Sweden Moves To Curb Influence Of Religion In Schools

Sweden wants to curb the influence of religion in private religious schools in a move to prevent the spread of fundamentalism and creationism in science, government officials said on Monday.

The new rules being drafted by the centre-right government would ban religious elements being taught in subjects other than Religious Education lessons. Education Minister Jan Bjorklund told Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter: “Students must be protected from every form of fundamentalism. A student shouldn’t be able to pass a natural science test by answering that God created the world. We don’t think that’s OK. Teaching in school must have a scientific basis.” The schools would also be required to report financial donations to the authorities, he said.

His comments came after a legal dispute involving efforts by the Exclusive Brethren to start a school in southern Sweden.

The Exclusive Brethren Christian Fellowship, which dismisses the theory of evolution, was granted permission by a county administrative court to start the school after it promised to follow the Swedish school plan and to welcome all students. It wasn’t clear how a cult with the word “exclusive” in its name could be open to non-cult members. The decision to permit the school was widely criticised. The group is regarded as isolationist, imposing heavy restrictions on its membership, including those on children at school.

There are 67 elementary schools and six high schools with a religious character in Sweden, mostly Christian. They are outside the public school system, but are governed by Sweden’s law on education. The government claims the law is not clear on how much religious influence is allowed in the curriculum. The new rules, which need parliamentary approval, would be introduced in 2009, Bjorklund’s spokeswoman Anna Neuman said.

The Council of Europe this month voted to urge European schools to strongly oppose teaching creationism and intelligent design in science classes, saying attacks on the theory of evolution were rooted in religious extremism.

It would also propose to parliament that it enable authorities to swiftly issue fines or, in especially serious cases, close schools that failed to adhere to the new rules.

Church attacks local library for not allowing religious advertising

Wolverhampton Council is in trouble with a local church because it refused to put up a religious poster in one of its libraries. Such has been the ferocity of the attack, that the policy of not providing advertising space for religion is being reconsidered.

Bill Nicholls from Holy Trinity Church tried to put up a poster advertising a religious play that would be performed in the church in Tettenhall Library. He was told it could not be put up because of its “religious nature”.

Mr Nicholls, a Christian activist attached to the “Faith Regeneration Unit”, said: “People of all faiths expect the freedom to put up posters which are within the law. Libraries are community buildings and the church is a community. We sometimes forget that when we champion the rights of others. I was specifically told the poster could not be put up because it was of a religious nature.”

His protest was supported by local Hindus, Muslims and other “faith leaders”.

Council leisure chief, Cllr John Reynolds, said: “The advertising of events of a non-commercial nature is an important public information function of the library service. Space for community publicity in city libraries is very tight and there are many demands on it and, as a result, we have had guidelines on publicity in libraries which have been followed for more than 15 years without incident, as far as we can recall. The guidelines currently state that libraries should not display material of an overtly religious or political nature, but if there is any confusion, the matter should be referred to the city librarian for a decision. I regret any misunderstanding. There should be a distinction between information on events held at local churches and posters promoting, for example, a particular political party or religious group.”

Cllr Reynolds said the council was currently reviewing its guidelines on the matter to ensure they are fairly applied across all library premises and would consult with the Inter Faith group. He said the guidelines would be published on the council website as soon as possible so that people could be clear about the criteria for displaying information material.

Christian Sunday Trading Hours: A Rant

As the major inconvenience to the weekend, Sunday trading hours force me to squeeze a weeks worth of shopping into 1.5 days. My task of zig-zagging between various shops is not helped by the fact that everyone else is doing exactly the same or simply just getting in my way. From mums and kids having done all their shopping during the week, have nothing better to do than idle about taking up the rest of the walk way unused by the other oxygen thieves; the grey army.

We all know that these trading hours are a religiously based as they inconvenience most of us so that a one religious group can sure of their influence. It is yet another example of how we are far from the secular society most of us believe we live in. I often wonder if the reason weekend shopping is so manic is because of the time limit.

The DTI launched a review of the existing Sunday trading legislation in January 2006, and was considering extending permitted Sunday trading hours from six to nine. There are no laws restricting the trading hours of between Monday and Saturday so rather than an extension the government should just abolish the christian based trading restrictions and allow businesses to decide their own hours.

Smaller shops currently have no restrictions on Sunday opening hours, and have whined that any changes in the law could place them at a disadvantage, making it harder to compete against large supermarkets and chain stores.

