Integration and Community Cohesion

Baroness Hazarika Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hazarika (Lab)]

My Lords, I begin by paying tribute to my noble friend—my good friend—the Minister, Lord Khan, who is doing a really terrific job. This is not an easy gig, particularly in these days of inflamed social tensions. He does his work with great energy, compassion and good faith. I also congratulate my noble friends Lord Raval and Lord Rook on their wonderful, warm maiden speeches. They are going to make some terrific contributions to this House.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Verma, for securing this important debate and for her very warm and personal opening speech. It made me think about my own story as a Muslim girl growing up in Coatbridge to Indian Muslim immigrant parents. I have told this story before but when my dad first got to Coatbridge as a GP, one of his patients asked him, “What are you?” He said, “I’m a Muslim”, and they said, “Aye, but what kind? A Rangers Muslim or a Celtic Muslim?” My mum and dad wanted to preserve their heritage while making sure that I integrated and learned the local culture. So, on a Saturday morning, my mum would drive me to my Koran lessons, which I then followed up with Scottish country dancing lessons. Having done the two, I am not sure which one was more dangerous, to be honest—stripping the willow is not for the faint-hearted.

I think of my father, who came to this country in the late 1960s. He began his working life in Clatterbridge Hospital on the Wirral and was desperately homesick and lonely. The sister on his ward, a formidable woman called Audrey, noticed this lost soul and, in her bossy way, demanded that he came round to her house for Sunday lunch. He did what he was told and off he went. Audrey took him and his pal Aftab under her wing. My dad had never been to a British house; he did not even know how to use cutlery properly. Audrey and her family taught them all about British life. My dad had his very first pint under the tutelage of her husband Arthur. He became a more moderate Muslim at this point, it is safe to say—don’t tell the Imam. In return, my dad cooked them delicious Indian food and they learned about his life. They became the best of friends and Audrey became like a grandmother to us. She sadly passed away a few years ago, but we are still so close to her children and grandchildren. That is the essence of integration. It should be based on human qualities of kindness, curiosity and friendship.

That is the fuzzy, feel-good bit out of the way—now for the other side. I got an email when I first came into this place. I had just done “Newsnight”, during the riots. I paraphrase, but this is the gist of that email: “Don’t kid yourself Hazarika. For the millions of us who can trace our heritage on these islands back many centuries—unlike you—we loathe and detest you and your kind more than life itself, because of how you have completely destroyed our country. You can fill the streets with uninvited and unwanted migrants, ethnics and left-wing Trots, but plenty of us are prepared to die to save our nation and its way of life, but we are not going to die in vain. Don’t ever, ever forget that. Long live Enoch Powell”. It is always nice to get some fan mail, isn’t it?

So it is not all good. There are extremists in different communities, including my own, who spread hate and feast off division. International conflicts, particularly in the Middle East, are affecting these shores, and, as we have heard, we are seeing a shocking rise in anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. Let us be honest: our politics have not helped either. We on the left are still deeply ashamed that anti-Semitism bloomed in the Labour Party under the last leadership. I personally apologise for that. On the right, politicians today say ridiculous things such as you cannot possibly be English if you have a different skin colour or were born to immigrants.

I do not share Rishi Sunak’s politics, but I was damn proud to see him become our first Hindu Prime Minister. We should be welcoming people who want to come here, work hard, contribute and be part of our community. Of course, we must allow people to have their religious and cultural differences, but we must also set clear guardrails about what is expected in our society and what we expect our values to be. We should all care about greater community cohesion and integration. It is better for everybody, as we have heard expressed so eloquently. But demanding it through humiliation, hatred and inciting violence is not the solution. To go back to my own dear dad’s story: a wee bit of kindness, humour, curiosity and friendship is the way. We should all be a bit more Audrey.