Politics Home | Government Confident Of Defeating Legal Challenge Over Anti-Muslim Hate Definition

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PoliticsHome understands that the new definition, announced on Monday as part of a wider social cohesion strategy, was amended during the writing process to be as robust as possible in the face of an expected legal action, with one government source saying that the wording had been put through the “legal ringer” in preparation for judicial review.

The government asked an independent working group, led by former Conservative cabinet minister Dominic Grieve, to advise on whether a new definition of Islamophobia was needed in response to a rise in hate crimes against Muslims.

Ministers received a template definition from the group in September and spent the subsequent months finalising the wording.

During the process, as PoliticsHome reported in October, the government decided to drop the term Islamophobia and instead refer to anti-Muslim hostility.

The adopted definition focuses on anti-Muslim hostility as “violence, vandalism, harassment, or intimidation, whether physical, verbal, written or electronically communicated” towards Muslims. 

The government decided not to include a clause identifying Muslims as a race, explaining that Muslims come from a range of racial backgrounds. Instead, the definition sets out how hostility towards the group includes prejudiced stereotyping based on perceived markers of being Muslim, like appearance, dress and names.

Speaking on Monday, the cabinet minister leading the work, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, Steve Reed, said: “Crucially, this definition protects the fundamental right to freedom of speech while protecting people from unacceptable abuse and violence.

“A special representative on anti-Muslim hostility will also be appointed to support action to strengthen understanding, reporting and response.”

The definition was welcomed by the Chair of the British Muslim Trust, Shabir Randeree, who said it would “help guide institutions that have too often been too slow or too weak in their responses to incidents a tolerant and respectful country like ours must never accept”.

Andrew Copson, Chief Executive of Humanists UK, said his organisation was pleased that the wording seeks to combat hostility towards Muslims “while explicitly protecting speech that is critical of religious ideas, in line with international human rights standards”.

However, on Tuesday, The Telegraph reported that the Free Speech Union (FSU) was preparing a pre-action letter and threatening legal action.

FSU founder, Conservative peer Toby Young, argued the definition is illegal because it would result in criticism of Islam being censored. “Bringing a judicial review against a secretary of state isn’t cheap, but we believe this is a vitally important free speech issue. Blasphemy crimes were repealed as far back as 2008 — let’s keep it that way,” he told PoliticsHome.

There is confidence in Whitehall that any legal challenge brought by free speech campaigners will be unsuccessful.

Government sources familiar with the definition-writing process told PoliticsHome there are three broad reasons why it took six months to produce the final wording, with one being ensuring the definition would stand up to a legal challenge.

The second was making sure it could be applied in public sector settings like the NHS and the police as simply as possible, while the third was an effort to make sure the government was sufficiently engaged with Muslim communities.

Lord Walney, former extremism adviser, told PoliticsHome: “Already people are signalling they will use this definition to try to silence criticism of Islam, which must be allowed in a free society.

“So the government must monitor this situation closely and be prepared to reverse their decision if the definition has the chilling effect many of us fear it will.”

PoliticsHome has contacted the government for comment.