At the end of last month, the first results of the 2021 UK Census were published. As many will recall, the results were simultaneously, although not quite paradoxically, shocking and expected. The information published showed that 1 in 6 UK citizens are born in another country – ten million of the UK’s 69 million; a 33% increase from the 7.5 million a mere decade ago.
The details were shocking insofar that few expected a demographic shift of such extreme proportions, even when compared to the last census in 2011. Nevertheless, they were expected. As anyone with an elementary understanding of British politics knows, the political system has pursued, less-so out of empirical consideration and moreso out of humanitarian (“it’s our moral obligation!”), diveristiarian (“diversity is our strength!”), and utilitarian (“immigration grows the economy!”) dogma(s), a policy of mass immigration since the late 1990s.
Just last week, data from the ONS showed that migration into Britain had reached a new record of 504,000 – a net increase of over 331,000 from the year prior. Keep in mind, all of this has happened despite the public’s clear and consistent opposition to immigration, nevermind the magnitudinous demographic change it has caused.
As soon as the data went public, one could piece together the overarching division of attitudes. Some welcomed the rapid erosion of Britain’s native-born citizenry. By contrast, the murmurs of the moderate-minded indicated a sense of foreboding. If the data on citizenship is this demographically untenable, what on Earth is the data regarding national identity going to look like?
Well, now we know. Reported by the ONS, the UK 2021 Census showed:
“81.7% of residents in England and Wales identified their ethnic group as within the high-level “White” category in 2021. A decrease from 86.0% in 2011.
As part of the “White” ethnic group, 74.4% of the population in England and Wales identified their ethnic group as “English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish or British. This is a continued decrease from: 80.5% in 2011 and 87.5% in 2001.”
As with the initial citizenship data, many celebrated this seismic change, suggesting that fewer white British Christians in Britain amounted to a moral improvement.
On the other hand, some deemed the largest demographic shift since late antiquity to be completely ineffectual. Directed at Nigel Farage’s reaction to the census, which underscored the shrinking ethnic British population in London, Conservative MP Sajid Javid tweeted a forthright and mask-off response: “So what?”.
“It’s not happening and that’s why it’s a good thing” as the saying goes.
Nevertheless… So what? Well, for a start, it shows that the 2011 Census wasn’t a one off, but signified the start of an unprecedented trajectory: the continuous decline of the ethnically British population. On its own, this should be alarming, but the fact this demographic shift has occurred within a single generation makes it even moreso. Needless to say, but worth saying nonetheless, to do so without consultation from or consideration of those implicated is, to put it moderately, extremely irresponsible.
Moreover, what good is talk of “integration”, the oft-proposed silver-bullet to the consequences of immigration, if the historical ethnocultural in-group, the one which immigrants are supposed to integrate, cannot sustain its hegemony? At most, they’ll “integrate into” (perpetuate) a godless ratrace; a demoralising sluggish existence against the world’s richest on the housing market and the world’s poorest on the labour market. As Morrissey says: shelve your Western plans… Life is hard enough when you belong here.
As it stands, numerous communities across England and Wales are majority-minority – where the national majority group constitutes a local minority – a fact which makes panicked rhetoric about rhetorical divisiveness all the more out-of-touch. Mutually-segregating, and often mutually-loathing, communities have been around for decades, the census just reaffirms this reality.
More to the point, who could expect integration? Flimsy abstractions of Britishness aren’t holding British society together. Having a cuppa, forming an orderly queue, and appealing to vague, arbitrary, and contradictory notions of “tolerance” and “inclusion” and so on just doesn’t cut it. What is a nation, especially a democratic one, if it cannot inspire loyalty?
The rate of immigration and concentration of immigrant and immigrant-descended populations diminishes any incentive or expectation of integration, no matter how willing the native population is to water down the criteria of national belonging. If people can choose to associate and live amongst their kind, they shall do so – as has been the case since the dawn of time. Blood is thicker than water, even if the water is boiled, milked, and caffeinated.
