THE CHALLENGES FOR GORDON BROWN
Published: 27/06/07 17:00
The Ramadhan Foundation
today congratulates Gordon Brown on being appointed as Prime Minister
of the United Kingdom, we hope that he will be more of a listening
Prime Minster than his predecessor. There is huge responsibility
on him to deliver on his promises and the British people will not
forgive him if he fails to listen.
There
are many challenges facing the incoming Prime Minister that we feel he
needs to address, they are:
Tackling Extremism
The Muslim community has
recognised that there is a small number of people that wish to cause
harm to others, the Ramadhan Foundation is at the heart of the campaign
to eradicate extremism from our country. We require the
Government to listen and engage with the community, consult more widely
with grassroots organisations, invest in the future make up of
communities, action proposals agreed by the community, stop demonising
Muslims and holding 1.6 million Muslims responsible for the actions of
a small minority.
Integration
The Ramadhan Foundation is
disappointed that the Government’s attempts to address this issue have
been all one sided. The proposals have focused solely on the
responsibilities of the minority communities without considering on the
responsibility of the majority communities. There needs to be
more investment in helping newly arrived immigrants to learn English,
you cannot demand they learn English and then cut the funding for ESOL
classes. We urge the Prime Minister to demand a u-turn on this
contradictory proposal that will encourage more separation and less
integration.
Faith Schools
Despite attempts by
secularists to abolish faith schools it is important for the incoming
Prime Minister to ensure that faith schools are provided with all
resources to ensure they teach equality, justice, integration, and
tolerance. People cannot hide away from faith schools being some
of the highest achievers in exams. We urge the Government to
include more Muslim schools in the state funded sector though enabling
more support for the schools to prosper. There needs to be total
equality for all faiths in this area, the same facilities should be
given to faith schools. Islam teaches tolerance, respect,
cohesion, and this need to be recognised.
Poverty and
Deprivation
The Ramadhan Foundation
urges the Prime Minister to tackle the inequalities and discrimination
amongst Britain’s minority communities, it is a disgrace than Ethnic
minority men are five times more likely to be rejected for a job than
their white peers. There are many more Ethnic minority families
living in the UK that suffer poverty than when Labour came to power in
1997. They are finding it harder to get sustainable jobs that pay
well. We urge the Government to develop a cross Departmental
strategy to tackle these issues, this will be the biggest tool to
defeat extremism.
Policing
The Ramadhan Foundation is
the first Muslim organisation to pay tribute for the hard work our
police do in our name and to protect us, not everyone can sacrifice
their lives to save others but with this power comes huge
responsibility. We cannot hide away that since the Stephen
Lawrence inquiry there still is institutional racism in the police
forces, that’s why we believe that Greater Manchester Police were wrong
to say there was no institutional racism in the force. We urge
the Prime Minister to set up a review into Stop and Search that is
being carried out and why ethnic minorities are stopped more often than
others even though they are in a minority. There needs to be
constructive engagement with young people so that they feel their voice
is being heard.
UK Foreign Policy
The Ramadhan Foundation
has consistently argued that the double standards of UK foreign policy
have increased the risk of terrorism in the UK. This does not
mean we do not condemn terrorism as our record speaks for itself on
this issue; we have consistently spoken out against this evil.
However, we need to recognise that this sort of terrorism is increased
when we go into an illegal war in Iraq, we refuse to condemn the aggression
of Israel against Palestinians, and Lebanese and we do not respect
democracy when it delivers something the west does not want. We
urge the Prime Minister to rebalance the foreign policy from an
aggressive to a reserved policy where human rights, tolerance, and
respect for sovereignty are paramount even when we disagree with the
end result. We further urge the Government to speak out and take
action against the Israeli aggression that is carried out in the Middle
East and ensure that the daily oppression is stopped and also for the
world to respect the choice of the Palestinian people.
Mr Shazad Anwar, Chief
Executive comments:
On behalf of the Ramadhan
Foundation I wish Gordon Brown the very best wishes in his new role of
Prime Minster. I can reassure the British people that where we
agree with the Government we will support them and we strongly disagree
we will speak out, this is a unique role we have carried over the past
few years.
We hope that this detailed
study of the challenges facing the Prime Minister will be looked at and
seriously considered. The British people wish to see action not
further spin.
The Ramadhan Foundation
will continue to provide a platform for the views of young Muslims to
be expressed to Government, media, and the world. The challenges
are for the Government to respond to this positive approach.
END
Notes
for editors
The
Ramadhan Foundation is the UK's leading Muslim youth organisation that
is working for peaceful co-existence and dialogue for all
communities. Based in Greater Manchester and working to also
establish the platform for human unity amongst our
communities in the UK.
For
further information contact:
Mr.
Mohammed Shafiq
Press
Spokesman
Mohammed.shafiq@ramadhanfoundation.com
07814835912
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