Under the Sunday Trading Act 1994 a shop that is less than 280 square metres in size can open at will on Sunday. However, shops bigger than this can only open for six hours (consecutive) between 10am and 6pm given that:

1. They notify the local authority
2. Provide visual signs of their opening hours both internally and externally.

All businesses MUST close on two specific Sundays:

1. Easter Sunday
2. Christmas Day (falling on a Sunday)

The DTI (unable to do its own work) appointed (at tax payers expense) Indepen Consulting (an independent management and economic consultancy) to produce an economic cost-benefit analysis report on the impact of allowing large shops to open for longe. The headline conclusion of the cost benefit analysis is that the net economic benefit of full liberalisation is worth £20.3 billion over 20 years or £1.4 billion per annum. The report also states that the net benefit of allowing large shops to open on Easter Sunday would be £1.03 billion over 20 years.

The proposals were opposed by unions, religious groups (christian), and more than 220 MPs.

Sunday Shopping Review

In November 2005, Alan Johnson, then Secretary of State, asked DTI officials to review the pros and cons of relaxing the restrictions on Sunday shop opening hours. The Sunday Trading Act 1994, and hence the review, only applies to England and Wales.

From January to April 2006 we asked for views and evidence on this subject from consumers, religious groups, employees and businesses, not only on the economic case, but on all aspects of further relaxation of the current restrictions. A summary of the responses is available on the right.

During February 2006 we held a Small Business Service Focus group on the impact of relaxing the restrictions on Sunday shopping hours. A full report of this discussion can be found on the right.

In early 2006 the DTI appointed Indepen Consulting (an independent management and economic consultancy) to produce an economic cost-benefit analysis report on the impact of allowing large shops to open for longer. A full version of their report was published in May 2006 and can be found on the right.

As part of the consultation process, DTI organised a half-day conference in London on 10 May 2006 to discuss Indepen’s analysis. To the right are:

• Indepen’s main presentation on the cost benefit analysis
• Indepen’s presentation on international comparisons
• a full report of the conference, including a summary of the discussions in the various forums

On 6 July Secretary of State Alistair Darling announced that the government had listened to the results of the informal consultation and having looked at the evidence on all aspects of the issue, concluded that there should be no change to the Sunday trading laws.

The DTI have said that they considered all aspects of the impact of changes to Sunday trading; “It is clear that there is no substantial demand for change to the present regime. Most respondents believe the current situation strikes the right balance between all the interests involved. After considering all the evidence received, we have concluded that this is not the right time to make any changes to the Sunday trading laws.”

When does the government give up the chance for an extra  £3.55 billion? When it rocks the boat with religious voters.

Church Schools – the way backward

A critique of the Church of England’s “Dearing” report The Way ahead: Church of England schools in the new millennium (2001), first published in New Humanist, Autumn 2001

Marilyn Mason, Education Officer of the British Humanist Association, had to change her mind about Church schools on reading the recent Archbishops’ Council report. Church of England schools are generally seen as a “good thing”: academically successful, inoffensive on religious matters, and popular with parents. The arguments against Church and other religious schools have been well rehearsed elsewhere; here I will examine the vision for Church schools set out in the recent Archbishops’ Council’s report The Way ahead: Church of England schools in the new millennium, the report that proposed a hundred new Church schools and was so warmly welcomed by the Government. The report is not quite as forward-looking as it imagines, nor as innocuous as some of us might have assumed. Reading it changed my hitherto tolerant attitude to Church schools.

The aspect of Church schools that made them, in recent years at least, tolerable to non-believers and non-Christians like me was that in religious terms they were often barely distinguishable from other schools. Many Anglican schools did serve the whole community: their ethos and admissions policies were inclusive; Christianity was low-key and not always a requirement for teachers or pupils; they frequently taught the same multi-faith Religious Education as other local schools. I sent my children to one such school, I confess. I did not have to attend church, produce a clergyman’s reference or even pretend to be religious – the sensible and liberal-minded head teacher required only mutual tolerance. I had no problem with that: it was an easy regime to tolerate and an excellent school. But this “service” function, with its inclusive ethos, is threatened by the report’s demands that Church schools should concentrate more on their “nurture” function and “re-Christianise”. Church schools like the one that my children attended are criticised for being insufficiently distinctive. They must change, becoming places that “offer Christ” and “demonstrate that educational ‘effectiveness’ is concerned with the development of the whole person as a child of God.”

The first lines of the report reveal the true aims of the Church’s involvement in education: “Our work over the last eighteen months has confirmed the crucial importance of the Church schools to the whole mission of the Church to children and young people, and indeed to the long-term well-being of the Church of England”. This sounds remarkably like a last-ditch attempt to ensure the survival of the Church by persuading hoards of ambitious parents to take up church-going, if only for the few years preceding school selection, followed by hoards of young people who have absorbed “the truths of Christian faith” from Church schools. The evidence is that they may be realistic in their expectations of parents (there is very little to which the devoted parent will not stoop), but hopelessly optimistic about the effectiveness of promoting Christianity to unchurched and unreceptive children.

