New poll finds Muslims are more politically engaged

The Policy Exchange has published a new report where it once again has sought to de-legitimise the Muslim Council of Britain. The report utilises a poll commissioned from ICM, but we are struck by the lengths the report has taken to misrepresent what are otherwise promising results.
 
Poll findings
 
The Muslim Council of Britain consistently looks for  empirical data to help drive policy development and this ICM poll, despite the interpretation Policy Exchange has chosen to give the findings, provides fresh information about Muslims living in locations where the Muslim population accounts for at least 20% of the total population.
 
The poll finds that Muslims are more engaged in the political process (72% vs. 54%), significantly more likely to have raised money for charity (23% vs. 4%) and volunteered at a local school or other care-based institution (10% vs. 4%). Muslims seem to care about the same issues as the rest of the population and favour a common national curriculum for young children that would enhance community cohesion, even more so than the rest of the UK population (69% vs. 58%).
 
On issues related to extremism, a smaller proportion (2%) of Muslims sympathise with those committing terrorist acts as a form of political protest compared to the UK population as a whole (4%), and more Muslims (90%) condemn these individuals compared to the UK population (84%).
 
In addition, the poll findings show great support for greater role in women in decision-making, providing young people with a greater voice and a stronger action by the government to tackle Islamophobia. The MCB’s own listening exercise on the importance of tackling violence to keep our nation safe and secure has also found that for the majority, ‘there is no single explanation for terrorism’.
 
However whether most regard ‘government funding for special programmes to help Muslim communities combat violent extremism’ and the Prevent programme with equanimity is a moot point, to say the least. The report’s choice of words on this topic are surprisingly subjective and emotive, for example: 
 
Attempts to portray government policies – such as those associated with the Prevent agenda – as anti-Muslim initiatives rejected by the whole community, wildly misrepresent the views of British Muslims (p. 9)
 
 There is also an underlying and childish attempt at point-scoring over the MCB:
 
Yet, as our survey suggests, there is majority Muslim support for a range of government interventions to help combat the allure of violent extremism. And this is not to mention the obvious point that, as already mentioned, the MCB itself can scarcely lay claim to significant levels of support among British Muslims.
 
This misses the point that while all sane people support efforts for a safe and secure environment, the criticisms of Prevent arise from the  legal duty placed on, for example health professionals to report people considered at risk of being drawn into terrorism, and the subjective ways in which ‘extremism’  can be interpreted in an educational setting.
 
We look forward to these findings being celebrated even if the Policy Exchange considers some of the positive findings “striking” and chooses to question whether “these latest figures conceal a ‘shy’ sympathy for acts of political violence”, perhaps shedding light on the bigotry overshadowing the organisation's starting premise.
 
There are some disturbing results in the poll that deserve further investigation. A large minority of Muslims seem to agree that conspiracy theories “often contain elements of truth”, in line with the broader UK population (40% vs. 37%). In addition, more British Muslims have conspiracy views about 9/11 in a proportion that is high and similar to results polling the US population on this issue. As the Muslim Council of Britain, we will be meeting to discuss how to understand this problem properly so that action can be taken to challenge these worrying views.
 
The bizarre interpretation of the Policy Exchange about the Muslim Council of Britain
 
The Policy Exchange’s conclusions about the Muslim Council of Britain are unsurprising, given also its decade long pursuit to de-legitimise the organisation. Almost every report the Policy Exchange has commissioned on Muslims has sought to say that the Muslim Council of Britain is either irrelevant or dangerous. We wish it would make up its mind.
 
To clarify, the Muslim Council of Britain is an affiliate-based body of mosques, charities and schools from a range of backgrounds and geographies. We do not have individual membership or act on behalf of specific individuals in engaging with government officials. As a result, it is not surprising that the poll results of such a question yielded such results. The last time a poll asked whether the MCB does a good job representing the views of Muslims, a majority said they did (BBC Comres poll, 2015). It is also very interesting to note that in this poll, over 70% believe that their mosque did represent their views.
 
Unfortunately, the Policy Exchange is even trying to diminish the real impact of Islamophobia, claiming that Muslim “culture” is “infused with an abstract sense of grievance, at least as much as it as a response to tangible, empirical realities.” Ignoring the appalling generalisation of Muslim communities, such a conclusion seems justifiable given the wealth of empirical data from police forces and third party agencies demonstrating the prevalence of Islamophobia.
 
The right wing think tank seems to have pursued an agenda to cast British Muslims as separate, dangerous and in need of saving. It has provided ample fodder to countless headlines demonising Muslims. This report’s interpretations and conclusions should be seen in that light. Let us not forget that in 2008, BBC Newsnight exposed the organisation for falsifying evidence in one of its reports where they tried to press the line that there was extremism in British mosques.