Because of its importance, I have copied below an item from last Friday’s National Secular Society’s Newsletter in full. There is a call for people to sign a petition at the end. Please consider doing so.
One Law for All campaign launches with call for new legislative curbs on sharia courts
New legislation may be needed to curb the activities of informal sharia courts that are operating in Britain, said the organisers of the One Law For All campaign, which was launched at the House of Lords this week.
The meeting was attended by peers who are interested in challenging the growth and influence of Sharia Councils and Muslim Arbitration Tribunals. Campaign organiser, Maryam Namazie, commented that sharia law was undesirable in any form as it sets up conflicts between both human rights and civil law in Britain. “Even in civil matters, Sharia law is discriminatory, unfair and unjust, particularly against women and children,” she said.
Of particular concern was whether women were being coerced into using these courts and tribunals against their best interests.
NSS Vice President and chairperson of the LawyersSecular Society, Carla Revere, explained how the Sharia Councils and Arbitration Systems differed and how they were ruling on family matters — divorce, child custody and inheritance matters — that were outside their legal scope. She quoted Justice Minister Jack Straw, who said in Parliament recently, in response to a question about sharia law courts in the UK: “Arbitration is not a system of dispute resolution that may be used in family cases. Therefore no draft consent orders embodying the terms of an agreement reached by the use of a Sharia council have been enforced within the meaning of the Arbitration Act 1996 in matrimonial proceedings”. Therefore the decisions of Muslim Arbitration Tribunals are not legally binding in that they are not enforceable in the UK courts.Gina Khan, a secular Muslim who has been fighting for justice on these issues, spoke of her own and her family’s experiences at the hands of sharia justice. She spoke passionately about the way extremists within the Muslim community were exerting control through giving the impression that “real Muslims” would settle their disputes using only “God’s Sacred Law”. This, she said, led to injustice to Muslim women, many of whom didn’t know they had rights in British civil courts.
Keith Porteous Wood, Executive Director of theNational Secular Society, said: “Sharia is becoming a growth industry in Britain, putting growing pressure on vulnerable people in the Muslim community to use sharia councils and tribunals to resolve disputes and family matters, when they could use the civil courts. Sharia “law” is not arrived at by the democratic process, is not Human Rights compliant, and there is no right of appeal.”
Mr Wood pointed to the Muslim Arbitration Tribunal’s own website, which says “MAT will therefore, for the first time, offer the Muslim community a real and true opportunity to settle disputes in accordance with Islamic Sacred Law with the knowledge that the outcome as determined by MAT will be binding and enforceable.” It proudly shows photographs of the recently retired Lord Chief Justice and Justice minister Lord Hunt claiming various types of endorsement by them.”
Carla Revere added: “Such self-appointed, unregulated tribunals are gaining in strength; they increasingly hold themselves up as courts with as much force as the law of the land, but are not operating with the same controls and safeguards. They appear to be operating in the area of family law and some even in criminal matters, where they have no right to make binding decisions as they claim to do. Even if the decisions were binding, UK courts do not uphold contractual decisions that are contrary to UK law or public policy. We call on the Government and legal establishment to stand up for the vulnerable and tackle this significant and growing problem, rather than ignoring it.”
The one Law for All Campaign website is here. Please add your name to the petition and disseminate this as widely as possible.
I agree that the abuse of unofficial courts, no matter what their religious, political or philosophical orientation, should be stamped out and people educated about their rights.
What I am less happy about is that the petition site invites the would-be signatory to be rather more confrontational than I think is desirable or politically wise.
We are invited to give up to 5 reasons for signing and some of these are distinctly hostile to Sharia law, one, for example, describing it as “cruel and barbaric”.
While it is perfectly legitimate for anyone to entertain an opinion that Sharia is “cruel and barbaric”, that is not the point we should be striving to make. That point is that any unofficial “courts” - whether religious or otherwise, whether based on some creed or merely ad hoc - are illegitimate and should not be allowed to operate.
Including statements that Sharia is “cruel and barbaric” detracts from the main point and risks causing signatories to be accused of prejudice or racism which, after all, is at root what Sharia courts are being accused of.
We are opposing Sharia courts, not because they are “cruel and barbaric” (we would oppose them even if they were models of compassion and clarity) but because they are not the courts designated by law, custom and practice to uphold the law of the land and because one law must apply to all or by definition it is not law.
Silver Tiger said, We are opposing Sharia courts, not because they are “cruel and barbaric” (we would oppose them even if they were models of compassion and clarity) but because they are not the courts designated by law, custom and practice to uphold the law of the land and because one law must apply to all or by definition it is not law.
Well said. Oftentimes, the best thing to do is stick to the basic point and avoid getting sidetracked by minutiae.
Tried to sign petiton but my e-mail is showing as not being valid? I do support what you are saying. Sorry, I could not sign up.