But beyond a debate of causation, whether it’s a case of “can’t integrate” or “won’t integrate”, both instances point to the same overarching problem: Britain is fragmenting.
In order to accommodate the contradictory complexities of the world, primarily a consequence of the similarly unwanted reimagination of Britain as a “global” entity, “Britishness” has been reconfigured from a distinct identity – something that people indivisibly are, that their parents are, that their parents’ parents are – into a bureaucratic technicality – something that people can have, should and whenever they be so inclined; from a complex and unique ethnocultural particularity to a two-dimensional universality.
This fact, combined with evidently unmanageable and unpopular immigration numbers, is not a good omen. Rather, it risks gradually wiping Britain from the face of the Earth; from its unique and beautiful place in relation to a global diversity of similarly unique and beautiful ethnocultural organisms to a crude amalgamation of all-else, pathetically bound though an appeal to inoffensive all-inclusive emptiness.
All the more fitting then that the census should also reveal a collapse in religiosity. In a nation where church and state are bound, less than 50% (46.2%) of the population identifies as Christian – down from 59.3% in 2011. Simultaneously, those self-identifying as having “no religion” surged from 25.2% to 37.2%. This is the first time in 1000 years that Christainity is not the majority faith.
Of all the census details, this is perhaps the least surprising. For decades, we’ve barely considered ourselves “Cultural Christians” – those that tick the box, but don’t attend the service. In this regard, the 2021 Census is merely a formal confirmation of long-waning Christainity.
Who could have seen any of this coming? Actually, quite a few people. Back in 2011, then-UKIP leader Nigel Farage, citing statistics published by Migration Watch, said that the UK could expect 50,000 Romanians every year over the course of ten years.
At the time, these numbers – as well as millions of ordinary people – were lampooned and ridiculed by the media, politicians, comedians, and (most damning of all) the Experts (the Serious People that Know Things), as delusional racists, fruitcakes, loonies, and so on.
Nevertheless, a decade later, that is exactly what has transpired. The census revealed that the number of Romania-born people living in the UK amounted to 539,000 – a 576% increase from 2011.
It’s no secret that Farage’s acknowledgement of immigration-led displacement of white Britons was one of his early selling points. Indeed, it was arguably as important (if not more important) than his euroscepticism. As has been established time and again, the latter is very much a product of the former. As such, it’s rather uncharitable to interpret his aforementioned comments with regard to London as anything but a reiteration.
Additionally, there’s David Coleman, former Professor of Demography at Oxford University, who predicted back in 2013 that, if demographic trends continued, “white Britons could be a minority by 2066” – a prediction which not only remains valid after the 2021 census but, evidently, did not assist him in retaining his then-already under-pressure position.
Granted, these are only notable examples. I cannot begin to imagine the number of normal people that have lost their livelihoods for concurring with such predictions, nevermind articulating the sentiment that they spelt trouble. Not even then does this account for those who have been scared into silence by active legislation and the fear of a vitriolic social death. You can be targeted for far less.
The inability to talk about matters in a frank, open, and civilised manner compounds problems which arise from matters which provoke the desire to discuss them in the first place.
On the religious front, Peter Hitchens has written and spoken about Britain’s post-Christainity on multiple occasions. Ever since WW1, Britain’s religiosity ceased to be sincere, instead being a series of motions undertaken without spiritual, theological, or moral investment. Now that there’s no room for doubt, one can expect the iconoclasts of Diversity and Inclusion to erase whatever hollow secularised traces of Britain’s Christian identity still exist in public life.
Put diplomatically, none of this is sensible. Quite the contrary, all these convergences spell catastrophe. Over the past few years alone, we’ve seen the fledglings of a nihilistic balkanised Britain.
Back in September, the now white British minority city of Leicester – a so-called “model” for a ‘diverse but cohesive’ Britain – fell victim to ethnoreligious rioting between Indian-descent Hindus and Pakistani-descent Muslims. Far from ‘diverse’, the riots were a replication of pre-existing global troubles.