There are many other unexamined assumptions. “…If the children are not coming to us we must go to them. Church schools are the Church’s major opportunity to serve young people. It is an opportunity more and more parents are asking the Church to take.” Really? The Archbishops have listened to the voices they wish to hear: “The advice to us was that parents welcome the opportunity to send their children to a faith school where there is belief in God.” And, we are told: “In a world of shifting values, many parents have welcomed the stability offered by schools that offer an enduring alternative to the secular values of society.” Of course they praise the ethos of the Church school which parents “know has a well-grounded basis for its values and moral standards recognised even by those who are not practising Christians.” They also admit, rather patronisingly, “that there are many Community schools that have clear moral purposes and in which parents rightly have every confidence.” But they add, “We simply comment that the distinctive character of Church schools is attractive to many because it is inherent in their claim and practice to serve Christ.” Whenever the need for supporting evidence arises (often, though rarely satisfied) the writers tend to turn to Jesus – understandable, but hardly convincing.

Parts of the report would make one laugh out loud if the situation were not so serious and it had not been received with such respect elsewhere. For example, although it acknowledges the opposition of the British Humanist Association and the National Secular Society to the very concept of religious schools, it attempts to overwhelm our reasonable concerns about their divisiveness and exclusivity with theo-babble, concluding with the stirring statement: “Our own vision of inclusiveness is based on Christ’s commandment to love all people, and his own sharing fully in the life of humanity: in his birth, in his own ministry, and in his suffering, death and resurrection. Church schools are part of the body of Christ, and a visible recognition of the divine within human experience.” Well, that’s all right then.

The Church’s educational strategy is incoherent. It cannot claim to serve the whole community and not to proselytise, as it does, while at the same time endorsing a mission in schools to “Nourish those of the faith; Encourage those of other faiths; Challenge those who have no faith”. It cannot claim to serve the whole community and, at the same time, recommend reserving places for Christians. Even where admissions policies are open and inclusive (and this is certainly not universal at present), Church schools may, increasingly, offer the community a service it does not want. The Jehovah’s Witnesses who come knocking on our doors offering salvation doubtless think they are serving the community, but it’s a service many of us would happily do without.

Non-religious families may not particularly want their beliefs challenged in school or the “meaningful worship” that is “a fundamental characteristic of a Church school”. Non-Christians may not welcome opportunities for their children to “explore the truths of Christian faith”. Nor may parents particularly wish the Church “to reach out to them” through their children, as the Archbishops naively suggest it should. Parents may well want something better – more objective, fair and balanced – than the Religious Education recommended by the Archbishops: “religious education and collective worship should be seen as an integrated experience, with collective worship acting as an expression of what is taught in many RE lessons.” Alarmingly, not content with influencing Church schools, the Archbishops also suggest that “dioceses should seek to offer help to Community schools, on a cost recovery basis, in providing good Religious Education”. Will children be safe from Anglicanism nowhere? The Archbishops’ longing to go back to the days of packed churches has clouded their judgement about what is possible or desirable in a multi-cultural and largely secular society.

The Lord Dearing who chaired the Church Schools Review Group and, presumably, had considerable influence over this report, is the same Dearing who instigated the changes to the sixth form curriculum which, all too predictably, led to overload and chaos in Year 12 timetables and examinations this year. Critics at the time were fobbed off with delayed implementation and minor adjustments. One hopes that history will not repeat itself.

Our soldiers need better preparation for life after death, says army chief

Death is not the end and soldiers need to be spiritually better prepared for war, according to the head of the British Army.

General Sir Richard Dannatt, Chief of the General Staff, said that Christian leaders and chaplains in the Army needed to equip soldiers for the spiritual issues at stake.

“In my business, asking people to risk their lives is part of the job, but doing so without giving them the chance to understand that there is a life after death is something of a betrayal,” he said.

Sir Richard, who has been outspoken with his view that the presence of British troops in Iraq exacerbates the country’s security problems, made his latest controversial comments at an evangelical Christian conference in Swanwick, Derbyshire.

The General, an unabashed evangelical Anglican Christian himself, said that he saw it as incumbent on him in his role in the Army to include a spiritual dimension when preparing soldiers for war.

