As in previous years, the Conservative Muslim Forum was well represented at the Conservative Party Conference 2016 in Birmingham from 2-5 October.

Our presence was anchored on our stand in the Party Zone of the exhibition area. The stand makes it very easy for people to come and meet us, and we signed up a number of new CMF Members. We have now created a photo album on Facebook at this link with photographs of some of our many visitors.

Apart from the main auditorium, the Party Conference always features a large number of fringe meetings, both inside and outside the security zone. As well as hearing from the varied speakers, these meetings also give you the opportunity to ask questions, and often to talk informally with the speakers before and after the meetings.

Overall, the Party Conference is an outstanding networking opportunity. If you have never attended, we strongly recommend doing so. Next year, the Party Conference will be in Manchester in the same broad time period. The CMF expects to be there in force again.

On Sunday 18 September 2016, Gavin Barwell, MP for Croydon Central and also Minister of State in the Department for Communities and Local Government responsible for (Housing, Planning and London held a Conservatives meeting at his home to discuss the implications of the planned constituency boundary changes. The meeting also raised funds for the Conservative Association.

One of our Executive Committee members, Mike Mogul, attended and is captured below with Gavin Barwell and Gavin’s wife Karen.

In the Queen’s Birthday Honours List published on 11 June 2016, CMF Chairman Mohammed Amin was awarded an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) for services to Community Cohesion and Inter-faith Relations in Greater Manchester.

At their individual expense, the members of the CMF Executive hosted Mohammed Amin and his wife Tahara to a celebratory dinner on 14 September 2016 at Darbaar Restaurant in London. (Mohammed Amin also invited some personal guests at his own expense.) The principal organiser was CMF Secretary Faruk Miah.

CMF President Lord Sheikh spoke to congratulate Mohammed Amin. His speech, and Mohammed Amin’s response, are reproduced below.

Lord Sheikh’s speech

At the outset Lady Sheikh and I would like to congratulate Mohammed Amin on being awarded the honour of an MBE.

I met him about 10 years ago and I have always been impressed by his dedication and for being focused in whatever he undertakes.

He is listed and one of the most influential Muslims in United Kingdom

His parents were not wealthy and despite this his father undertook community work and was one of the persons who founded the Manchester Central Mosque in Victoria Park, Manchester.

In fact I understand that the last cheque his father wrote before he died was in aid of a charity which was set up in memory of a boy who was murdered in Manchester.

Mohammed Amin likes to be called Amin and I will now refer to him as Amin.

Amin undertakes a lot of community work and I believe this is in his DNA and a quality that he has inherited from his father.

I understand that he was about 18 months old when he was brought to England; when he arrived in the country he threw a tantrum and wanted to go back to his uncles and be with his pet goat.

I am very glad that he did not go back to his pet goat otherwise we would have missed his presence here!

Amin went to a grammar school and then went on to read Mathematics at Clare College, Cambridge. Cambridge is one of the best places to read Mathematics.

Cambridge in fact recognised his achievements, and in 2014 he was elected as the Clare College Alumnus of the year.

I was indeed pleased to host a dinner in his honour when he received this accolade.

After leaving Cambridge, Amin became a teacher but subsequently qualified as a Chartered Accountant.

After a while he was made a partner in Price Waterhouse (now PricewaterhouseCoopers). He was in fact the first Muslim in the UK to be appointed a partner by Price Waterhouse.

Amin specialised in Islamic finance and taxation, and I believe he is one of the foremost authority on Islamic finance in the UK.

I am very much interested in Islamic finance and I do appreciate his knowledge and expertise.

I therefore have something in common with Amin. There is something else I have in common with him and that is the game of chess.

I understand he is a very good chess player. I am not very good but hope we can have a game. In regard to this, even Lady Sheikh beats me, so I have stopped playing with her!

Amin is a very strong family man and he has a very dedicated wife in Tahara. In fact Tahara was involved in preparing the submission to the Honours Committee as a result of which Amin received the MBE.

I understand however Tahara kept this a secret until the last moment, I am not sure how she did this.

