Luring Muslim Vote

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has stressed the significant contribution that the British Muslims have made in making the Labour Party a success.
Addressing the participants at a Labour dinner in Manchester on Thursday evening, Mr Straw said, it was a “great pleasure to be here amongst so many good friends”.

Mr Straw used the occasion to highlight the good things that the Labour Party has done for Muslims in the UK.

“No other party comes anywhere close in having Muslims at the heart of decision-making and influence in Britain today,” said the MP from Blackburn referring to the number of Labour Muslim MPs and the PPCs on “safe seats”.
The Labour Party has the country’s only two Muslim members of the Parliament in Mohammad Sarwar, MP for Glasgow Govan and Khalid Mahmood, MP for Birmingham Perry Bar.

For the next general elections, the Party has stood three parliamentary candidates from “safe” Labour seats, including Sadiq Khan from Tooting, Yasmin Qureshi from Brent East and Shahid Malik from Dewsbury.
The Muslim, Pakistani/Kashmiri communities are severely under-represented in the Parliament and the other mainstream political parties have failed to give a single “safe seat” to a Muslim/Pakistani candidate.

The Conservative Party has given a “key winnable seat” to Haroon Rashid in Bradford, but his status is under a big question mark since the party launched an inquiry against his selection around three weeks ago following a tabloid article accusing him of “irregularities” during his selection process.
Haroon Rashid vehemently denies the allegations and is currently suspended from the party.

Ali Miraj is another Tory candidate fighting heavy odds in his Watford constituency.

The Liberal Democrats have given Farid Ahmad a seat in Walthamstow which is currently being held by the Labour Party. Another Lib-Dem candidate Qassim Afzal also faces an uphill struggle against Labour MP Gerald Kaufman in Manchester.

Mr Straw said: “The bonds and ties we have forged over decades are strong - and we have much to celebrate at what we have achieved together.”
British Muslims, in particular the Pakistani/Kashmiri community have been traditionally pro-Labour, but following the US-led misadventure in Iraq and the continuing hostilities in the Israel-occupied Palestinian areas, they stand disillusioned with the Labour policies.

Their vote could affect the election results in around 40 constituencies across UK, including Mr Straw’s own in Blackburn, inhabited by a significant number of Pakistani/Kashmiri community.

“I am particularly proud of the work that this Labour Government has done to extend opportunities to Muslims in Britain,” said Mr Straw. “Britain is stronger for the major contribution made to it by those of an Islamic faith,” said the Labour leader while describing the UK as a “truly multi-faith, multiracial and multicultural society”.

Mr Straw criticised the “petty, constant” caricaturing by some quarters of Islam and stressed that the West needed a better understanding of “the great achievements of Muslim societies and people”. Describing Islam as a religion of peace, he said, Islam rejects violence against fellow human beings.
Mr Straw highlighted the “vast” increase under the Labour government in overseas aid going to the world’s poorest countries including Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The Labour Government, he said, had delivered “real and tangible benefits” for British Muslims, as well as other minority communities.

Establishing state-funded Islamic faith schools, reforming stamp duty to encourage Islamic mortgages, introducing anti-discrimination measures and race relations legislation were some of the good things the Labour Government had done, he said, before lambasting the Tory and Lib-Dem efforts to lure the Muslim and Pakistani/Kashmiri communities into their folds.
Describing the two parties as “fair-weather friends”, he pointed out that in spite of all their overtures, they had failed to give a safe seat to a member of Pakistani/Kashmiri community. That, he said, was enough to expose the claims of their sincerity to the Muslims in UK.