“I think there is very much an obligation on . . . a Christian leader to include a spiritual dimension into his people’s preparations for operations, and the general conduct of their lives,” he said. “Qualities and core values are fine as a universally acceptable moral baseline for leadership, but the unique life, death, resurrection and promises of Christ provide that spiritual opportunity that I believe takes the privilege of leadership to another level.” In his speech, reported in this week’s Church of England Newspaper, the Chief of the General Staff said that a true leader’s authority came down to the nature of their character and the degree of their integrity.

“Character defines the person – it answers the question as to whether this is someone to emulate and with what enthusiasm. Integrity establishes the moral baseline to lead.”

Sir Richard has well established views and has previously given warning about the “threat” of Islam in Britain. In a controversial interview last year with the Daily Mail, he said: “When I see the Islamist threat in this country I hope it doesn’t make undue progress because there is a moral and spiritual vacuum in this country.”

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said: “We can confirm that the Chief of the General Staff gave a wide-ranging speech on military leadership to the ‘Aiming 4 Excellence’ conference on October 2, attended by chief executive officers of a number of charities.”

General Dannatt has been outspoken about his Christian views and values and has emphasised his concerns over falling moral standards in Britain ever since taking over as head of the Army.

However, it is the first time that he has placed such importance on soldiers being prepared spiritually for battle.

He has given a warning in a previous speech of the need for the Army to prepare itself for a generation of conflict, and said that soldiers had to be ready physically and mentally for the struggle against extremism both at home and overseas.

Ontario kicks out Conservatives after promise of Faith Schools

The Canadian province of Ontario had an election this week, which resulted in a change of administration. The Liberals have taken over the reins of power after the Conservatives foolishly promised they would create a system of taxpayer-funded religious schools. The electorate reacted with extreme hostility to the idea, proposed by the aptly named Conservative leader John Tory.

Mr Tory tried during the election campaign to convince people that religious-based schools were a good idea. They didn’t agree and he not only lost the election for his party, but also his seat in the parliament.

This should give some hope to those British politicians who plead that it would the “electoral suicide” to oppose “faith schools”. On this reading, it would be the surest way to win an election. Indeed, according to this story, no Canadian politician would ever again take the risk of proposing that religion should have a stake in education. See here.

Come on, Gordon Brown. If you want to see your poll ranking rise – announce the abolition of “faith schools”.

Europe declares compulsory Religious Education an abuse of Human Rights

The European Court of Human Rights ruled on Tuesday that Turkey’s implementation of compulsory courses on religious culture and ethics in Turkish primary and secondary schools is in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights, urging the Turkish government to bring the Turkish educational system and domestic legislation into conformity with Article 2 of Protocol No. 1, which covers the right to education.

The applicants who filed the complaint with the European court in January 2004 are Hasan Zengin, 47, and his daughter Eylem Zengin, 19, who adhere to Alevism. When the complaint was lodged, Eylem was attending the seventh grade at a public school in İstanbul’s Avcılar district. As a pupil at a public school, she was obliged to attend classes in religious culture and ethics.

Under Article 24 of the Turkish Constitution and section 12 of Basic Law No. 1739 on national education, religious culture and ethics is a compulsory subject in Turkish primary and secondary schools. In February 2001 the applicant submitted a request to the Provincial Directorate of National Education for his daughter to be exempted from lessons in religious culture and ethics. When the authorities refused his request, Hasan Zengin applied to the administrative courts, arguing that the course in question was incompatible with the principle of secularism and that the lessons, which were based on the teaching of Sunni Islam, were not neutral.

On Dec. 28, 2001, the İstanbul Administrative Court rejected the application on the grounds that the course in religious culture and ethics was in accordance with the Constitution and with Turkish legislation. The applicant applied to the Supreme Administrative Court, which upheld the judgment on Aug. 5, 2003.

The applicants maintain that the way in which religious culture and ethics is taught in Turkey infringes Eylem’s right to freedom of religion and her parents’ right to ensure her education is in conformity with their religious convictions.

After declaring the complaint file admissible in June 2006, the Strasbourg-based court held unanimously yesterday that there had been a violation of Article 2 of Protocol No. 1 — the right to education — of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Under Article 41 of the Convention, which covers just satisfaction, the court held that the discovery of a violation provided in itself sufficient just satisfaction for the non-pecuniary damage sustained by the applicants. Under Article 46, covering binding force and execution of judgments, it considered that the above violation originated in a problem with the implementation of the religious instruction syllabus in Turkey and the absence of appropriate methods to ensure respect for parents’ convictions. Consequently it also held that bringing the Turkish education system and domestic legislation into conformity with Article 2 of Protocol No. 1 would also represent an appropriate form of compensation. Lastly, the applicants were awarded, jointly, 3,726.80 euros for costs and expenses, less the sum of 850 euros granted in legal aid.

