Authorities must down-size West Ham mega-mosque to neighbourhood mosque

Campaigner Cllr Alan Craig speaks at London Muslim 'Big Debate on Islamification' together with panel representatives from Political Islam, BNP and the British Humanist Association

At the Muslim-organised 'Big Debate on the Islamification of Britain' in central London later today (Thursday), Councillor Alan Craig, leader of the Christian Peoples Alliance group on Newham Council, will call on planning authorities to insist that the proposal by Islamic sect Tablighi Jamaat for the construction of a mega-mosque at West Ham close to the site of the 2010 London Olympics, should be radically down-sized.

"We live in a democracy and Muslims are fully entitled to mosques," Cllr Craig will tell the expected capacity audience at this eagerly-awaited event attended by TV and other media, "but this secretive separatist Islamic group must not be allowed to construct a huge national landmark mosque that will further promote their divisive and intolerant form of Islam."

Alan Craig will tell his fellow-panelists which include representatives from radical political Islam, from the far-right BNP and from the secular British Humanist Association amongst others, that Tablighi Jamaat - just like the BNP - divides communities, builds barriers and spawns hostility and intolerance.

Earlier this year Newham Council gave Tablighi Jamaat a January 2010 deadline to submit their masterplan for the mosque project. "In our democracy we allow the BNP to promote to their odious ideology and we therefore equally we must permit Tablighi Jamaat to promote theirs," Cllr Craig will say. "But in the masterplan their mega-mosque must be scaled down to the size of a neighbourhood mosque to reduce its anti-social impact. Alternatively the authorities should compulsorily purchase the 18 acre site and apply it for wider housing and community use."

In the Islamification debate tonight, Cllr Craig will warmly praise Muslims for putting religion back into public debate in the UK.

He will also argue for zero tolerance of Sharia (Islamic) domestic law in the UK as it is incompatible with European human rights and with equal rights for women; and for a debate to start about banning the anti-social, anti-integration niqab (face-veil) - an issue first raised three years ago by Jack Straw MP and more recently in France by President Nicholas Sarkozy.

(ENDS)

Editors Notes:
(i) Check against delivery.

(ii) Queries: Cllr Alan Craig 07939 547198

(iii) The panel debate tonight on the Islamification of Britain has been organised by the Muslim Debate Initiative and will be held at Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1R 2RL starting at 6.15pm.

(iv) Representatives from the British Humanist Association, the British National Party, the Christian Peoples Alliance, The Church of England, English Democrats and the Muslim Debate Initiative will sit on the panel.

(v) The debate is open to the public.