‘This is not protests… this is picking on a community that people think are defenceless’: Labour MP on violent disorder

We spoke to Suresh Grover, who is director of the anti-racist charity the Monitoring Group which was set up in the wake of deadly racist violence in the 1970s; Paulette Hamilton is the Labour MP for Birmingham Erdington; and Gulwali Passarlay came to the UK having fled Afghanistan and now campaigns for refugees’ rights.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Suresh, you’re a veteran of all of these race attacks, racist riots in the 1970s and 80s. How does this compare?

Suresh Grover: This is unprecedented. We seem to have leapfrogged from Europe, France and globally, a new kind of fascism, a new era of fascism, which is bent on the murderous intent to kill people, target refugees and Muslim communities in a systemic way, and what we had was individuals taking law into their own hands and beating us up and creating murder and mayhem, with political forces supporting them. It’s unprecedented because you have the EDL, led by Tommy Robinson, street fighters supported implicitly or explicitly by Reform UK in parliament. They are two sides of the same coin.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: We should say that they say they condemn the violence.

Suresh Grover: They say they condemn the violence, but look at the messaging. If you look at the messaging, they have been saying that every occurrence that takes place, where some South Asian person is held responsible or named responsible for some kind of attack, it’s as if this is done by people who are criminals.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: The thing that does have echoes again of what happened in the 20th century is tonight we saw, with Darshna Soni, there are young men from these targeted communities who are coming out to defend their homes and families. There is a danger here, isn’t there, of two groups clashing, of actual race riots?

Suresh Grover: There are two different groups. One is actually committing the violence against the community. The others are defending themselves. And we have to accept the right to self-defence. That’s the key lessons of the 1970s. It’s not enough to send symbolic messages or national messages about the police must do this, they must use the force of the law. What you have to do at the same time is to make sure those communities who are directly attacked, asylum seekers, Muslim communities, Black and minority ethnic communities, their representatives, their communities are also spoken to by the government and reassured that those attacks will stop.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Paulette, we’ve seen Keir Starmer, Yvette Cooper trying to give that reassurance. It’s clear that people do not feel safe tonight. So that reassurance hasn’t quite landed.

Paulette Hamilton: But there’s lots of work going on locally, like with MPs like myself going out to the local mosques, going to the local community, making sure that the messages are actually down, given on the ground to local people.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Do you think there’s enough police on the streets?

Paulette Hamilton: The prime minister has made it absolutely clear that the police will be there, they are there for when they’re needed. And the police have done a phenomenal job, under absolutely difficult circumstances, and they are there, they will be there, and they’ve being giving reassurances to both myself as an MP and to the local community…

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But it’s that visual presence, isn’t it? In the 2011 riots, we remember, there was a massive ramping up of police on the streets to make people feel safe, and we haven’t quite got to that yet. Here, there are businesses closed. Cafes have all shut up early saying they’re afraid. There aren’t any police out here.

Paulette Hamilton: At this moment in time, the police are there. They will be deployed if needed. Let’s get this right. This is violence and thuggery. This is not a legitimate campaign and a demonstration, and we have to clamp down on it. And the police and the government are working hard to make sure that every single person that’s involved with it, they will face the full force of the law.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Gulwali, as a refugee who works with other refugees, do you feel reassured tonight?

Gulwali Passarlay: To be honest, I’ve never been this afraid. I’ve lived in the UK for the last 17 years. I’ve been a citizen for the last five or so. As a refugee, as an asylum seeker, I saw the dehumanising language, the scapegoating. But now, I’m afraid for my kids. I told my wife, don’t go to the park. I had to travel from Bolton yesterday to take my girls to nursery because I was afraid for my wife to walk on the road. It’s scary, and I think there’s no legitimate concern when these attacks come out, the racists against Muslims and refugees. Sadly the media have been portraying it as though they were misinformed or there’s misinformation. Although if this guy who did this criminal act of killing these innocent children, which our sympathies should go to the family, even if he was a Muslim, even if he was a refugee, does not mean you have to go after the whole group and the whole ethnicity and the whole religion … So I feel like the media and some politicians have actually made it worse. I think they need to take some responsibility for their wording. I remember speaking to you before the election, asking about compassion and sadly things have turned out to be quite bad. Now, I think this was preventable and predictable because the way the media and politicians have been speaking about people like me, dehumanising me and thinking I am somehow the problem for the crimes and the social housing and so on and so forth.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Paulette, do you think this is as spontaneous as it appears to some, as if it’s just come out of nowhere?

Paulette Hamilton: It’s very organised. It was done through social media. And absolutely what I’ve seen on social media, social media can be a force for good. But what this has done, it’s created a whole level of threats and violence and intimidation that I’ve never seen before. I was involved in the 2011 riots when it was in the city centre, and I have never seen anything as bad as it is at the moment, and it’s organised.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Suresh, when you see those images of the police being attacked, taking a beating to protect minority communities. Times have changed, haven’t they?

Suresh Grover: Times have changed, times have changed.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But do you see this also as an intelligence failure?

Suresh Grover: Yes, I see that, because I think the Rotherham attack could have been prevented. I rang Rotherham Holiday Inn a couple of days ago with friends of mine warning them what would happen, and I think a sterile area should have been created around it, so no protest should have taken place. It’s lucky that we did not see any killing, fatality or injury at Rotherham yesterday or day before yesterday. I think the other thing is it’s no good Labour saying and condemning the worst excesses when they happen. They have a duty to explain or not use the language that refugees are talking about. Muslims have been demonised, refugees have been demonised. Immigration is seen as a hard rot that needs to be dealt with. We saw in parliament only five days ago a member of parliament for Tamworth actually naming Holiday Inn. Five days ago and that institution, hotel, was attacked.

Paulette Hamilton: But the prime minister has absolutely made clear, Sir Keir Starmer, and Yvette Cooper, that this will not be tolerated. This language, this treatment of minority communities will not be tolerated and they will clamp down really hard. And we have to allow the government to do their job.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And do you think they’re calling it what it is? Is it enough to call it thuggery or should they be calling it Islamophobic and racist?

Paulette Hamilton: Well, I’m calling it’s Islamophobic and racist and I’m absolutely sure that is what it is.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Just last word, what do you want tonight?

Gulwali Passarlay: I want peace. I came to the UK for safety and protection, and this is not okay. This is not…these young people, we need to help these people. I see the inequality, the injustice in the UK. But I’m all for peaceful protest, come out and raise your concern. But breaking down and burning things and targeting mosques, targeting businesses. This is not the way to go.

Paulette Hamilton: This is not protest. This is thuggery. This is violence of the worst kind. This is picking on a community that people think are defenceless and people that have come from abroad, that help us, that they think are defenceless and they are absolutely demonising them, and it’s not right.

Suresh Grover: You have to be consistent, not just short term. Labour has a duty to call out Islamophobia, call out racism, call out fascism. It doesn’t do that always.