To bare witness to the impotent, ahistorical, buzzword-laden gush of no-name ‘community leaders’, drowned out by an eruption of third-world carnage in Britain’s oldest settlements, as the mainstream press obfuscate the essence of the problem, is to bare witness to the self-deluding and short-sighted nature of Britain’s post-war political establishment.
Throughout various towns and cities across England, South-Asian grooming gangs have targeted white children since the 1980s. The police, more concerned about causing offence than networks of child prostitution, ignored the plight of the victims for several decades. Not even MPs could discuss the matter without facing repercussions.
Along the south-east, the perpetual tide of migrants (legal and illegal) has caused social unrest, so much so that coastal residents have taken to barricading their homes. The rate of immigration has skyrocketed housing costs, led to panicked hotel cramming by the Home Office, as well as an explosion of council-sanctioned homelessness.
Immediately following the release of the ethnicity data, tweets taunting white Britons to “come get your capital back” go viral, along with recorded procolations that Britain “is our country now”. Erstwhile, those of immigrant backgrounds descend on the capital, declaring their undying allegiance to a country that isn’t the one that houses them.
As for the sainted discourse, the goalposts of debate are shifted from “relax, you’re a local majority” to “relax, you’re the largest minority group” and pieces bemoaning “gentrification” are replaced by pieces celebrating “diversification”.
In the case of London, now 36.8% (down from 42.7% in 2011), some have tried to deflect any and all discussion of this matter by appealing to insinuations of white nationalism, forgetting that this entire question is, in essence, an ethnocultural one.
The idea that an unprecedented, unasked for, and potentially irreversible shift in the composition of a major city, nevermind an entire country, would not matter to the people insofar the shift was driven by those identifying “White Other” is obtuse and arrogant. Indeed, even when such a racial commonality exists between ethnically native and foreign-descended populace, there are still longstanding consequences.
As mentioned at the start, all of this boils down to mass immigration. The old and moneyed, addicted like junkies to the coursing streams of cheap foreign labour, are prepared to carve Britain’s youth out of the social contract in order to get their fill. Big business, professional activists, bureaucratic functionaries, and main-party politicians have locked arms and tirelessly marched in lock-step against my generation, their national belonging, and their prospect of a better future.
Both Labour and the Conservatives have demonstrated their indifference towards the problem of large-scale immigration-led demographic change. If anything, they have encouraged it, despite the pleas of their core voters.
Under Blair, Labour pursued a policy of mass-immigration to “rub the right’s nose in diversity”, simultaneously creating a pool of votes on which the party could rely in future elections, and accelerated Britain’s descent into ‘humanitarian’ quangocracy.
By not-so-much contrast, the Conservatives, having promised for decades to reduce immigration, won a landslide majority with the aid of traditional Labour voters (distinctly opposed to immigration) with a pledge to fulfil the spirit of Brexit – retainment of the sovereign control of borders to reduce the mass influx of people – only to do the exact opposite once in power. Don’t attribute to “failure” what is, in every respect, a design choice.
In the media, the Sensible umpires of political discourse, with clear-minded sobriety and transparent neutrality, insist that mass immigration is completely unstoppable and that we should shut up and make-do.
Likewise, in the equally Sensible world of think-tanks, mass immigration is supposedly the magical solution to all of Britain’s economic woes; everything from unprecedented high-tax levels to Britain’s economic stagnation. Even a general overview of Britain’s economic performance these past few decades is enough to clock that such “expertise” is merely an officialised delusion.
More than mere snark, “So What?” perfectly encapsulates the underlying problem of our entire political system. Everything, from the political media to think-tanks to sitting MPs, pushes depoliticisation. The art of the possible is replaced with the art of the impossible. A decision of indecision, democratic deliberation, and the alternatives it affords, is supplanted by the arbitrary apolitical confines of authoritarian managerialism.
By opening up a multitude of historically unprecedented political fronts (tension between ethnocultural groups) whilst depoliticising the policy areas pertaining to their creation (post-war immigration policy) the British political system has manufactured an increasingly unsustainable ethnocultural divide.