Lady Sheikh and I were in Geneva where I was attending a Conference and a text arrived just after midnight when the announcement was made for his honour.

Amin has a lovely family who have all done well and in fact one of his daughters cooked us a delicious meal when Amin and Tahara invited us to their flat in London.

As you know I founded the Conservative Muslim Forum and when I decided to give up the Chairmanship I felt that Amin would be the right man to follow me.

I found him very loyal and hardworking member of the inner circle of CMF.

I would like to thank him for carrying out ably the duties of the Chairman.

I understand he wears a Union Jack which proves his loyalty to this country.

Amin does a great deal of community work, promotes interfaith dialogue and building of stronger connections between all racial and religious groups. He deserves the MBE award and Lady Sheikh and I would like to present him with this piece of glassware to congratulate him on being granted this award.

Mohammed Amin’s response

Faruk Miah asked me to talk for 5-10 minutes about my life and especially what I do in interfaith work which led to the MBE award. Before I do, I want to give some thanks and I can never resist giving people advice!

The thanks

I want to thank the Conservative Muslim Forum Executive, and especially Faruk Miah, for organising this dinner and hosting me and Tahara. I also want to thank my own guests for coming. I will tell you about them in a moment.

The advice

Let me begin with the advice. I talk to young people a lot. When you are aged 65, most other people are young!

Tonight, I will limit myself to just one piece of advice.

The advice is that building, and keeping long term relationships is vital.

You can see that around the CMF Executive. We do have some new people. You always need new people or you stagnate. However, we also have a great deal of continuity. The people who joined four years ago now feel like veterans.

Lord Sheikh founded the CMF 11 years ago and I have benefited from his advice for the last decade. Nash Jaffer I have known since the early 2000’s since we were colleagues at PwC.

That advice leads on to my guests.

Imran Razzaq, is a chartered accountant and a technology expert. I have known him for 38 years, from the time he was aged 9. The reason is that his late father organised for me and Tahara to meet to see if we wanted to get married.

Idrees Qureshi is also a computing expert. I have known him for about 50 years as a friend from my teenage years along with his elder brother.

The longevity record goes to Nisar Mirza. Nisar has a PhD in electronics and designs flight control systems for airliners. The next time you fly in an Airbus, pray that he did a good job! I have known Nisar for about 55 years, since we both of us were aged about 10.

Obviously I have known all their wives since they got married. The other wife I have known since she got married is of course my own, Tahara.

I have a confession to make. I was a spoilt brat when I met Tahara. She is the one who straightened me out. My debt to her is limitless.

In the words of the song made famous by Bette Midler: “You are the wind beneath my wings.”

My life and my interfaith work

Now back to what Faruk Miah wanted me to talk about, my life and my interfaith work.

My life is very simple. I was born in Pakistan and came to the UK at the age of 1 ¾.

My parents were very poor, and illiterate. However, they understood the value of education. When you have no education, you know how important it is. My parents also doted on me.

I inherited great genes for intelligence and also was brought up by my parents with the right attitudes about learning. I passed the 11+ and went to a grammar school, and from there to Cambridge to read mathematics.

After one year as a teacher, I trained as an accountant and became a tax specialist. In 1990 I became the first Muslim partner in Price Waterhouse in the UK. I retired at the end of 2009.

My interfaith work has mostly been with the Jewish community. The reason why, is a religious one.

When you look at what the religions teach, Islam and Judaism are closer to each other than any pair of religions that I know.

Muslims and Jews in the UK have similar practical concerns: circumcision, halal and kosher food, non-invasive post-mortems, faith schools etc. I believe the two communities can be more effective if they lobby together rather than lobbying separately. That is why in 2005 I was one of the people who helped to set up the Muslim Jewish Forum of Greater Manchester.

The key principle is that we are about Greater Manchester, not about the Middle East.

The power of lobbying together was shown in 2015 by my petition to protect halal and kosher slaughter. Because the Muslim and Jewish communities got behind the petition, we got our 100,000 signatures in nine days. It took the British Veterinary Association nine months to get their 100,000 signatures.

