The National Youth Agency – a Government quango whose slogan is ‘getting it right for young people’ – has established a Young Muslims Advisory Group.
I’ve just received a press release from the Communities and Local Government department, entitled “The next generation of Muslim community leaders”
Communities Secretary Hazel Blears and Children and Families Secretary Ed Balls will today launch a new Young Muslim Advisory Group and unveil the names of the twenty two young people who will act as advisors.
The group, who will have their first official meeting in the coming weeks, will work directly with Government to help deepen its engagement with young Muslims. The advisors will talk to ministers and policy makers first hand about the issues affecting their day to day lives.
…
The Young Muslim Advisory Group (YMAG) will have direct access to senior cabinet ministers and will work with Government departments to find solutions to a range of challenges including tackling discrimination; increasing employment levels; preventing extremism and boosting civic participation.
That is an excellent idea. Some of the people on the YMAG are very impressive indeed.
But what is this woman doing amongst them:
Sabiha Iqbal, 17 from Heaton, Bradford.
Currently studying at Leeds University she is from Heaton in Bradford. A member of the Bradford Youth Service she set up her own not for profit organisation how to drum and perform poetry. She is a member of the Bradford Socialist Workers Party and of the organisation Love Music Hate Racism. She also volunteers part time at the Barnados Charity shop and writes on a freelance basis for a number of magazines.
Drumming and performing poetry is splendid stuff.
Being an activist with the Socialist Workers’ Party is not.
The Socialist Workers’ Party is a small, fringe political party. It participates in elections, from time to time, behind various front organisations. However, it is a Trotskyite organisation, which aspires to overthrown the elected government, and replace it with a dictatorship. Fortunately, it is tiny, and most of its members are extremely weedy.
Surely the Government could do better than appoint a member of an extremist party to advise it? Can you imagine what would happen if the Government appointed a member of the BNP to an advisory quango on “white people”? Given that the SWP has been active in promoting Islamist extremist groups – Jamaat e Islami, Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood and Hezbollah – as well as touring the militant anti-semite, Gilad Atzmon around, the parallel with the BNP is a strong one.
I can’t imagine that the SWP Central Committee can be that happy to have one of their cadre colluding with the regime that they hope one day to overthrow.
