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Through 14 years of Conservative rule, the UK Government has increasingly severed lines of engagement with Muslim communities amidst a rising tide of anti-Muslim hatred that is fracturing social cohesion and national unity.
But the precedent for this process began under the Labour Party in 2009 when Gordon Brown abruptly banned the government from engaging with the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) – the umbrella body representing some 500 mosques and Muslim community organisations nationwide.
At the time, MCB’s deputy leader, Daud Abdalah, had signed a controversial document in Istanbul calling for violence against Israel and condoning attacks on British troops.
The Government lifted the ban the following year after the MCB denounced the Istanbul declaration, made clear that Abdalah had acted in a personal capacity, and confirmed its commitment to ensuring members remained true to council policies opposing antisemitism and attacks on British defence interests.
A decade later in March 2020, under Boris Johnson’s premiership, the MCB made a fatal political mistake: it published an extensive report documenting evidence of high-level institutionalised Islamophobia across the Conservative Party and government.
Almost instantly, the organisation became persona non grata. Government departments were banned from engaging with the MCB.
But it wasn’t just the MCB. After that point, the UK Government began to systematically degrade and sever ties with diverse Muslim organisations across the country – to the point that there is now only one that it considers legitimate enough to speak with: a little-known group called ‘Faith Matters‘.
Originally established in 2006 under Tony Blair, Faith Matters was founded by Fiyaz Mughal and Iman Atta.
In 2012, with the financial support of David Cameron’s Conservative-led coalition Government, Faith Matters established ‘Tell MAMA’ as a national anti-Muslim hate crime monitoring agency.
The organisation was launched by then Senior Minister for Faith, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi. It was modelled on the Community Security Trust, a British charity which monitors antisemitic incidents across the UK.
Unlike the Community Security Trust, Faith Matters is not a charity. Rather, it’s a Community Interest Company (CIC), which means it is subjected to much lighter regulation.
Since 2012, as one of the only Muslim-led organisations the UK Government actively engages with, Faith Matters has received £7 million in government funding specifically to support its work monitoring anti-Muslim hate incidents across the country through Tell MAMA. Despite this, on the ‘about’ section of its website, Tell MAMA, states that is “an independent, non-governmental organisation” and that its work “is not influenced or wholly shaped by government”.
Shortly before crashing out of power in the 2024 UK elections, the Conservative Party’s manifesto mentioned Tell MAMA specifically, noting that it is “proud to support and help fund” its “vital work”.
British Muslim women speak out
It remains to be seen whether Faith Matters will continue to be the singular Muslim organisation of choice that Keir Starmer’s Labour Government turns to in understanding and combating Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hatred. If that’s the case, it would likely be challenged by some of the most prominent British Muslim politicians in the country.
On 20 May, several senior British Muslim members of the House of Lords publicly challenged the Conservative Government about its unstinting support for Faith Matters and its Tell MAMA initiative and the seeming monopoly it appears to hold on government engagement with Muslim communities.