However, while the original reason for getting involved was a practical one, something else has come out of it as well. I have made many new friends. It was one of the women members of the Muslim Jewish Forum Executive who secretly organised the MBE nomination.

While I started with the Jewish community, in recent years my interfaith activities have broadened, especially with the Mormon community, starting from a chance meeting. Lord Sheikh has also been heavily involved in getting closer to the Mormon community which has been a great help.

With that, I think I have exhausted the time allowance that Faruk Miah gave me.

My final piece of advice is very simple.

Always do what you believe is right and good for the country without worrying about yourself.

Presentation by CMF Executive

As mentioned above, Lord and Lady Sheikh presented Mohammed Amin with the pictured glass trophy. The Executive also presented him with a silver salver, which is pictured below.

One of the great stregths of the Conservative Party is the number of think tanks and sub-groups (such as the Conservative Muslim Forum) that are associated with it. This provides a continous flow of new ideas on many policy areas.

Bright Blue is an independent think tank and pressure group for liberal conservatism. It was first formed in 2010 by Ryan Shorthouse and a group of policymakers and campaigners who were passionate about applying liberal conservative ideas and insights to tackle the major economic and social problems of the modern day.

Bright Blue recentlly launched a Conservatism and Human Rights project with some very eminent commissioners. When they launched a call for written submissions, the CMF Executive decided to make a formal response. Our response was submitted on 14 July and is reproduced below, with two minor amendments:

1. To make the response easier to follow, we have reproduced the bullet points of questions to which we were responding.
2. The email address given for contacting Mohammed Amin has been amended.

Response to Conservatism and Human Rights Commission

This submission is from the Conservative Muslim Forum (www.conservativemuslimforum.com) which is a link group affiliated to the Conservative Party. The CMF’s full objectives can be summarised as encouraging British Muslims to play their full part in the political life of our country, and in particular to support the Conservative Party, join the Conservative Party and stand as Conservative Party candidates.

We have responded to the following section headings included in the open call for written submissions at http://humanrights.brightblue.org.uk/written-evidence/ To save space, we have not reproduced the individual bullet point questions, but have endeavoured to address all of the questions asked for each section.

Any questions about the submission should be sent to:

Mohammed Amin MBE

Chairman

The Conservative Muslim Forum

mail@conservativemuslimforum.com

Tackling discrimination – Religion

• What is the scale and nature of Islamophobia or anti-semitism in the UK, and what steps can be taken to reduce it?
• Is Britain becoming a less Christian country and, if so, is this problematic?
• What is the nature and scale of the threat from radicalisation is particular religious communities and how should we tackle this?
• How do we balance anti-discrimination laws with freedom of religious expression?

As a preliminary point, the word “Islamophobia” has a complex meaning as explained in the report “Islamophobia: A Challenge for Us All” published by The Runnymede Trust. Our response assumes that the Commission is using the word as a synonym for anti-Muslim hatred.

The reports published by monitoring bodies such as Tell MAMA, the Community Security Trust and the Metropolitan Police show a disquietingly high level of anti-Muslim and antisemitic hatred. Statistically most of the incidents collated take place online but there is also real-world abuse and occasionally physical assaults, sometimes serious and occasionally fatal.

The absolute numbers of incidents relating to Jews and relating to Muslims collected by the monitoring bodies are broadly comparable. As Britain has 10 times as many Muslims as Jews, this demonstrates that the Jewish community suffers far more hatred than the British Muslim community.

The single most important long-term step in reducing such hatred is to teach children in schools to understand that human civilisation has been a joint enterprise of many different racial and religious groups. Children should be taught to understand the history and beliefs of Jews and Muslims and their contribution to civilisation generally and to Britain in particular.

Evidence from the census shows that the percentage of the population that identifies as Christian is steadily declining. Furthermore, many of those who identify as Christian almost never take part in Christian religious services. The decline in Christian belief is paralleled by a growth in “aggressive secularism” which does not simply reject religion but which actively seeks to constrain religious practices such as Jewish and Muslim religious slaughter and circumcision. Indeed, the strongest intolerance against Jews and Muslims today comes not from Christians but from aggressive atheists.

