Arbitration and Mediation Services (Equality) Bill [HL]

Baroness Massey of Darwen Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 27th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank and greatly admire the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, for her insistence and persistence in fighting for the rights of women under the law. It is interesting that no matter how many times the noble Baroness brings back the issue of mediation and arbitration to your Lordships’ House, so many of your Lordships not only attend but speak, and with increasing eloquence and determination. I shall be very brief today, because so many of the problems have been aired and so many points have been validly made.

The noble Baroness has consistently talked to women —mainly Muslim women—about their severe problems and their oppression under religiously sanctioned gender discrimination in this country. She has written many articles and reports on this subject, talked to many organisations, and has asked Governments to change the law in similar Bills, in 2012-13, 2015-16, and again now. As we know, the Government in 2016 established an independent review into the application of sharia law, which will report in 2017. I hope that it will take account of the important point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, that many Muslim women,

“are unaware of their legal rights”.

If they are unaware, how can they act?

The noble Baroness’s brilliant 2015 report for the Bow Group, A Parallel World, says it all. She gives numerous examples of discrimination from women and from organisations to illustrate her powerful case. She says in the preface to the report:

“I have sat and wept with those who are oppressed, abused and treated as second class citizens. One Muslim woman told me: ‘I feel betrayed by Britain. I came here to get away from this and the situation is worse here than in the country I escaped from’. This cannot be allowed to continue. Provisions must be introduced to ensure that the operation of Sharia law principles in the UK today is not undermining the rights of women and the rule of law”.


As the noble Baroness has consistently pointed out, she fights incredibly hard for women. Again, she points out:

“The Bill does not interfere in the internal theological affairs of religious groups. In a free society, and in accordance with the hard-fought tradition of freedom of religion and belief, individuals must be able to organise their affairs according to their own principles, whether religious or otherwise. However, attempting to operate a parallel legal jurisdiction and to allow the de facto creation of new legal structures and standards is unacceptable”,


in this country. She is asking for a positive response from the Government. I sincerely hope that she gets it. We shall be watching every move.