AT A time of rising community tensions, it’s important that MPs be protected against intimidation and threats of violence, the Bishop of Norwich, the Rt Revd Graham Usher, has said.
Bishop Usher was speaking within the House of Lords on Thursday of last week in response to a government statement on the safety of elected representatives.
The government statement, made within the House of Commons by the Minister for Security, Tom Tugendhat, spoke of “rising community tensions” in recent weeks.
“Instead of debate and accountability, we’ve seen intimidation and threats. Members of this House have told me that they feel they must vote a certain way, not since it is the fitting thing for his or her communities, and even that almost all of their communities want it, but because a number of — a violent few — have made them fear for his or her safety, and the security of their families.”
The murders of the MPs Jo Cox (News, 24 June 2016) and Sir David Amess (News, 22 October 2021) had affected all MPs, the statement said. “We know that there are extremists on the market, and the reality is obvious: the danger is real.”
Since the 7 October attacks on Israel, pressures facing MPs had “spiked”, the statement said, “together with a dramatic rise in anti-Semitism”. British Muslims also faced threats from far-Right extremists, it said.
The Government was committing an extra £31 million “to guard the democratic processes and our elected representatives”.
Responding to the statement, Bishop Usher told peers that this protection for MPs was “vital, because this can be a time frame of immense concern”. The impact on women, and ladies of UKME heritage, was “deeply troubling”, he said, “as is the abuse suffered by Muslim and Jewish colleagues”.
Bishop Usher also said that parliamentarians needed to make use of language with care, “to watch out that we don’t incite further trouble. We must learn that art, which is seemingly fast being lost from our society, of disagreeing agreeably. So I ask how, within the work of presidency, that sense of mirroring and modelling disagreeing agreeably is likely to be lived out all of the more. Given the ignorance around many other faith communities, how might priority be given to non secular literacy across education and inside our public institutions?”
Responding for the Government, Lord Sharpe said: “We have been in search of the views and perspectives of experts on this field, which, I hope, would come with the Rt Revd prelate, to explore how religious hatred is experienced across all British communities. But it seems self-evident that considered one of the ways to combat this form of ill-advised and poorly informed hatred is to coach and improve general understanding of the problems under discussion.”
Speaking outside Downing Street last Friday, the Prime Minister spoke of “a shocking increase in extremist disruption and criminality. . .
“What began as protests on our streets, has descended into intimidation, threats, and planned acts of violence. . . MPs don’t feel protected of their homes. Longstanding parliamentary conventions have been upended due to safety concerns.”
In an interview with The Spectator this week, the Archbishop of Canterbury said that “more may be done legally” to guard MPs from abuse and harassment, comparable to “rigorous prosecution of threats, rigorous prosecution of abusive use of social media. Members of each Houses of Parliament being very careful about language and never accepting hate speech.”
He said that he had “heard [hate speech] in the previous few weeks . . . each between members and towards the Church, by members of parliament, saying the Church is colluding with evil. And we definitely — particularly bishops who’re women — have had an infinite increase over the past 12 months or two in abusive language.” He carried an alarm due to threats against him, the magazine reported.