While the numbers affected by radicalisation are small in absolute terms, it is a real and serious problem in the Muslim community. Small numbers of young Muslims, often unsure about their identity and where they belong in British society, are easily captivated by a millenarian ideology, just as in previous decades young people were captivated by ideologies such as Marxism Leninism or anarchist ideologies. Tackling radicalisation is very difficult. The primary responsibility rests with British Muslims who need to bring up their children to appreciate the values that make Britain the wonderful country that it is.

Government has its part to play by ensuring that it maintains a clear distinction between extremists who teach unacceptable views and the broader generality of British Muslims. In general, the precise words of government ministers achieve that but they need to pay much greater attention to the tone and colour of language that they use. While freedom of the press must be preserved, more could be done to encourage tabloid newspapers to be less irresponsible in their reporting of stories involving Muslims.

The anti-discrimination legislation in the Equality and Human Rights Act 2010 is broadly satisfactory. Providers of goods and services should not be allowed to discriminate on grounds of religion. Nor should employers except where discrimination is reasonable. For example, an off-licence whose member of staff decides that they are no longer willing to sell alcohol should be entitled to terminate that employment without compensation since the sale of alcohol is essential to the job being done properly.

Foreign policy – Freedom of religion or belief

• Where and how is religious freedom most under threat in the world?
• What more can the British Government do to improve religious freedom in particular countries?
• Are there examples of projects or interventions that have helped to reduce religious persecution in particular countries of the world?

Religious freedom is most under threat in numerical terms in the People’s Republic of China. That country seeks to suppress religion or co-opted in the service of the state. There are also countries such as Myanmar which actively discriminate against and persecute religious minorities such as Muslims.

In many Muslim majority countries there is a growth in intolerant and exclusivist interpretations of Sunni Islam which leads to discrimination against other Muslim minorities and against other religions. This is particularly marked in several Middle East countries but there are also worrying trends in previously tolerant countries such as Indonesia and Malaysia. Furthermore, it is far too easy for unscrupulous politicians to exploit religious beliefs or political purposes.

The Government should follow the example of the USA by appointing a senior diplomat to have responsibility for religious freedom worldwide. We should make it clear that UK foreign aid will not be given to countries whose governments restrict religious freedom and fail to protect religious minorities.

British Bill of Rights

• Should we keep the Human Rights Act, and why?
• How important is is that Britain remains a signatory of the European Convention on Human Rights, and why?
• Assuming that a British Bill of Rights will replace the Human Rights Act, what should this new bill contain?

The goal of the Human Rights Act was to make it possible for UK citizens to litigate in the UK courts for their rights under the European Convention of Human Rights without having to go to The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. To do so, it quite properly repeated the terms of the Convention in UK Statute Law.

To the extent that problems have arisen, they are due to the fact that the British constitution is unwritten and does not have a fully developed concept of the separation of powers. In particular Parliamentarians complain bitterly that “unelected judges can frustrate the will of Parliament.”

In our view a permanent solution requires the UK to adopt a written constitution specifying the powers and limitations of the executive, the legislature and the judiciary, something that almost all other countries have done. Meanwhile, the Human Rights Act should remain on the statute book as it is.

It is essential that the UK remains a signatory to the ECHR. Firstly, the U.K.’s withdrawal would send a terrible message to demagogic governments in Europe such as Russia and Belarus, and would be damaging to human rights across Europe. More importantly, the experience of the last 60 years has shown that Parliament cannot be relied upon to protect the human rights of UK citizens which is why on many occasions UK citizens have had to successfully litigate against the UK government at the European Court of Human Rights in order to protect their human rights.

The concept of a British Bill of Rights to replace the Human Rights Act is fundamentally misconceived. Those who promote this concept in reality are seeking to limit the power of the judiciary to protect citizens against the arbitrary exercise of power by the executive and the legislature. Furthermore, rights are not contingent upon citizens also living up to their responsibilities as citizens; they are the absolute possession of citizens by virtue of being human. Accordingly, in our view the UK should remain a signatory to the ECHR and no attempt should be made to replace the Human Rights Act. The right of UK citizens to take their cases to the European Court of Human Rights needs to be maintained, in particular because the Supreme Court has not yet developed the robust attitude to the wishes of the executive and the legislature demonstrated by the United States Supreme Court.

