Showing posts with label changing nature of British society. Show all posts
Showing posts with label changing nature of British society. Show all posts
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Polish has become England’s second language, the latest figures from the 2011 census show.
An influx of workers from Eastern Europe has transformed the face of the UK over the past decade, with some areas such as Boston, Lincs, and Ealing in west London seeing the most dramatic changes.
A total of 546,000 people in England and Wales said that Polish was their “main” language, second only to English in England.
A total of 562,000 people said that they spoke Welsh, predominantly in Wales. Although four million people living in England and Wales – or eight per cent of the population – said English was not their first language, only 138,000 admitted having no English or Welsh at all. » | John Bingham, Social Affairs Editor | Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Friday, January 11, 2013
MAIL ONLINE: All three communities have a white British population of less than 50%, 2011 UK census shows, and Birmingham will be the same by 2020 / Slough has the lowest proportion of white Britons in the UK outside London - 35 per cent / Immigration from Eastern Europe since 2004 a major cause, say academics
Three towns and cities have joined London in having a minority white British population.
Researchers say more than 50 per cent of people living in Leicester, Luton and Slough are either foreign or from an ethnic minority.
Birmingham is expected to have a similar make-up by 2020.
The findings are based on the 2011 national census, in which residents were asked which ethnic group they were in.
The census also broke the white population down into those who see themselves as white British and those who consider they are ‘white other’ – a group that will include immigrants from Europe as well as Australasia and America.
London has already been shown to have a white British population of only 45 per cent.
Yesterday’s breakdown showed that those who call themselves white British amount to 45 per cent of the population of Leicester, 45 per cent of the population of Luton and only just over a third, 35 per cent, of the people of Slough. » | Steve Doughty | Thursday, January 10, 2013
Sunday, December 16, 2012
The future will be another country. They will do things differently there.
The Census is not just a description of the state of things on a day in 2011, it is a prophetic document telling us where we are going, whether we like it or not. I don’t.
For the past 60 years or so, we have lived in a nation that was more or less familiar to anyone who had grown up in the pre-war Britain of 1939.
Even the devastation of conflict had not transformed it out of recognition.
People behaved, thought, worked, laughed and enjoyed themselves much as they had done for decades.
They lived in the same sorts of families in the same kind of houses. Their children went to the same kinds of schools. And they had grown up in a land that was still identifiably the same as their grandparents had known.
And so it went back for centuries.
As recently as 1949, the prices of most goods were roughly the same, and expressed in the same money, as the prices of 1649.
A short-distance time-traveller between 1912 and 2012 might be perplexed and astonished, but he would not be lost.
That period is now coming to an end. I suspect that anyone in Britain, travelling between 2012 and 2112 would be unable to believe that he was in the same place.
What is the most significant single fact in the Census? I do not think there is one. Several are shocking or disturbing, if you are not fond of change, and delightful if you are. Read on and comment » | Peter Hitchens | Saturday, December 15, 2012
Monday, July 27, 2009
DAILY EXPRESS: SNOOPING residents are being offered rewards of up to £500 to spy on their neighbours.
Taxpayers’ money is being used to pay “covert human intelligence sources” who report bad conduct to authorities.
Anyone who photographs dog fouling, litter being dropped, graffiti crime or fly tipping which result in prosecution will receive a cash reward.
The amount is staggered, according to how far the prosecution is taken.
If a court summons is issued the snooper gets £100. On a conviction he gets £150 and if the offender gets a maximum sentence he receives £500.
The scheme has been given the Big Brother-style motto “See them, report them”.
It tells residents: “We need your eyes and ears to help us wipe out enviro-crime.” The local council scheme is being launched in London and could eventually be rolled out across the country.
Last night the payments were slammed by critics who said they were a waste of vital public funds. >>> Chris Riches | Monday, July 27, 2009
Sunday, July 26, 2009
THE SUNDAY TIMES: As more and more non-Muslim Britons seek Islamic justice, Edna Fernandes asks how it will change our society
Dressed in immaculate white kurta pyjamas and with fingers interlaced, Sheikh Faiz Siddiqui leant back in his white leather chair as he listened.
Before him were two warring businessmen: a Muslim of Asian origins and his white non-Muslim partner, who had come to seek judgment on a dispute. This proved to be a run-of-the-mill squabble over whether the non-Muslim had been cheated out of the profits of their jointly owned car-fleet company by the Muslim.
What made the case out of the ordinary is that it was the the non-Muslim who had chosen to take his grievance to a religious tribunal run by imams according to the laws of sharia — an ancient Islamic code of conduct that dates back to the time of the prophet Muhammad in the 7th century.
As the story of the business unfolded, the sheikh — one of two judges presiding that day — began to suspect the Muslim businessman was not being entirely honest in his evidence. So what happened next, I asked, when I met Siddiqui at his opulent offices in Warwickshire.
“I reminded him of his vows to God,” he said. “I told him, ‘You can lie and you can cheat this other man. But realise this: one day, you will face the Day of Judgment and on that day you will face Allah himself and be punished’.”
The sheikh’s words apparently had a profound effect. The Muslim businessman promptly changed his story, admitting he had cheated, and his non-Muslim partner was awarded £48,000 in compensation by the two Muslim judges.
“Sharia,” the 41-year-old sheikh explained to me, “is the law of Allah. So, yes, I invoke God in a legal setting. It creates a moral compulsion to tell the truth.”
This case was just one of several hundred that have been ruled on by the Muslim Arbitration Tribunal (Mat) since it was set up two years ago to operate as a civil sharia court. Since its formation, 5% of the cases have involved a non-Muslim.
Siddiqui is a Pakistani-born barrister and the founder and chairman of Mat’s governing council. He organises the funding of the service and costs are recouped through charges to those who use it — ranging from £150 to £2,500, depending on the nature of the case and its duration. Each hearing has two judges: one a mufti who is a learned imam with training in Islamic law; the other a Muslim lawyer or judge trained in UK law. None of the 67 judges is paid a fee. And, according to the sheikh, none of the money needed to run the tribunals comes from abroad.
His judges are not the only ones dispensing justice in British sharia courts: a recent report by Civitas, the think tank, estimated that there are about 85 sharia tribunals — including many that deal with divorce — operating in the UK. Some of these are less formal affairs in which individual imams make rulings in their mosques.
All of them are increasingly busy as more and more people bypass the traditional courts to seek religious rulings that are just as binding under British law. >>> Edna Fernandes* | Sunday, July 26, 2009
*Edna Fernandes is the author of Holy Warriors, published by Portobello Books. www.ednafernandes.com
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