Rıza Türmen, the Turkish member of the European Court of Human Rights whose term will expire in a few months, was among a chamber of seven judges which made Tuesday’s decision.

Although religious education is a compulsory subject in British schools, parents have the right to exclude their children from both RE and collective worship.

Abortion inquiry asks scientists to disclose links to faith groups

An influential inquiry into the future of Britain’s abortion laws will begin today amid controversy over an apparent attempt by faith-based organisations to skew the balance of evidence presented to the committee of MPs.

At least eight submissions of written evidence have come from medical professionals who have not disclosed their membership of Christian groups opposed to abortion on faith grounds. Six of the doctors are members or activists with the Christian Medical Fellowship, an organisation that has given its own evidence to the inquiry.

Suspicion that contributors had not been transparent about their affiliations has led the clerk of the committee to take the unusual step of writing to all those who gave evidence asking them to disclose their links to any relevant organisations.

The committee is examining recent scientific evidence on issues such as the long-term impact of abortion on the mother’s health and whether babies born younger than 24 weeks (the current limit for most abortions) can survive. The inquiry’s terms of reference specifically focus on scientific considerations and not ethical and moral arguments.

Some on the committee are worried that unless witnesses are transparent about their affiliation to anti-abortion groups the inquiry will not be able to properly assess their evidence.

Evan Harris MP, the Liberal Democrats’ science spokesperson, said: “This inquiry is specifically about the scientific evidence not moral or religious arguments and our witnesses need to be evidence-led not ideologically or theologically driven. The CMF risk undermining the inquiry by getting people called as expert scientific witnesses when they are not.”

Two witnesses who will give evidence today, Chris Richards, a paediatrician and honorary clinical lecturer at Newcastle University, and John Wyatt, a neonatal paediatrician at University College London, are members of CMF, but did not disclose that on their original submission.

“Everyone is entitled to an opinion but when non-experts are submitting their views about findings they really ought to declare where they are coming from so their expertise and standpoint is not misunderstood,” Dr Harris said.

Professor Wyatt, who sits on CMF’s public policy committee, said: “I’m basically giving this submission as a private individual not a representative of any organisation. It doesn’t seem to me helpful in a way to wish to diminish the impact of evidence according to the personal beliefs of the people who present them, unless one is going to do that across the board … what we are asking is for scientific evidence to be considered on its merits and avoid a sort of polarisation which so easily comes into this field.”

He added: “The idea that people can give information without people finding out where they are coming from – that there is some attempt to hide – is surely ludicrous in the age of Google.”

In an article in autumn 2005 on the CMF website he wrote that “CMF has played an important and increasing role in making submissions to government and other official bodies, commenting in the Christian and secular media and working behind the scenes through the BMA [British Medical Association], in the Royal Colleges and in parliament”.

His submission to the parliamentary science and technology committee’s inquiry focuses partly on evidence suggesting an abortion increases the risk that a woman’s subsequent pregnancies will be premature.

Conservative MP attacks the British Humanist Association

The British Humanist Association are left wondering ‘Are the Conservatives a Christian party?‘

The Rt Hon John Gummer MP made an unprovoked attack on British Humanist Association (BHA) staff and volunteers at the BHA stand at the Conservative Party conference earlier this month.

In front of several bystanders, including delegates and other exhibitors, Mr Gummer approached the stand making audible and derogatory comments to his companion about his hatred of humanists and the British Humanist Association. He then walked away backwards, shouting that it was a shame the BHA was there, that the BHA should not be there and that the Conservative Party is a traditional Christian party – is and always has been.

Mr Gummer is of course entitled to his personal opinions about Humanism and humanists, but his claim that the Conservatives are a Christian party is of much wider interest, and not only to the rapidly growing number of non-religious people in the UK.

The BHA has written to the Chair of the Conservative Party seeking clarification of its position and asking for an apology from Mr Gummer, and intends to publish the response it receives.

While the BHA is not aligned to any political party, it took stands at this year’s Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat Party conferences.

Eleven Conservative MPs and Peers are members of the All Party Parliamentary Humanist Group.

You can read the BHA’s letter to the Conservative Party Chairman here .

Schoolgirl attack because of her religion

ireland.com

A Belfast schoolgirl was punched repeatedly in the face simply because she was a Protestant, it was claimed today.

Police said the teenager was set upon by a gang of five and pulled to the ground by her hair during yesterday’s attack in the Old Park Road area of the city.

Detectives said they had not confirmed a motive but added it was “perceived” to be sectarian.