Many people forget that about 20% of Israel’s citizens are Muslims, a ratio four times higher than that of the UK.

Accordingly when the Israeli Embassy in London asked if the CMF would like to be guests at the Embassy’s first ever Eid reception, we readily agreed. It took place at the Israeli Embassy on Wednesday 13 July, with guests being invited by the Conservative Muslim Forum and by the Embassy directly.

The evening consisted of an informal reception with light kosher food hosted by His Excellency Ambassador Mark Regev.

Below is a small selection of pictures.

Below, from left to right:

1. CMF Executive member Mike Mogul
   
2. HE Ambassador Mark Regev
3. CMF Chairman Mohammed Amin

Below, from left to right:

1. Cllr Sarfaz Anjum, Mayor of Saffron Walden
2. CMF Secretary Faruk Miah MBE
3. CMF Executive member Cllr Halimah Khaled MBE
4. Cllr Aisha Anjum, Uttlesford District Council
5. CMF Executive member Raza Anjum
6. CMF Executive member Tahara Amin

Below is Zimar Sivardeen, President and Chairman of the British Sri Lankan Association with Rony Yedidia-Clein, Director of Public Diplomacy, Embassy of Israel.

Below is CMF Executive member Mike Mogul with Rabbi Herschel Gluck. The CMF’s Chairman Mohammed Amin is also Co-Chair of The Muslim Jewish Forum of Greater Manchester. A speech in Manchester in 2004 by Rabbi Gluck and his colleague Ismail Amaan directly led to the founding of that body.

Kulvinder (Vic) Sethi, Director, Daewoo International (Europe) Ltd with Shai Masot, Senior Political Officer, Embassy of Israel. Shai was the principal organiser of the evening on behalf of the Embassy.

Eid al-Fitr is the Muslim festival that marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadan. The Arabic name “Eid al-Fitr” means “Festival of breaking of the fast.” The Wikipedia article linked gives much more information about Eid al Fitr and how it is celebrated around the world.

On Tuesday 12 July, we held a very well attended reception to celebrate it, at 7 Millbank, Westminster, London, SW1P 3JA. This building is part of the Parliamentary Estate, and opposite Victoria Tower Gardens.

The Master of Ceremonies for the event was CMF Executive member Rabia Bhatti.

The evening commenced with Sheikh Bilal Khan reciting from the Quran, verses 2:185-186.

After a moving Arabic recitation, he provided an English translation. For the benefit of readers, below is the translation of those verses as given in “The Quran: a new translation” by Muhammad Abdel Haleem, King Fahd Professor of Islamic Studies at SOAS, University of London.

“It was in the month of Ramadan that the Quran was revealed as guidance for mankind, clear messages giving guidance and distinguishing between right and wrong.

So any one of you who is present that month should fast, and anyone who is ill or on a journey should make up for the lost days by fasting on other days later.

God wants ease for you, not hardship. He wants you to complete the prescribed period and to glorify Him for having guided you, so that you may be thankful.

[Prophet], if My servants ask you about Me, I am near. I respond to those who call Me, so let them respond to Me, and believe in Me, so that they may be guided.”

Dr Tania Mathias – MP for Twickenham was our Parliamentary host for the evening.

Dr Mathias emphasised how all are equal and welcome in modern Britain, regardless of religious or ethnic background.

Lord Sheikh – President of the Conservative Muslim Forum

Lord Sheikh spoke about the work of the CMF. The prepared text of Lord Sheikh’s speech is available lower down on this page below the group photograph. He also extemporised, and amongst other points congratulated CMF Chairman Mohammed Amin on the award of an MBE in the June Queen’s Birthday Honours List.

Marie van Der Zyl – Vice President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews and Chair of the Board’s Interfaith Committee.

