Female Genital Mutilation

Lord Parekh Excerpts

Wednesday 4th December 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parekh (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow my noble friend Lord Patel. I begin by congratulating the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, on securing this debate. In the three minutes that I have at my disposal, I want to make five very quick points. First, I think that prosecution has to be far more vigorous than it has been. In order that that can happen, we need to do two things: medical professionals and care workers ought to be more forthcoming in providing evidence; and the Crown Prosecution Service should restructure its criteria of proof and responsibility.

Secondly, since we have only limited resources and energy, we should concentrate on those groups where this is far more prevalent, rather than talk about all ethnic minorities or all Muslims or whatever. For example, in Somalia, it is 98% prevalent; among the Egyptians, it is about 91%; it is 74% among Ethiopians; but when you come to Ghana or Uganda, it is barely 1%. It is important to select groups and concentrate on them.

Thirdly, we should be increasing awareness of the consequences of female genital mutilation, not that women do not know. After all, many of those who perpetrate this have already suffered: they know the consequences. I have in mind the young girls within the family—trying to educate them on what this involves, and getting them to put pressure on their own parents and peers and others within their own communities. In dealing with many ugly practices, getting young people to organise and mobilise in this way is generally very effective.

Fourthly, we must find some way of de-legitimising this practice in the eyes of those who engage in it. They engage in it not because they want to harm their children; they know it is bad. They do it not just under social pressure—they do it because they think they are doing what is right. They think it is right because they think that it disciplines their sexuality and so on. We need to involve religious leaders and cultural leaders, and get them to convince the people involved that this is not the way that the practice can ever be justified. Here it is important to talk in idioms that people can understand, rather than talk about human rights and why women are being deprived of sexual pleasure. That is not the language in which you can communicate with people who do not place much value either on human rights or on sexual pleasure. One has to talk in terms of idioms and arguments which make sense to these people.

Finally, it is quite important to bear in mind that we are not objecting to female genital mutilation per se. Whenever I have talked to these women, they have said that they know that some nuns undergo the practice voluntarily. They know that some adult African women have undergone the practice voluntarily after the birth of their first child in order to convince themselves that they are mothers and not just wives. They also know that, for all kinds of reasons, every year 200 to 300 adult women undergo it in our own society for all kinds of reasons. It is therefore important to bear in mind that we are objecting to this practice because it involves small children, and we ought not to lose sight of that particular focus.