In a scrambled effort to feign unity, schools across the country are mandated to teach the British state’s reinvention of its foundational identity, utilising empty appeals, laden with contradiction and irony, to “democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs“.
It does not occur to our leaders that democracy is the conduit by which identity groups will compete against others, that high social trust is prerequisite to liberty, or that mutual respect and tolerance can be hard enough within predominantly monoethnic/monocultural societies, nevermind increasingly multiethnic/cultural ones. In the end, all that is left is the brute force of authority.
Being the only politician with sizable political support that is prepared to deliberate this fundamental matter, Farage’s hour of decision is upon us. If he does re-enter politics, he must do so on the back of these census results. The stalwart indifference of the political class, and all that has transpired as a consequence of their dogmatic recklessness, must not be allowed to continue.
If he does create a new party, there’s every reason to believe he’ll be rewarded handsomely at the ballot box. The Conservatives face electoral annihilation. Javid, fully aware of this fact, is not standing at the next election; presumably why he felt comfortable telling his constituents (96% white British) that their survival, in their own native land, never meant anything to him.
That said, few expect things to improve under a Labour government. Having never promised a precise number on immigration, one could safely bet, if they ever did, that a) it wouldn’t be sufficient or, if it was, b) they’d u-turn on their promise once in power – just like the Tories.
However, should Farage decide against a new party (or leadership of an already existing party), he must stand aside for an alternative to manifest. Whether we like it or not, as Britain’s demographics continue to change, especially at the current rate, ethnicity, identity, and all things in-between will become a far more prevalent part of our politics. We must be prepared to address these matters – for our own good and for the good of others. The only thing worse than an insufficient answer to the demographic question is to never answer it at all.
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Why The Tories Should Be Afraid of the Australian Labor Party’s Victory
The Australian Labor Party’s victory in Australia marks the end of almost a decade of Liberal Party rule. Indeed, the Liberal Party bears many similarities and its philosophy and ideology derived from the Conservative Party in their mother country. Having just scraped a majority in 2019, Scott Morrison has led the Liberal Party to its worst defeat since 1944. This claim however isn’t based on losing government but more critically losing its affluent seats like Goldstein, Higgins, North Sydney, Mackeller and former Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s seat of Warringah failing to be won by the Liberals again. But with the shock victory of independent Dr Monique Ryan in Kooyong suggests a worrying foreshadowing of what is yet to come in Britain.
Poor Leadership, Good Results
Firstly, the presumptive narrative that ‘Keir Starmer is an awful leader, so we’ll get back in’ is to be questioned due to the Australian election. Net satisfaction with Labor leader Anthony Albanese’s performance fell to a record low of minus 14 per cent – the worst for an opposition leader since Bill Shorten – just in mid-April. Starmer too shares an abysmal rating with 53 per cent of respondents to a YouGov poll in April judging him to be ‘doing badly’ as Labour leader in Britain. Nevertheless, with a shared cost of living crisis due to high inflation and rampant house price increases, both conservative parties have failed on their perceived core mission of safeguarding the economy.
The Wavering Middle-Classes
May’s local election results in the UK display signs of dissatisfaction with the current Tory government. The Liberal Democrats (not to be confused with the Australian Liberal Party) exploited the dissatisfaction among middle-class Tory voters in historically safe Tory areas. Australian Labor too exploited this dissatisfaction with middle-class Liberal voters. Being dubbed the ‘teal independents’, predominantly female, middle-class, wealthy, small-l liberal and climate-conscious candidates swept through solid Liberal seats. Teal itself being a mixture of green and blue (the Liberal Party’s colour) displays similarities with NIMBY-minded candidates in solid Tory wards during the UK May election. England’s results saw a net increase of 194 councillors for the Lib Dems and 63 for the Green Party with Labour seeing an increase of only 22 councillors at the expense of a loss of over 336 councillors for the Tories.
Forget the ‘Red Wall’ concept in Britain and in Australia, the Tory Party and the Liberal Party are seeing their core base desert them before their very eyes.
