Commitments for British Muslims: A 2024 General Election Guide for Prospective Parliamentary Candidates
Introduction
As the 2024 General Election approaches, the Muslim Council of Britain presents ten pivotal commitments for Prospective Parliamentary Candidates to champion, addressing the hopes and challenges faced by British Muslims.
These commitments aim to ensure political leaders hear and respond to the needs of British Muslims, a community seeking fairness, equality of opportunity and outcome, and the freedom to practice their faith.
We recommend Muslim communities and organisations use these pledges to ask candidates if they will sign up these pledges.
Please use the form below.
Commitments for British Muslims: A 2024 General Election Guide for Prospective Parliamentary Candidates
Oppose all forms of racism, including Islamophobia, by adopting the consensus definition of Islamophobia. Engage meaningfully with grassroots Muslim communities, not just government-approved individuals. This would ensure a two-way dialogue, better policy input, and greater uptake of government initiatives such as mosque security funding.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Adopt the All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims’ definition of Islamophobia.
- Revive and refresh the cross-government working group on Islamophobia, addressing new and emerging challenges with experts in hate crime, prejudice, and discrimination.
- Tackle Islamophobia within all political parties.
- Ensure the government has independent advisors on Islamophobia, similar to advisors on other forms of hate crime.
- Initiate a hate crime action plan with a zero-tolerance approach, strengthening and improving existing laws with a focus on hate crime reporting, especially for Muslim women.
- Commit to active engagement between the government and Muslim representative bodies, ensuring community voices are heard in the policy-making processes.
- Increase funding to support efforts to tackle threats of violence and hate crime from the far-right.
- Provide viable and visible funding for mosque security, involving grassroots communities.
FACTS
335% Rise in Islamophobic hate crimes since 2023
(Source: Tell Mama)
As a permanent member of the UN Security Council, the UK must uphold international law. This includes immediately recognising Palestine, ending the Israeli occupation, and ensuring we are not complicit in the ongoing case of genocide.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Immediately recognise the Palestinian state and end the Israeli occupation, including an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza and the West Bank.
- Continue Britain’s role in advocating against human rights abuses globally, including support for war-torn regions and sanctions against states that violate the Geneva Convention.
- Review our arms trade policy to prevent British arms exports from contributing to human rights abuses or war crimes.
- Endorse and support the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the International Criminal Court (ICC) in their efforts to uphold international law and ensure accountability for war crimes and human rights violations.
- Ensure the Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office’s overseas aid budget continues to support legitimate global suffering.
- Promote the participation of British academics in international collaborations in the social and natural sciences, and technology.
Fact
146 United Nations Member States recognise the State of Palestine out of a total of 193 countries.
* https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/06/un-experts-urge-all-states-recognise-state-palestine
Tackle child poverty by enhancing skills training, providing mentorship, bursary grants, and financial support for young people in deprived areas, where many young Muslims face limited opportunities.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Commit to addressing child poverty.
- Provide economic opportunities for young people, including skills training and mentors in the most socio-economically deprived neighbourhoods in the UK.
- Ensure the availability of bursary grants and additional financial support for young people from low-income families to improve economic empowerment.
FACTS
X3 A Muslim newborn baby has almost three times the chance to be born into the most deprived (10%) local authorities in England and less than a quarter of the chance to live in the most affluent (10%) local authorities as compared to other newborns. [Source: MCB, Striving For Fairness, 2024]
Promote a diverse and inclusive curriculum, ensure adequate funding for schools in deprived areas, and guarantee year-round free school meals for low-income families. Provide student loans based on ethical finance, such as Islamic finance, for those entering higher education.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Promote an inclusive curriculum that reflects the diversity of British society and its communities.
- Ensure effective funding for schools to provide high-quality education, adequate teachers, and resources, especially in deprived areas.
- Guarantee free school meals for all children from low-income families, ensuring no child goes hungry, including during school holidays.
- Offer ethical finance products, such as Islamically-based loans, alongside current student finance options to encourage young Muslims to enter university education.
FACTS
24.6% of pupils in England are eligible for free school meals, up from 23.8% in 2022, representing 2.1 million pupils.**
In April 2014, the Government launched a consultation on a “Sharia-compliant Alternative Finance Product,” which ran for 10 weeks. The conclusion of the report stated that the Government supports the introduction of a Sharia-compliant Takaful Alternative Finance product available to everyone and will work on its development.***
Commit to protecting the most vulnerable during economic uncertainty and alleviating financial burdens on struggling households.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Provide financial assistance and support to families struggling with the rising cost of living, ensuring that basic needs are met.
- Advocate for a living wage that reflects the true cost of living, reducing financial stress on households.
- Foster an economic environment that promotes real job creation, particularly in areas with high Muslim populations, ensuring equal opportunities for all British citizens.
FACTS
There has been a 200% rise in hardship funding applications to the National Zakat Foundation over two years. [Source: NZF, Economic Impact Report 2024]
45.3% of Muslims in England and Wales employed over the age of 16 are in front-line jobs: wholesale/retail, transport/storage, health/social care. [Source: ONS Census 2021]
Only 1.2% of Muslims in England and Wales are in the National Socio-Economic category ‘Large employers and higher managerial and administrative occupation,’ compared to 2.4% of the overall population. [Source: ONS Census 2021]
Increase social housing and address overcrowding. Ensure equitable healthcare access with targeted interventions for health issues prevalent in Muslim and other minority communities.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Increase public investment in social housing to balance supply and demand, and support new assisted housing build schemes.