Ms van Der Zyl talked about the common interests of British Muslims and Jews. She illustrated this with the example of the February 2015 petition to preserve the right to halal and kosher slaughter, which was strongly supported by both Muslim and Jewish organisations.

Sir Iqbal Sacranie – Founding Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain and currently a Trustee of Muslim Aid, Balham Mosque and a number of other national organisations.

Sir Iqbal emphasised the importance of political engagement, and reminded the audience that from having no Muslim MPs before the 1997 general election, the UK now had 13.

CMF Chairman Mohammed Amin gave the vote of thanks. After the formal proceedings, the guests enjoyed an Asian meal catered by Pride of Asia, with good provision for vegetarians. Below is a group photo of some of the participants, taken after the room had thinned out a bit.

The prepared text of Lord Sheikh’s speech

Bismillah ir-rahman ir-rahmin, ladies and gentlemen.

Good evening, assalaam alaykum, namaskar sat sri akaal, shalom aleikhem.

I in fact founded the Conservative Muslim Forum in 2005 and served as Chairman for 10 years. I am now the President but still like to take a role in its affairs.

CMF is a robust body, with membership open to everybody. Indeed, on our Executive Committee we have members from various religious groups including a Christian and a Buddhist.

One of the major objectives of CMF is to build and maintain strong relationships between various communities. In the United Kingdom, we are fortunate to have a very diverse society, where communities and religions of all shapes and colours are respected.

In this regard I would like to state that it is written in the Holy Qur’an that Allah sybhana wa ta’ala said that, “we have created you from male and female and made you peoples and tribes that you may know one another”. We must therefore maintain friendships with all communities.

Islam is a religion of peace; we must make every effort to explain to other communities the true message of Islam. Sometimes problems do arise because of a misunderstanding of Islamic principles and so we must explain the true principles in a gentle and polite manner.

We must be clear that Islam forbids murder and suicide and it is written in the Holy Qur’an that “whoever kills a person… it is as though he has killed all mankind”.

We totally condemn the recent bombings in Mecca, Baghdad and Bangladesh. Unfortunately, Islam is being hijacked by a tiny minority of people who wish to promote twisted interpretations of Islamic values and principles.

Sheikh Bilal just read verses stating that the Holy Qur’an was revealed during the month of Ramadan.

There are over 1.5 billion Muslims in the world, belonging to several different sects. All Muslims follow five basic Pillars of Islam, one of which is fasting during the month of Ramadan.

Muslims fast during daylight hours and in the UK it has been difficult to fast as the days are long and sometimes hot. Fasting is however good for the mind and the body, as it establishes a discipline in one’s life.

At the end of Ramadan, we celebrate Eid al-Adha, which is a joyous occasion. On the day of Eid, people visit Mosques, hug each other, exchange gifts, give money to children and meet friends and relatives.

Although Eid was last week, I would like to wish you all “Eid Mubarak”.

Ladies and gentlemen, the political situation in the UK has changed dramatically over the last few weeks. The British people have decided to leave the European Union and will shortly have a new Prime Minister.

I have a lot of respect for Theresa May and feel she will make an excellent Prime Minister; I look forward to her leading us out of the current turmoil and uncertainty.

We must respect that David Cameron has decided to resign and I consider him to be a man of honour. I would like to pay tribute to his premiership as I feel he has been a highly effective Prime Minister.

When the Conservative Party was elected in 2010, this country was experiencing economic hardship. Over the past six years, David Cameron has led a Government that has halved the deficit, created over two million new jobs and over one million apprenticeships. We are now more stable and more prosperous.

As a businessman, I am also now keen that our standing in the world is not affected by our decision to leave the EU.

We need to establish our trade links with Europe on the best possible terms and also go forward in undertaking more business with the rest of the world.

Sadly, we live in a time when almost any place can suffer terrorist carnage without warning.

Istanbul is one of the most historic cities in Europe, and is both a European and an Asian city. Many of us have been there to visit some of the world’s greatest heritage sites. Like London it has experienced much terrorism before, and last night was struck again, with the death toll at Istanbul’s airport standing at 41 at the time of writing. We suspect the death toll would have been much higher had the Turkish police not responded so promptly.