Repercussions for Australia and Dangers for Britain
Republicanism is strong in Australia and the return of the Labor Party with outspoken republican Albanese at the helm, coupled with the culture war heating up over trans rights during the election, this presents danger to the future of the monarchy in Australia once again. For Britain, the story is already well understood since Blair that a Labour government (no matter how appealing to traditional middle-class Conservative voters) will irrevocably vandalise the British constitution once more.
One key lesson learned from this election is that it is a massive challenge to hold onto the prosperous middle classes (which are a core rightist constituency) without compromising on conservative social values. Values of ambition and enterprise have been consistently championed by each Tory government since around the 1860s, yet this current Tory government is the first to not encourage – or even boldly talk – about these values. To fight the culture war without a sound handling of the economy risks losing both to left wing manipulation and thus conservatives are once again in opposition dominated by a left-wing hegemony in economy and culture.
The implication of defending traditional values by the Liberal Party and – supposedly – by the Tory Party without the confidence of the middle-classes on the economy is to pave the way for a leftist victory. Due to the shared Anglo traditions of parliamentary sovereignty, this leaves Australia’s institutions open to vandalism and destruction.
Conclusion
With the end of almost a decade of Liberal rule in Australia marks the beginning of a new era of Labor government. The recriminations inside the Liberal-National Coalition will begin as the moderates seek to flex their dwindling muscle to make the case that the 2022 electoral strategy of chasing ‘Red Wall’ voters cost them their heartlands. Right wing Liberals who protested Scott Morrison’s party by voting for the United Australia Party or Pauline Hanson’s One Nation may return home, but this election has marked the end of solid conservative dominance in Australia.
The Conservative Party in Britain should be worrying. The long-held belief that the Tories will stay in government due to Labour being unable to produce a competent-enough leader has been proven wrong. Ineptitude in optics over Partygate and 40-year high inflation (the highest among G7 countries, currently) is cutting away the Tory Party’s electoral backbone. Forget the insipid ping-pong of which party leaders held illegal gatherings during lockdown and focus on the disastrous state of the economy. If the awful May local election results weren’t a warning of what is yet to come for the Tories, this Australian election result should scare the Tories to death beyond the years of Brexit.
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The government’s ‘compassionate’ approach to addiction has made the problem worse
Methadone has been used to treat heroin (diamorphine) addiction since the 1950’s, but its use has massively increased in the 1990’s. Methadone is a man-made opiate (opioid), which is similar to heroin, and therefore it can be used as a substitute which can be gradually withdrawn, easing the symptoms of heroin withdrawal and, theoretically, making the transition to a clean life easier.
This is not, however, the reality. In order to be an effective substitute, methadone has to be very chemically similar to heroin, meaning that, in the short term, it has very similar effects. What’s more, as a prescribed drug from NHS clinics, methadone is free to the consumer, who, for 23 and a half hours a day, is free to roam the streets.
Given these two facts combined, I am sure you can guess what the outcome of this has been. Addicts turn themselves in to the drug services (for which they can face no criminal action), gain a high dose of methadone from the well-meaning staff at the drug service, and simply top it up with a reduced dose of heroin; thus saving themselves a few quid. This is not my cynical prediction, but was evident from research undertaken by Radcliffe et al, produced by interviewing 23 using mothers and relevant professionals about their experiences and observations with the drug services.
This demonstrates a major problem with the way that our addiction services are run. I accept the notion that addicts with a genuine desire to get clean, atone for their sins, and contribute to society should be supported in doing so, but this has to be subject to a more rigorous test than simply saying so.
Given Radcliffe’s findings about the revolving-door nature of our drug services, it is also not unreasonable to suggest that there should be a limit to how many chances someone is given to turn their life around. The other problem with this system is that, while there are guidelines in place for drug services staff, there is no strong requirement that the period for which methadone is prescribed be limited, and that over this period the dose be reduced as is medically desirable. This leaves drug services staff, who often have come to know their patients well, to simply use their discretion on how much state-sanctioned heroin should be prescribed.
