THE TELEGRAPH: My colleague Nile Gardiner is absolutely right to criticise the counter-evidence given to the Parliamentary committee investigating extremism by the National Association of Muslim Police (NAMP). How can NAMP claim that Islamist extremism is not the main security threat to this country? Gardiner says NAMP is “in denial”. I’d put it a lot more strongly than that.
On its website NAMP recommends that British Muslims reporting crimes should also “report any such actions to the Islamic Human Rights Commission”. Why on earth should a police organisation in the UK suggest that British Muslims report crimes to such a group? Why on earth would anyone go to them as an authority?
And NAMP has been here before. In November 2007, only a few months after the organisation was launched, NAMP gave evidence to a House of Commons committee. There it argued for a loosening of the vetting procedures for people from Pakistan who want to join the UK police. According to NAMP, unless security vetting procedures were made less strict then terrorism would rise:
The NAMP believes the current vetting system is putting obstacles in the way of recruiting and promotion of BME [Black and Minority Ethnic] officers. This may result in low morale and feelings of structural obstacles to promotion, which will have an adverse effect on retention. Furthermore, it is likely to impact on the operational ability of the police service and its capabilities within counter-terrorism operations.NAMP is clearly more interested in pressurising the Government than it is in helping it. In a way you can’t blame it for offering advice to ministers so eager to take it. But you do have to wonder about the long-term future of a country that works like this. Being so sectarian as to have different police associations for different “communities” is one thing. To take advice from them that jeopardises our security strikes me as suicidal.
NAMP should never have been created. But, as I hope this latest episode demonstrates, there is no reason to listen to it. Let’s hope no one does again. [Source: Telegraph Blogs: The Government should ignore the National Association of Muslim Police] Comment here | Thursday, January 21, 2010
