self-censorship.
Under the APPG’s framework, deciding what is and isn’t ‘reasonable criticism’ of Islam is a matter of subjective interpretation. The APPG report proposed ‘tests’ for distinguishing between ‘reasonable criticism’ and ‘Islamophobia masquerading as “legitimate criticism”’. Yet such tests are so vague and open-ended that they would be impossible to police fairly. If Rayner’s Islamophobia working group adopts this approach, speech restrictions won’t be judged against objective legal standards, but against perceived intent, leaving those who dissent at the mercy of political and institutional gatekeepers.
The UK government insists that any new definition will be ‘compatible with the unchanging right of British citizens to exercise freedom of speech and expression’. But it is hard to take this claim seriously. The moment a definition like this enters public institutions, it risks becoming a speech code, even if it is not legally binding.
This has already happened with the APPG definition which, although not endorsed by the UK government, has been adopted by 52 local councils in England. It has led to individuals facing disciplinary action for otherwise lawful statements about Islam and its adherents. In 2023, a South Kesteven councillor was investigated for allegedly Islamophobic social-media posts after her council adopted the definition. A councillor in Boston, Lincolnshire was blocked from becoming mayor after raising concerns about Islamic practices in Qatar during the 2022 World Cup. The simple act of adopting a broad definition – even one that isn’t legally binding or backed by the national government – has already led to people being investigated by their employers and fired from their jobs.
The government now faces a choice. It can either stand firm in defence of free expression, ensuring that people remain free to debate and criticise ideas, including religious beliefs. Or it can endorse a definition that will make such discussions fraught with legal and reputational risk, creating a culture of self-censorship that benefits only those who wish to control the boundaries of public debate. The stakes could not be higher. If the plans for an official Islamophobia definition go unchallenged, we risk sleepwalking into a de facto blasphemy law.
Freddie Attenborough is the digital communications director of the Free Speech Union.