Whatever one’s ideological preferences on how this issue is handled, it is clear that this policy simply is not working. Drug-related deaths are increasing, our prisons are dirtier than ever, and more lives are being ruined by drug use; both individual lives and those of their families.
One option is simply to end the methadone programme altogether, and have those who declare a desire to get clean (which is then ratified by professionals) placed into a rehab facility similar to those for alcoholics, where they have no access to any drugs of any kind.
Heroin, however, is an altogether different beast from alcohol. The effects of withdrawal are so extreme, and one’s tolerance diminishes so quickly, that people often relapse simply to ease the symptoms, and in doing so can fatally overdose, as even within 48 hours their tolerance has diminished. While the physical symptoms of withdrawal are usually over within 10 days, the psychological aspects last a lifetime. When coming off heroin, people will realise what the effects of it have been on their lives. In many cases they will have burned their bridges with family, lost any productive friendship networks and had their lives dominated by fellow users, and will have few employment prospects. These are scars that last a lifetime, and there are doubts over whether peer support networks are actually as effective as advocates would like us to believe.
This leaves serious questions about how relapse can be prevented without putting a serious strain on the public purse. While temporary institutionalisation during the period of physical relapse is viable, and probably a worthwhile investment (if only in reducing the demand for drugs), a lifetime of holistic support is not. This issue also opens bigger questions.
While in theory all adults have the agency to make decisions about their lives and face the consequences of these, the notion of agency becomes very fuzzy when dealing with people who are physically incapacitated after 24 hours of heroin withdrawal. The current legal threshold for institutionalisation under the Mental Health Act is very high, with the need to demonstrate that the individual concerned is a threat to the public before they can be removed from the streets. This means that, legally, despite admitting to heroin use (with the accompanying loss in the ability to make sound judgements), the state still has to treat addicts as competent adults, despite this being clearly not the case. This leaves the state, and of course all of us as taxpayers, open to exploitation by a selfish few trying to exploit a programme meant to help people improve their lives to top up their daily fix.
What is obvious to me is that a sorting process is required. Rather than the drug services staff making arbitrary judgements about what doses are required in a manner akin to the Harry Potter sorting hat, they need to first be given guidance on how to determine who has the serious intention of getting clean, and who is simply trying to exploit the system.
Allowing methadone out onto the streets means that the doses prescribed by drug centre staff are rendered meaningless as addicts will simply top up with extra bought from the streets, which means that those deemed to have the genuine desire and ability to get clean cannot be allowed to take methadone home with them. It must be taken under professional supervision.
I am not an addiction specialist. But as someone who has seen half of my family ruined by a small number of using individuals, I know that something has to change. We need to be able to talk about these issues honestly, not blinded by the politically correct notion of ‘compassion’ at the expense of families and communities devastated by drug use. I call on the government to urgently review the procedures for prescribing methadone and consult with specialists on the best way to determine people’s true intentions. Only then can progress be made in freeing Britain from the plight of drugs which has plagued her for 50 years.
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Why Britain’s counter-extremism policy is not working
Last year marked 20 years since 9/11, making it an appropriate time to review and reflect on Britain’s counter-terrorism policy. The beginning of the 21st century saw the issue of terrorism and Islamic extremism become increasingly salient. Britain’s counter-terrorism officials claim that most of the country’s terror threats come from British-born extremists. The government has therefore introduced counter-extremism strategies, which seek to: stop terrorist attacks; stop radicalisation; strengthen protection for potential targets of terrorism, and ensure that there is a plan of action if an attack does occur.
The most well-known of these is The Prevent program, which aims to achieve the second of these objectives. Prevent requires that individuals perform their “civic duty” reporting individuals suspected of extremism to the local police. A Prevent committee subsequently decides whether the person should be referred to the programme, but participation is voluntary. Despite some successes, several reports highlight that Prevent has been ineffective.