DUP councillor Diane Dodds said: “There is no doubt that this was a sectarian assault on a vulnerable child who was easily identifiable because of her school uniform.” She called for a review of transport arrangements to ensure pupil safety.

“It is intolerable that children are being attacked on their way home from school because of their community background,” she added.

“If the PSNI cannot guarantee the safety of these children then the education board must provide adequate transportation to make sure that they get home without harm.”

A police spokeswoman said: “The girl was punched a number of times to the face and pulled to the ground by her hair. “She sustained facial injuries but didn’t require hospital treatment.”

Pope asks South Korea to halt stem cell research

VATICAN CITY (AP) – Pope Benedict XVI appealed Thursday to South Koreans’ “inherent moral sensibility” to reject embryonic stem cell research and human cloning after the country decided to let embryonic stem cell research resume.

Benedict also praised South Korea’s efforts to halt North Korea’s nuclear ambitions in comments to Seoul’s new ambassador to the Vatican, Ji-Young Francesco Kim, who presented his credentials to the pontiff.

“It is my ardent hope that the ongoing participation of various countries involved in the negotiation process will lead to a cessation of programs designed to develop and produce weapons with frightening potential for unspeakable destruction,” Benedict said.

Separately, the pope noted South Korea’s “notable successes in scientific research and development.” But he said such research must be carried out with “firm ethical standards” that always respect the dignity of human life.

“The destruction of human embryos, whether to acquire stem cells or for any other purpose, contradicts the purported intent of researchers, legislators and public health officials to promote human welfare,” the pope said.

“I pray that the inherent moral sensibility of the Korean people, as evidenced by their rejection of human cloning and related procedures, will help attune the international community to the deep ethical and social implications of scientific research and its utilization,” the pontiff said.

Last month, South Korea decided to allow research on creating stem cells through human embryonic cloning to resume despite a scandal involving a prominent scientist in the field.

Such research had been suspended following the downfall of Hwang Woo-suk, a scientist once regarded as a national hero for internationally hailed work in cloning and stem cell research that was later shown to be falsified.

Stem cells are master cells that can grow into any bodily tissues, which scientists say could lead to revolutionary new cures for hard-to-treat diseases.

Benedict noted that the Vatican does not oppose – and in fact encourages – somatic stem cell research – also known as “therapeutic cloning,” which uses human eggs specifically for research from which stem cells are harvested.

The Vatican approves of such research because it doesn’t involve obtaining a fertilized egg or embryo to harvest the stem cells. The Vatican holds that life begins at conception.

Council of Europe rejects the teaching of creationism

Strasbourg, 04.10.2007

Parliamentarians from the 47-nation Council of Europe have urged its member governments to “firmly oppose” the teaching of creationism – which denies the evolution of species through natural selection – as a scientific discipline on an equal footing with the theory of evolution.

In a resolution passed by 48 votes to 25 during its plenary session in Strasbourg, the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) declared: “If we are not careful, creationism could become a threat to human rights.”

Presenting the report, Anne Brasseur (Luxembourg, ALDE), a former Education Minister, said: “It is not a matter of opposing belief and science, but it is necessary to prevent belief from opposing science.”

“The prime target of present-day creationists, most of whom are Christian or Muslim, is education,” the parliamentarians said in the resolution. “Creationists are bent on ensuring that their ideas are included in the school science syllabus. Creationism cannot, however, lay claim to being a scientific discipline.”

The parliamentarians said there was “a real risk of a serious confusion” being introduced into children’s minds between conviction or belief and science. “The theory of evolution has nothing to do with divine revelation but is built on facts.”

“Intelligent design, presented in a more subtle way, seeks to portray its approach as scientific, and therein lies the danger,” they added.

“Creationism … was for a long time an almost exclusively American phenomenon,” the parliamentarians pointed out. “Today creationist ideas are tending to find their way into Europe and their spread is affecting quite a few Council of Europe member states.”

The report cites examples from Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

Adopted resolution
Voting results
Full report
Rapporteur’s press conference (video)
Verbatim of the debate

Thank you europe.

Philip Pullman film stripped of anti-religious themes

By Lewis Hannam for the Telegraph

A Hollywood movie based on British author Philip Pullman’s popular children’s books is to be controversially stripped of key religious themes amid fears it will offend Catholic audiences.

	Censorship groups have condemned the move

The first instalment of the award-winning trilogy, His Dark Materials, will hit cinema screens later this year after the fantasy books captured the hearts of millions of children around the world.

But one of the series’ main themes – the rejection of organised religion and in particular the abuse of power within the Catholic Church – is to be watered down.

The move has been described as “white-washing” by anti-censorship groups.

