UK chaos slowed Tory efforts to tackle Islamophobia, report warns

LONDON — The “political turbulence” plaguing the U.K. Conservative Party over the last two years has slowed its internal efforts to tackle Islamophobia, a new report has found.

Former equalities and human rights commissioner Swaran Singh was asked in 2019 to carry out an in-depth review of the way the governing party handles allegations of anti-Muslim abuse after a string of complaints. His report, along with a host of recommendations for change, finally landed in 2021 — and Monday’s follow-up aims to track progress against those recommendations.

The report lauds some success, but also finds “weaknesses” in the Conservative Party’s implementation of Singh’s asks. And it says Britain’s tumultuous political scene is in part to blame.

Singh points out that since the publication of his 2021 report, the Tories have had “three leaders, two CEOs and seven Party Chairs. Each of these changes has had an unavoidable impact on the day-to-day running of the Party and has led to delays in implementing the recommendations.” Britain cycled through three prime ministers in 2022 alone, moving from Boris Johnson to Liz Truss to Rishi Sunak in rapid succession.

The report finds that the Conservatives still have “no formal measures in place to handle complaints relating to discriminatory behavior involving the most senior members of the Party,” with existing measures merely “ad hoc” and no evidence of a “documented formal procedure” to hold its top figures to account “beyond the standard process that applies to all complaints.”

It says this situation should be reviewed in the next six months — with the party ordered to set out whether complaints against senior Conservative members should be assessed by an independent body.

There is some praise in the report for a new submission form the party has introduced allowing people to lodge complaints, and it says outreach events — including those held during Ramadan 2023 — have been well received by HQ staff and the parliamentary Conservative Party. 

Singh also found that Conservatives have “invested considerable time and effort in developing new training material,” and that the party has “increased its focus on diversity.”

However, he caveats that this increase in activity has “not necessarily led to a corresponding change in awareness [of Islamophobia] or action on the ground” and says the Conservative complaints team is “very focused on the process of investigating and resolving complaints, and less mindful of the experience of those involved in the process.”