Prevent is often rendered ineffectual because institutions are reluctant to intervene, and some student groups actively dispute counter-extremism measures. For instance, the National Union of Students has pledged to oppose counter-radicalisation work. The actions of these groups should be given greater attention by counter-terror policy makers and enforcers.
Sadly, there is more to the issue of extremism on British campuses. Over 30% of individuals involved in Islamist terrorism in Britain went to university in the UK, and there is strong evidence that some of them were radicalised during their studies. According to security sources, Kafeel Ahmed, the 2007 Glasgow airport suicide attacker, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, mastermind of the 2002 murder of Daniel Pearl and Omar Sharif, the 2003 Tel Aviv suicide attacker, were radicalised at university.
Students are therefore being exposed to an intolerant and sometimes violent interpretation of Islam. Extremist speakers are being welcomed on campuses and presented as mainstream representatives of Islam. For instance, speakers at UCL have included Abu Usama adh Dhahabee, an advocate for armed jihad who believes that apostasy and homosexuality are punishable by death, Abdur Raheem Green, who has defended domestic violence and Haitham al-Haddad, an open Hamas supporter.
Concerningly, there is evidence of discriminatory practices by some university Islamic Societies (ISOCs), such as mandatory gender segregation and sexist behaviour. Yet, these same student groups often label counter-extremism measures as “racist”, an accusation lacking hard evidence.
The underperformance of Prevent, in educational institutions, is exemplified by the infamous case of the Bethnal Green schoolgirls who were not identified as vulnerable to radicalisation. On top of this, when one of the girls was killed by an airstrike in 2016, the Labour MP Rushanara Ali called for a “full review of Prevent”, expressing concerns, not over the failure to halt radicalisation but the risk of stigmatisation of young Muslims. The risk of stigmatisation is a very real one, but is must not detract from the need to identify those responsible for, and vulnerable to radicalisation.
Douglas Murray argues the question of responsibility for radicalisation of young people is often ignored, partially due to the policies pursued by British governments since the 1970s – chiefly a lack of focus on integration. A lack of government focus in this area has led to fragmentation in our society through the creation of “parallel communities” that rarely interact with each other. This reinforces ‘a narrative of difference’ whereby minorities become solely defined by their ethnicity and religion and become viewed as homogenous units by the wider British population. In this context, some young British Muslims are recruited by radical Islamic groups where they seek to find a sense of identity and belonging.
Extremist figures often gain legitimacy through their ties to local organisations even becoming self-appointed community leaders, who often to not genuinely represent the voice of their community. Despite this, local authorities often communicate with minority communities via these gateway individuals, increasing the risk that authorities gain a distorted view of these communities which impedes efforts to promote and enforce counter-extremism measures.
The dangers of the closed nature of some communities and allowing “cultural sensitivity” fears to dominate is shown through the lack of investigation into cases of human rights abuse like female genital mutilation (FGM). Whilst FGM was criminalised in the UK in 1985, there were no convictions of FGM until 2017, although cases of FGM had been known. More shocking was the 2014 Rotherham Child Sexual Exploitation scandal where more than 1400 girls had been abused, threatened and raped between 1997 and 2013. Some council and police officials had known about it but felt nervous about highlighting the offenders’ ethnicity in fear of being labelled racist. Given this and the fact that such fringe practices still take place in 21st century Britain illustrates the failure of the government’s counter-extremism policies.
In short, Prevent has been unsuccessful in combating extremism. In higher education, student groups and universities have opposed counter-extremism initiatives, whilst the government has not been robust enough in their enforcement. This has permitted speakers with radical affiliations platforms on campuses and undermined Prevents’ efforts. The emergence of parallel communities has also allowed extremist cultural practices to be carried out. Without reform counter-extremism policies are likely to remain hard to enforce. The government should focus on promoting integration of minority communities, so that such groups can develop a sense of belonging that is not detached from wider British society.
Marina Barats is a Policy Fellow of The Pinsker Centre, a campus-based think tank which facilitates discussion on global affairs and free speech. The views in this article are the author’s own.