The controversy centres around the trilogy’s sinister Magisterium, which readers understand to be a thinly veiled attack on the Catholic Church.

But when the film is released in December the Magisterium will be shown as a critique of all dogmatic organisations, thereby avoiding a religious backlash.

Director Chris Weitz confirmed the film’s portrayal of the mythical body will not echo that of Pullman’s books.

He said: “In the books the Magisterium is a version of the Catholic Church gone wildly astray from its roots.

“If that’s what you want in the film, you’ll be disappointed.”

The film, which stars Nicole Kidman and British actor Daniel Craig, is called The Golden Compass after the US title of Pullman’s novel Northern Lights, the first book in the trilogy.

The second volume is called The Subtle Knife, while the final part of the trilogy is called The Amber Spyglass.

Pullman himself expects the film to remain ‘faithful’ to the books he wrote, but the National Secular Society – of which Pullman is an honorary associate – has reacted against the changes.

Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the society, said: “There is an issue here over the white-washing of religious problems from cinema and literature, especially in America.

“It is wrong that children watching these films should not get the opportunity to see the more balanced picture of religion. “

“The Catholic Church in particular has had problems in the past that it has tried to cover up – such as child abuse – but these things are much better discussed out in the open. This is part of a long-term problem over freedom of speech.”

The Golden Compass tells the tale of Lyra, a young girl brought up in the cloistered world of Oxford heading off to save her best friend Roger, who has been kidnapped.

Nicole Kidman, who plays the role of Mrs Coulter in the film, said she would not have been comfortable starring in an overtly anti-Catholic production. She told film journalists in the summer: “I would not be able to do this film if I thought it were at all anti-Catholic.”

The Catholic League in the US has made its feelings known over the content of Pullman’s books, while also urging parents to ban their children from watching the forthcoming film. While it acknowledges religious themes have been watered down for cinema, it is still launching a boycott as it says the movie lures kids and their “unsuspecting parents” into reading the books.

It also says The Golden Compass is “the least offensive of the three books” and warns that The Subtle Knife is “more overt in its hatred of Catholicism” and The Amber Spyglass “even more blatant”.

Among the awards Pullman has received for the literature is the 2001 Whitbread Book of the Year for The Amber Spyglass, and the Carnegie Medal for children’s fiction in 1995.

I am not afraid to say the West’s values are better

Douglas Murray for the Spectator

Before sidling off into history last month, the Commission for Racial Equality published a final report. Decades of multiculturalism, it revealed, had left Britain a fractured and unequal nation at risk of splitting up. The Commission’s chairman Trevor Phillips stated several years ago that multiculturalism had failed. His commission waited till its final hours to admit as much. It was impossible not to feel saddened by this confession.

Even as left-wing experiments go, multiculturalism was an especially costly failure. Principally it blighted the lives of immigrants who escaped their own countries only to be told not to integrate into ours. But its victims also included those who refused to remain silent before their era’s craze. For some, like the Bradford headteacher Ray Honeyford, speaking the truth ended their careers. Others — like the philosopher Roger Scruton — had to endure years of libel and innuendo. How different it could have been had the recent worthies all spoken out a little earlier, or kept silent a little less.

Just one of the lessons to be rescued from the multicultural wreck is how important it is to speak out even when all around you are shouting for quiet. Next week I am speaking at the Intelligence2 debate in London for the motion that ‘We should not be reluctant to assert the superiority of Western values’. It’s already been gathering the kind of interest which has a touch of the ‘How could you?’ about it.

Speaking alongside me is the great Islamic scholar, Ibn Warraq, one of the great heroes of our time. Personally endangered, yet unremittingly vocal, Ibn Warraq leads a trend. Like a growing number of people, he refuses to accept the pretence that all cultures are equal. Were Ibn Warraq to live in Pakistan or Saudi Arabia, he would not be able to write. Or if he did, he would not be allowed to live. Among his work is criticism of the sources of the Koran. In Islamic states this constitutes apostasy. It is people like him, who know how things could be, who understand why Western values are not just another way to live, but the only way to live — the only system in human history in which the individual is genuinely free (in the immortal words of Thomas Jefferson) to ‘pursue happiness’.

Recognition of the superiority of our values is made with people’s feet every day in the one-way human migration to the West. It is an admission which many make in private. But we seem to have become so comfortable with our rights that we no longer acknowledge their superiority, or the superiority of the values which gave them life.

Even a couple of generations ago, assertion of the superiority of Western values — the rule of law, parliamentary democracy, equalities, freedoms of expression and conscience — was uncontentious. But we have become morally lazy. If other people live under tyranny, then who are we to ‘impose’ democracy on them? If others live in benighted societies in which half their population can be treated as chattel, then why should we disturb them? Like the multicultural edifice before it, this genuine prejudice — the refusal to discern or assert moral difference — is finally collapsing. It must do, when reality comes a-knocking.

