Crime: Religiously Motivated Crime

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Thursday 21st April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

Let me put on record and make absolutely clear that at no time did the Prime Minister or any other member of the Conservative Party allege that the right honourable Member for Tooting is an extremist. We need to ensure in the current climate that we take a very responsible view on all the circumstances and the environment in which we find ourselves—and, more importantly, build and strengthen the partnerships that we are investing in. I pay tribute to all across the House who are doing just that, to ensure that wherever we find bigotry and hatred, be it based on race, religion or any other cause, we unify against it and build and strengthen our partnerships across the UK to face up to it.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, while echoing everything that my noble friend has just said, may I ask him to make it abundantly plain, in the wake of the question of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, that there is an enormous difference between race hatred and hate crime and freedom of speech? Many of us are extremely concerned by the erosion of freedom of speech, particularly in our universities.

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

One of the things that I would say to my noble friend is that the Government’s view, particularly in my Home Office brief of countering extremism, is that we must ensure that we face up to hate and bigotry but, at the same time, protect the very freedoms that we battle so hard to achieve, which include the freedom of expression and belief.