Ahmadiyya Muslim Community

Justine Greening Excerpts

Thursday 24th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening (Putney) (Con)]

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) for securing this hugely important debate. As she set out, she has a significant local Ahmadiyya community. I praise her speech, which was not only comprehensive but shocking in its detail of the persecution suffered by the Ahmadiyya community around the world.

The Ahmadiyya community plays a key role in my local community. Not only was its first mosque built in 1926 in Southfields—the first mosque built anywhere in London—but the area has been a home to the community ever since. The role that the community plays more broadly within the Putney, Roehampton and Southfields constituency that I have the privilege of representing adds hugely to our wider community. It was the Ahmadiyya community that got everybody together after the 7/7 bombings many years ago and made sure that we would not be divided by the hatred that led to those attacks. It is the Ahmadiyya community that has had a peace symposium every single year for 14 years, giving us an annual chance to come together and talk about all the issues that our communities face.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association does amazing work around the country raising money for charity. When we had the floods several years ago, its members ran towards them. They went to visit and help many of the communities affected, not only in nearby places such as Surrey, but further afield up in Cumbria. Of course, we have also heard of some of the transformational work that Humanity First does around the world. The funds that it uses are raised by the community and put to good use to help others who are far less fortunate.

Only last weekend we had the royal wedding, and one of the street parties that I had the chance to go to was in Arnal Crescent in West Hill. It was organised by local Ahmadiyya residents who saw it as a wonderful opportunity not only to celebrate the wedding, but to try to bring together for the first time people who live in that little bit of my constituency and might not have had the chance to meet one another.

The phrase that we have already heard—love for all, hatred for none—percolates through not only every single thing the community stands for, but how people conduct themselves. That is the case not only locally to me, but throughout this country and around the world. We have heard about the persecution that the community faces, and it is shocking that we have seen some of that right here in the UK. We heard about the terrible murder of the Glasgow shopkeeper Asad Shah—and for what? Apparently for simply wishing his local community a happy Easter, which apparently disrespected the Muslim faith. What an awful attitude to have to a pillar of the community who clearly played their role in bringing people together every day.

I draw the attention of the House to some of the invidious persecution that happens closer to home, including some of the literature that we know gets put out in places such as Tooting, and the fact that some shops are encouraged not to deal with the Ahmadi community, whether by selling goods to them or by employing them. That is totally unacceptable on our doorstep. Whenever I have needed to, I have always raised the issues with our local police, but we certainly should not tolerate persecution right in our backyard.

[Mr Dhesi]

The persecution of the Ahmadiyya or any community is abhorrent. If we are to be true to the principles of humanity, we must stand shoulder to shoulder with that community and stand up to discrimination in all its guises. Does the right hon. Lady agree that the appointment of a UK global ambassador for religious freedom would assist in highlighting and tackling the issues that we are discussing today, as well as helping to fight discrimination and promote equality?

[Justine Greening]

It might well help. It is also very helpful that one of our Foreign Office Ministers, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, is himself Ahmadi, so he is intimately familiar with some of the persecution faced by the community.

I draw the House’s attention to the excellent report “Ahmadis in Pakistan Face an Existential Threat”. It comprehensively sets out the persecution that happens around the world. I thought that the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden did an excellent job of setting out just how many countries the persecution happens in. It is absolutely shocking. As she said, only last night a 500-strong mob attacked a mosque that has been there for 100 years in a part of Punjab in Pakistan.

I know that others want to speak, so I will finish my comments by saying that this is a country that has always stood up against persecution and for religious freedom. A debate in this Chamber is hugely important to set out our renewed determination to stand up against such persecution. The fact that this persecution is against a community that is the antithesis of the hatred shown by so many people who carry it out is the ultimate irony, and the approach of the community sets it apart in many positive ways. I am proud to have these people as part of my local community. They have been an intrinsic part of it for a century now, and they will always be hugely welcome. They add to it in a way that is impossible to convey through this short debate. I will play my role as a local MP in standing up against the persecution they face, both here in the UK and internationally.