Bill to curb sharia councils passes second reading

Published: January 27th, 2017

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Baroness Cox's Arbitration and Mediation Services (Equality) Bill passed its second reading in the House of Lords today. The bill aims to curb the activities of sharia councils, and had widespread support from 18 peers who spoke in support of it in the debate. Lord Kalms described the bill as a "small masterpiece". The government, however, argued that action was unnecessary. The bill will progress to the next stage. Tim Dieppe explains the need for this bill here.

Baroness Cox's Arbitration and Mediation Services (Equality) Bill passed its second reading in the House of Lords today. It will now progress to the committee stage, and will need to pass a third reading before it can progress to the House of Commons.

A network of sharia councils

There is a network of dozens of sharia councils operating in this country and applying sharia law to resolve disputes. This has created a de-facto parallel legal system in communities where women are pressured by their community into resolving disputes under sharia law, and where they are often unaware of their legal rights under UK law. Baroness Cox's Bill, which is supported by Christian Concern, seeks to curb the operation of these councils by amending the law to prevent them from operating according to sharia principles.

Prevent discrimination

The Bill would make it an offence to discriminate on grounds of sex in arbitration services, and explicitly clarifies that this would include "treating the evidence of a man as worth more than the evidence of a woman", for example. According to sharia law, a woman's testimony is worth half that of a man, and there is evidence that this is the way that these sharia councils operate. The Bill would make it clear that arbitration services are not allowed to operate in such a discriminatory manner.

The Bill also enables a court to disregard a negotiated agreement if considers that one party's consent was not genuine, thus helping to ensure that informed consent is obtained by women using these services. This means that a ruling from a sharia council can be disregarded if the court considers that the woman was pressured into using the sharia council.

Unregistered marriages

The Bill seeks to address the lack of protection for women in unregistered marriages by placing a duty on public bodies to ensure that women are not misled as to the legal status of their marriage. It is estimated that 100,000 couples are living in unregistered marriages in the UK, with many of them unaware of their lack of legal rights. The Casey Review highlighted this problem and proposed that:

"All marriages, regardless of faith, should be registered so that the union is legally valid under British laws."

As the Review said:

"We need to ensure that women in 21st century Britain are better informed about their rights and, in particular, practices relating to marriage and divorce. We must put a stop to cases where, in the name of religion, women and children are given short shrift, discriminated against and denied the rights that this country provides for everyone."

Baroness Cox's Bill seeks to meet this need.

Falsely claiming legal jurisdiction

Finally, the Bill creates a new offence of falsely claiming legal jurisdiction. This is aimed at preventing sharia councils from deciding cases that relate to criminal law, such as cases of domestic violence. The Casey Review cited claims that:

"…some Sharia councils have been supporting the values of extremists, condoning wife-beating, ignoring marital rape and allowing forced marriage… we were told that some women were unaware of their legal rights to leave violent husbands and were being pressurised to return to abusive partners or attend reconciliation sessions with their husbands despite legal injunctions in place to protect them from violence."

Baroness Cox's Bill would make it an offence for sharia councils to adjudicate matters which should be referred to the UK courts.

Strong support in the Lords

This is not the first time that the Bill has been debated in the House of Lords, but as Baroness Cox said:

"Since the Bill was last debated, evidence of these concerns has increased. So too has the need for urgent action."

"Muslim women are today suffering in this country in ways in which, as I always say, would make the suffragettes turn in their graves."

In all eighteen peers spoke in favour of the Bill, and none against. Lord Kalms made a particularly notable comment:

"The Bill is a small masterpiece. It isolates a deepening problem and focuses on an issue of greater importance than many people realise. Already many sharia courts have become illegal and unjust by any standards. They are controlled by fundamental Islamists and aim to stand not beneath but above the law of this land."

Government Declines to Act

Speaking for the government, Lord Keen of Elie, disappointed peers by arguing that the provisions of the Bill were largely unnecessary, and stating that the government wishes to wait for the review into sharia councils to conclude, as well as for its own formal response to the Casey Review which is due in the Spring. Six peers challenged the government on this response.

Baroness Cox concluded:

"The Minister's reply will disappoint countless people who are hoping for some effective government action to be taken as a matter of urgency to help alleviate the problems that have been widely documented and highlighted in this debate. It seems that Her Majesty's Government are living on a different planet of reality from the realities which have been put on the record in this debate. Those realities are widespread and the examples given are just the tip of an iceberg of great suffering. Instead, we have another delay during which countless women will continue to suffer, without any of the very modest remedial measures which the Bill could provide and which they emphasise would be of great help to them. They will be deeply disappointed."

The Bill will progress to committee stage.

Government under pressure

Pressure is increasing on the government to take action to curb the activities of sharia councils. The government's review into sharia courts has been heavily criticised before it even started for the makeup of the panel, and its terms of reference. Many women's rights campaigners and organisations have boycotted the inquiry. We hope that the continued progress of Baroness Cox's Bill will act as an additional pressure on the government to take decisive action to tackle this problem.

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