Social Cohesion and Community during Periods of Change

Lord Mann Excerpts

Friday 6th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mann (Lab)]

My Lords, I apologise for having spent most of the session in my office but, after yesterday’s Covid jab, I think it was better to collapse in the office rather than collapsing here. If I suddenly fall over, your Lordships will know it is of only minor seriousness.

I am listening; I have listened all the way through the debate. Lots of policies are being suggested as to how we can do things to people, but the overwhelming message that I get everywhere is that people are fed up with politicians doing things to them. They want to be left alone. They want to live their lives without hassle. The more I go into the Jewish community, the Muslim community, the huge swathes of basically unorganised middle-class and working-class communities that I have represented for 18 and a half years, that is the theme: “We don’t want hassle in our lives. If there’s hassle, sort it out; then, just let us get on with things”.

We are taking our eye off the ball. I declare my interest, having been appointed by the Prime Minister to advise on anti-Semitism. I do not get paid for it, and I am not Jewish. I get a lot of grief from it—an awful lot of grief. My wife and daughter have been threatened with rape online. People have been arrested, jailed or convicted in other ways. We got the full hat: from the left, from the right, from pro-Iranian forces—the whole lot. We have Iran on our backs at the moment. We are having to deal with people. It is a bit of a pain.

So why do it? Perhaps it is because I have been well brought up, I might suggest, rather immodestly. Also, being outside the community has a certain advantage. The difference is fundamental, and it is very important that noble Lords understand it. When I go home, I am not Jewish. When I go to sleep and in the middle of the night, I am not Jewish. Therefore, it does not get to my soul in terms of who I am, my identity or my future in this country. Yes, it is lots of grief I could do without, but what I see, hear and, I think, understand is exactly how people in the Jewish community, and the Muslim community, feel—atomised, isolated, hassled and disempowered. They feel that we are not doing enough about it because what they really want is just to get on with their lives.

As part of that process, I invite the Minister to come to Eaton Hall, which does imam training. It has not engaged with the Government for 20 years. It has 115 mosques and I think 55 imams in training. He and his boss would be very welcome. I think it would be very useful.

I fear that we might go for the easy routes. I am all for bishops, vicars, rabbis and imams holding hands and having meetings, but in the real world, from what I hear in the Muslim and Jewish communities, that is not going to be happening in the next 12 months. We have got to rebuild that, and it will not be short term. We have to be honest and realistic about where we are. When there is conflict going on, when people are angry and taking sides and when they can see grievances in front of them, the more we can bring people together, the better, but we will also need to run parallel strategies of engaging separately in order to be successful in the next 12 months. I suggest that the political environment might be somewhat more difficult than before, not easier. That is fundamental to what the Government should be thinking about.

I hesitate to give any advice to the Bishops, but I could channel my inner Michael Caine and say just read the Book. Matthew says quite a lot. Matthew 19, verse 24 is early on in the New Testament, so it must be important. It is not hidden away. It says,

“it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God”.

Bishops in the Church of England are making the same mistake we are making. It is right to deal with the misuse of power and to shuffle the pack. People come and people go because of that. I dealt with huge numbers of survivors of sexual abuse in some torrid meetings, and I still represent some who have not seen justice. But the bishops and we need to think about how we are misconstruing power, and that is a bigger problem. We are not seeing how it works. We are happy to be in the meeting room, here or in the tearoom, in our comfort zone. I would quite like—in fact, I am asking for—access to Lambeth Palace and for it to join me in an event on anti-Semitism. If I get the traditional hobnobs and tea from the Church of England, I will be well in my comfort zone, so I am not eschewing that.

However, we do too much in the comfort zone and not enough dealing with people we do not understand—of thinking about and going to places that we are not comfortable in. If there is any point to the House of Lords, we need to get our act together, because we do not have electoral pressures. If people are saying that the best model is not to have some replica Chamber, that is fundamental because I do not think we are doing our job nearly well enough. The bishops are a microcosm and no worse than anyone else but, comparably, how much time do they spend in here and how much dealing with declining numbers of pupils, declining buildings or the problems of connecting with communities?

Out there, we have an avalanche of children not attending school. I am a trustee of an academy chain. Parents used to say: “School is rather good; it’s free childcare. Get the kid out; I want them out; it will be good for them. I want them away and out of the house”. They are now saying exactly the opposite. They say: “School is no good; I didn’t like it. I want them in the house. There’s no need to go; they’re happier in the house and they have hassle at school”. That is a fundamental crisis in our society and I do not think the Government have put it as a top priority. This should be a significant cross-party priority.

What kind of society are we trying to build? I am looking at it and thinking that I do not have the freedom to do the things I would like to do with my grandchildren. You cannot, as I did, go through meadows or fields. You struggle to find trees. It is congested and overpopulated in the mountains. We are taking away what people use. I do not call it escapism; I call it real life—the bits that take the hassle out of people’s lives. We in this House need to spend an awful lot of time thinking through how we can influence that. It strikes me that that is not a role that could ever come, however good it is, from the other place. That is something we should be good at with our combined expertise.