Atu XVIII - UK Politics and Civil Liberties Blog

Integration

For once I find myself whole-heartedly in agreement with Tony Blair. In a speech last week he stressed that whilst we should continue to welcome multi-culturalism we should also expect integration. People, he said, should be expected "to be part of Britain, to be British and Asian, British and black, British and white". He also stressed that Britain is traditionally a tolerant society and one of the few things we won't tolerate is intolerance:

"Integration, in this context, is not about culture or lifestyle. It is about values. It is about integrating at the point of shared, common unifying British values. It isn't about what defines us as people, but as citizens, the rights and duties that go with being a member of our society.

"Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and other faiths have a perfect right to their own identity and religion, to practice their faith and to conform to their culture. This is what multicultural, multi-faith Britain is about. That is what is legitimately distinctive.

"But when it comes to our essential values - belief in democracy, the rule of law, tolerance, equal treatment for all, respect for this country and its shared heritage - then that is where we come together, it is what we hold in common; it is what gives us the right to call ourselves British. At that point no distinctive culture or religion supercedes our duty to be part of an integrated United Kingdom."

I agree. I wish he hadn't excluded atheists, and many people up here would disagree with the UK reference, but in principle I agree.

I think multi-culturalism is great. I also think that it needs to be multi-culturalism within a British context. Where there is an insurmountable conflict between cultures then British culture and values must win. For example no figure or ideology is above criticism and ridicule.

Of course, we can have a long debate about exactly what British values actually are.

To me core British values include freedom, privacy and the presumption of innocence.

All things that Blair's government has been vigorously attacking with control orders, ID Cards, mass fingerprinting & DNA recording, on the spot fines, limits to the right to trial by jury, abolishment of double jeopardy and more.

Maybe it's Tony Blair who needs lessons in British citizenship.

Blair UK politics ukpolitics

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Comments:

Dave Berry said:
The list in your penultimate paragraph seems a bit of a mixed bag to me. Some I definitely agree with, others less so. I expect other people might add in more ideas - e.g. speed cameras seem unpopular in some quarters.

To pick one item in particular, it seems that the government has got the new double jeopardy law about right. The aim of double jeopardy, it seems to me, is that the prosecutors shouldn't be allowed to keep hassling someone just because they didn't get the verdict they wanted. I.e. they can't just grab you after you've been found innocent and throw you back before the court with the same evidence.

On the other hand, if substantially new evidence comes to light that shows an earlier judgement was quite possibly in error, it seems only right and fair that the accused should have to answer the case. It matchs the appeals process in which new evidence can be used to challenge a wrongful conviction.

The new law only applies for serious crimes where substantial new evidence has been found. I believe it has only been used in a handful of cases. That seems a fair balance - it is still easier to have a wrongful conviction overturned than a mistaken judgement of innocence, which errs on the side of presumption of innocence.

# posted by

Dave Berry : 9:30 PM

bolshy_spice said:
Hmmm... who can argue with his core sentiments? He's saying nice, agreeable things.

However, I'm going to switch into Incendiary Irish mode now. :-)

Lately it amuses (rather than angers) me that when the likes of Tony Blair talks about British values and integration, they rarely look at things from the perspective of other countries with minority British populations.

For example, take the 1 million or so British pensioners living in Spain, many of whom never bother learning Spanish and make weekly trips to the Gibralter branch of Tesco to stock up on rubbish "traditional" British food rather than eating lovely paella.

And as for "freedom, privacy and the presumption of innocence", hmmm... Northern Ireland anyone? Prevention of Terrorism Act anyone?

Don't get me wrong, if I don't like it here I can always go home. Britain's a much better place to live in than many parts of the world (sadly for people in other parts of the world). However, I think a lot of British people need to develop a greater sense of self-awareness before making grandiose pronouncements about "British values".

# posted by

bolshy_spice : 10:21 PM

Trevor said:
Bolshy:

For example, take the 1 million or so British pensioners living in Spain, many of whom never bother learning Spanish and make weekly trips to the Gibralter branch of Tesco to stock up on rubbish "traditional" British food rather than eating lovely paella.

I totally agree. It's beyond me how anyone can go to live in a country without bothering to learn the local language and culture.

And as for "freedom, privacy and the presumption of innocence", hmmm... Northern Ireland anyone? Prevention of Terrorism Act anyone?

No argument there. When it comes to destroying our way of life, governments are far more dangerous than terrorists.

In the recent debate on restricting the right to trial by jury the government argued that judge-only trials had worked well before. One example they used to "support" this was, of all things, the Diplock courts.

*sigh*

# posted by

Trevor : 11:31 AM

tchernabyelo said:
Interesting to see the mention of Spain u above; I made exactly the same point on my blog. As far as I can tell, there aren't quite a million Brits over there (790,000, however, is still plenty much lots), but there's no doubt that a significant proportion of those people interface with the endemic culture on only the most superficial level.

I can understand how people might end up living in a country where they don't know/can't speak the language (I spent a week working in Saudi, as it happened, without knowing a single word of Arabic). But I can't understand why on earth anyone would not make significant efforts, if they expected to be in that country for any length of time, to learn the language.

But then, most of the people who have emigrated from the UK to Spain don't really want anything of Spain other than the climate. In all other respects they want to stay British, but maintain the illusion that Britain still runs the world and is composed entirely of sensible decent people who Know Their Place. That illusion is much easier to maintin when you aren't here.

# posted by

tchernabyelo : 3:46 PM