- Ensure equitable access to healthcare services for all, with targeted interventions for specific health issues prevalent in all communities, including Muslim communities.
- Address the inequalities leading to large variations in life expectancies between residents in affluent and deprived areas.
- Tackle the persisting health inequalities and structural barriers faced by elderly Muslim communities, particularly women, in accessing healthcare.
- Support and promote places of worship and faith-based organisations as delivery partners in community social prescribing and wellbeing work.
FACTS
– 43.6% of Black African households reside in socially provided housing.
– 33.5% of Bangladeshi households reside in socially provided housing.
Impact:
– Higher rates of overcrowding among Muslim households.
– Negative effects on children’s health and educational attainment.
(Note: Numbers from England and Wales Census 2021)
Implement the Leveson recommendations on press standards in full. Ensure the BBC Board is independent of political interference and that regulators are equipped and supported to enforce the rules. Support initiatives to encourage a diverse and inclusive media in both output and staff.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Implement all recommendations from the Leveson Inquiry Part 1 on press standards, including reviving Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act, which incentivises news publishers to join a regulator approved by the Press Recognition Panel (PRP).
- Revive Part 2 of the Leveson Inquiry to examine the relationships between newspaper organisations, the police, politicians, and prosecuting authorities.
- Review the appointment process for any media-related boards, including the BBC Board, to ensure they are independent of political interference.
- Maintain the current regulation for broadcasters to be impartial under Ofcom and support Ofcom in enforcing these rules.
- Require public service broadcasting to be inclusive in its output, including religious programming, and measure its success by the number of hours and spend distribution for different groups.
- Support public service broadcasters in ensuring a diverse workforce and an inclusive environment.
FACT
A report by the Centre for Media Monitoring, analysing over 48,000 online articles and 5,500 broadcast clips between 2018 and 2022, revealed that almost 60% of online media articles and 47% of television clips associate Muslims and/or Islam with negative aspects or behaviour.****
Justice and law enforcement must be fair. Muslims, often viewed through a security lens, face restrictions on free speech, protest, and public participation due to unfounded extremism accusations. This must change.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Scrap the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill.
- Promote fair and responsible immigration policies to facilitate the resettlement of refugees throughout the UK, including a fast-track route for those with emergency refugee status, such as those displaced in Gaza.
- Do not close avenues for peaceful and civil protest and activism.
- Commit to not banning lawful boycotts aimed at preventing human rights abuses in states like Israel, Russia, or China.
- Protect the right to protest and stand up to attempts to stifle free speech.
- Ensure the government does not adopt a definition of non-violent extremism that unfairly targets Muslim communities and Palestinian advocacy groups.
- Call for a new framework for counterterrorism led by a truly independent review of the current PREVENT duty, which works to build community trust.
FACT
The UK will have to pay up to £230,000 per asylum seeker under the Rwanda system, compared to £55,000 per person under the pre-Rwanda system. Payments for an initial cohort of 20,000 irregular arrivals could reach up to £3.9 billion.^
On 15 November 2023, the Supreme Court unanimously dismissed the Home Secretary’s appeal and upheld the Court of Appeal’s conclusion that the Rwanda policy is unlawful.^^
^^https://www.supremecourt.uk/cases/docs/uksc-2023-0093-press-summary.pdf
Pursue net-zero targets by providing government grants for eco-friendly places of worship and investing in green energy.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Ensure the UK fulfils its historic commitment to meet net-zero targets.
- Improve public transport with increased access for more deprived communities.
- Support national policies aimed at reducing carbon footprints and protecting the environment and conservation efforts.
- Provide government grants to support more eco-friendly places of worship, including investment in green energy.
- Encourage investment in renewable energy and sustainable infrastructure.
FACT
Climate change is directly contributing to humanitarian emergencies, including heatwaves, wildfires, floods, tropical storms, and hurricanes, which are increasing in scale, frequency, and intensity. Research shows that 3.6 billion people already live in areas highly susceptible to climate change. Between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250,000 additional deaths per year from undernutrition, malaria, diarrhoea, and heat stress alone.^^^
^^^ https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/climate-change-and-health
Champion the religious rights and heritage of all faith communities by supporting frameworks that enhance social cohesion and better engage with faith and civil society.
ACTION REQUESTED
- Engage with communities to support better faith and civil society-led frameworks in policy and social cohesion.
- Support and empower interfaith understanding and cooperation for the common good at every level.
- Preserve our rich tradition in social statistics by ensuring the Office for National Statistics’ 10-year census continues in its present form and is not replaced by alternative sources of administrative data.
- Provide places of worship and faith-based organisations with more diverse funding for heritage and history preservation projects.
Fact
94% of respondents answered the voluntary religion question in the Census. Reliable data on religious affiliation and ethnicity are essential for matching the allocation of public services and resources with needs. British social statistics are a world standard, and the government’s proposal to replace the traditional ten-year census completed by every household with data from government departments (e.g., DWP) is akin to throwing away precious family silver.