Hate Crimes Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Singh of Wimbledon
Main Page: Lord Singh of Wimbledon (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Singh of Wimbledon's debates with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
(6 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, I think my noble friend’s experience bears out the statistics that we saw announced by the Community Security Trust last week, showing the highest number of reported anti-Semitic incidents on record in 2023, with the majority of these being reported from 7 October. There is no place on British streets for demonstrations, convoys or flag-waving that glorify terrorism or harass the Jewish community, and we will work closely with the police, who we urge to step up patrols and use all available powers to enforce the law.
My Lords, the current practice of giving government funding to more vocal communities to collect figures to show that they are more hated than others is a waste of that funding. Does the Minister agree that a better approach would be to tackle the underlying ignorance on which prejudice thrives by stressing, in the teaching of RE in schools and elsewhere, the large number of important ethical commonalities between different faiths to show that the superficial differences are very insignificant?
My Lords, the Government committed to break down the recording of hate crime first by religion and then more recently by race. That provides us with an important insight into the experiences of different communities, which can be quite different across the country. Where I agree with the noble Lord is that part of the solution to some of these issues is focusing on where we have more in common than what divides us. We should emphasise that, particularly in our schools.