Britain’s largest Muslim group has written to the Conservative party to call for an investigation into “structural Islamophobia” within the party’s ranks. In a letter addressed to the Conservative chair, Richard Holden, the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) said Islamophobia in the party was “institutional, tolerated by the leadership and seen as acceptable by great swathes of the party membership”. The secretary general of the MCB, Zara Mohammed, wrote that “Islamophobia was on public display this week” and highlighted inflammatory comments made by the former home secretary Suella Braverman, the former Tory party deputy chair Lee Anderson and the former prime minister Liz Truss. The letter said Braverman’s article last week in the Daily Telegraph, in which she wrote that “Islamists … are in charge”, fell into a “well-trodden Islamophobic path”. The letter also addressed Anderson’s comments on GB News where he claimed “Islamists” had “got control” of London and the city’s mayor, Sadiq Khan. Anderson, who had the Conservative whip withdrawn from him after refusing to apologise, was criticised by the MCB for engaging in “Islamophobic tropes”. In a statement on Saturday after a call from the chief whip, Anderson said: “I understand the difficult position that I have put both he and the prime minister in with regard to my comments. I fully accept that they had no option but to suspend the whip in these circumstances.” Khan said Anderson’s comments were “Islamophobic, anti-Muslim and racist” and that they “pour fuel on the fire of anti-Muslim hatred”. The deputy prime minister, Oliver Dowden, declined to say on BBC One’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg whether Anderson’s comments were Islamophobic. He also said the MP would have kept his job had he apologised.
Tell Mama, a charity that records anti-Muslim incidents, said there were 2,010 cases of Islamophobic hate during a four-month period from 7 October – a steep rise from the 600 recorded in the same period of the previous year. Truss was also criticised by the MCB for engaging in what it said was an “Islamophobic trope”. The former PM, who recently appeared in an interview with the far-right commentator Steve Bannon, claimed a “radical jihadist party” could send someone to parliament and remained silent when Bannon described the far-right figure Tommy Robinson as a “hero”. The letter by the MCB said: “There is no radical Islamic party – this is false and Islamophobic to play to this trope of Muslims taking over”. In response to such incidents, the Labour party leader, Keir Starmer, accused Rishi Sunak of harbouring “extremists in his party”. Speaking to the Observer, Starmer said: “Whether it is Liz Truss staying silent on Tommy Robinson, or Suella Braverman’s extreme rhetoric, Rishi Sunak’s weakness means Tory MPs can act with impunity.” An investigation into Islamophobia in the Conservative party found there was no institutional racism in the party in 2021, although some party members shared concerns that Muslims were excluded from the inquiry. Mohammed said the MCB had shared the letter with the Equalities and Human Rights Commission to encourage Holden “to take this complaint seriously and take actions”.