It appears from the Turkish Government and the BBC that the attack was organised by Daesh (ISIS). It demonstrates yet again their utter disregard for human life.

In Parliament today, Prime Minister David Cameron spoke for the entire nation in condemning this attack, stating that our thoughts and prayers were with the killed and injured and their families.

The Conservative Muslim Forum’s Executive also send our condolences, and stand together with our Government and the Turkish Government against the abomination that insults Islam and humanity with the effrontery of calling itself “Islamic State.”

The following statement was sent by the Conservative Muslim Forum to all CMF Members and Supporters.

I do not know of anyone who was not shocked and horrified by Jo Cox’s murder yesterday. Her death is a devastating loss to her family, and a reminder to all of us of how Members of Parliament put service to others at the front of their lives every day.

The Prime Minister spoke for every Briton, regardless of political affiliation, when he said the following, from the No 10 website, yesterday:

“This is absolutely tragic and dreadful news and my thoughts are with Jo’s husband Brendan, their 2 children and wider family. We’ve lost a great star. She had a big heart and people are going to be very, very sad at what has happened.

She was a very strong campaigning MP. She had a great track record of caring about refugees and had taken a big interest in how we can look after Syrian refugees and do the right thing in our world. She was a star for her constituents, a star in Parliament and a star right across the House.

It’s right that we are suspending campaigning activity in this referendum and everyone’s thoughts will be with Jo’s family and her constituents at this terrible time.”

Mohammed Amin

Chairman, Conservative Muslim Forum

I joined the Conservative Party in 2009 under the leadership of the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon David Cameron MP. His vision of the Conservative Party best represents my core values where hard work pays, aspirations are encouraged and where a strong economy provides a stronger, fairer foundation for us all and the next generation.

In March 2016 I was elected as the Chairman of my local conservative Party Association, East Ham (Newham). Having served the Association over the past three years as a Deputy Chairman, political agent and head of legal compliance, becoming Chairman was a natural progression and a recognition of my commitment to Newham.

As Chairman, my vision and commitment to Newham is for wider, fairer representation where irrespective of your background, race, religion or sexual orientation, we can all play an important part in making Newham a better place to live and work. I want to reach out to the all residents, our youth and to our great religious institutions to come together and build a safer, fairer and more prosperous community, by working together. I am extremely proud of Newham – it is full of hardworking, honest people who strive for a better future. That is why I believe Newham Can Be Better.

Orlando in Florida is a place many of us have visited with our families since it is the home of Disney World and many other theme parks. Sadly, it is now also associated with the worst mass shooting in recent American history with the death toll currently standing at 49 and with some critically injured and many others with serious, possibly life changing wounds.

The Executive of the Conservative Muslim Forum is shocked and horrified by this heinous crime. Our prayers go out to the families of the deceased and to the wounded. This is a time for unity such as London demonstrated after the 7 July 2005 bombings, and not a time for division and political point scoring.

The US authorities are still investigating the background of the killer, Omar Mateen, an American-born citizen of Afghan descent. However, he is reported as having called the authorities on 911 shortly before the shooting to declare his allegiance to ISIS. His former wife has reported that he was mentally unstable and regularly violent towards her. The FBI twice interviewed him regarding possible connections to terrorists but found no substantial connection. His father has reported that Omar Mateen was hostile to people who were gay, and the site of the shooting was apparently well known as a gay nightclub. Omar Mateen is reported to have been radicalised over the internet.

If these reports are accurate, this appears to be another example of how dangerous it can be when a young person with personality problems finds a purpose in their life by absorbing the murderous ideology of violent Islamist extremism propagated by organisations such as Al Qaeda and ISIS.

All Britons need to do what they can to counter the spread of such ideologies in the UK. At the same time, we should be grateful that our Parliament has always made it impossible for people to purchase assault rifles of the type used in this massacre, and after the Dunblane killings decisively restricted the availability of handguns.