At a school in east London recently, a student perfectly calmly expressed his opinion to me — and in front of his principal — that girls who did not cover themselves in 7th-century desert-garb would be raped. It was salutary to speak with his headteacher afterwards as he boasted of the broad range of opinions at his school. Advocating the rape of fellow pupils strikes me as an unwelcome addition to the debate. But the principal’s desperate values-equality was an expression of a dying trend. In the face of one particular demographic which seems not at all afraid of being branded ‘culturally imperialist’, the West’s inability to assert the superiority of its values is beginning to look not so much coy as selfish.

It wasn’t always like this of course. In early 19th-century India, when Sir Charles James Napier was confronted with Hindu demands for a lifting of the ban on suttee, the general famously replied: ‘You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours.’

Today we assume that any assertion of superiority must lead to assertion by force. But it need not be so. Rights are spread as much by confident example as by force. And as the multicultural fallacy showed (and countless harder totalitarianisms have demonstrated), when no one speaks up then lies become truths and the truth gets lost.

This year in Britain we have seen the creation — with government assistance — of a parallel system of banking. Never mind that sharia banking is both a recently invented tradition and a dumbly hypocritical fudge. It has set a standard. If the people of Britain are no longer equal in the eyes of the banking trade, why should they continue to be equal in the eyes of the law? There are many cultures in which they are not, and it is no coincidence that equality before the law arose out of Judaeo-Christian ethics. By contrast, sharia law recognises no such equality. Our unwillingness categorically to condemn sharia (in its formal or informal practice) at home or abroad seems to me to be an expression of defeat rather than an expression of sensitivity.

And the callow racial exclusivity of our values is already felt. Our values were never enjoyed by the dozens of immigrant women whose murders appear to have gone uninvestigated by the British police because the police thought such ‘honour’ crimes a ‘community issue’. They were never extended to the tens of thousands of UK women genitally mutilated yet still awaiting the prosecution of even one mutilator. The rights which we enjoy but hold only silently superior were not extended to Ghofrane Haddaoui, stoned to death in Marseilles in 2004. And if we can’t assert the superiority of our values at home, what hope is there that our values would ever extend to, for instance, Iran, where teenage boys are hanged for being gay, and women stoned for owning their own lives? If we in the West don’t speak up for pluralism, democracy and the rule of law, who will? And what chance do reformers have in other countries?

Decades of intense cultural relativism and designer tribalism have made us terrified of passing judgment. But it’s time we spoke up. All systems are not equal. Across the non-Western world there are millions of people who would believe in our values and who envy our rights. It is time we believed in them too. And said so.

Douglas Murray is the director of the Centre for Social Cohesion. Listen to the debate.

Make The Workplace Secular, Says NSS

The National Secular Society has called on the Government to permit employers to declare their workplaces to be secular after another incident of conflict over religion emerged.

This week, a Catholic man was suspended for three days from his job as a car park supervisor at Manchester Airport after he hung a “picture of Jesus” on the wall of the staff room, and incurred the wrath of a Muslim colleague. He claimed that the picture was deliberate “provocation”. Mr Langmead, of Atherton, Greater Manchester, was eventually reinstated without consequences, his employer saying he had done nothing wrong.

Now, instead of telling employees to leave their religion at home, the airport has engaged the chaplain and his team to work with employees to “foster a greater level of understanding about each other’s beliefs”. It does not say whether these lessons in tolerance will be part of the working day when, presumably people uninterested in religion will be left to hold the fort while the believers go off for their training in hate management.

This incident follows on from the incident of a Hindu woman who insisted on wearing a nose stud, against uniform policy, at Heathrow airport, and was consequently sacked – and then reinstated.

Another Heathrow worker, the Christian activist Nadia Eweida, was suspended for four months for wearing a Christian cross. She returned to work after the airline came under intense media pressure to change its uniform policy to accommodate her demands. She subsequently demanded that BA include Bible readings on its in-flight entertainment system.

Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society, said: “These incidents are only the tip of the iceberg. Conflicts between people who insist on making an issue of their religion in the workplace will escalate. In the USA, the number of legal actions about religious discrimination at work is second only to sex discrimination cases. That will also soon apply here. Instead of trying to accommodate every religious demand (as each concession is made, another demand is waiting in the wings – as last week’s incident with Sainsbury’s and the Muslims refusing to handle alcohol showed).”

Mr Sanderson continued: “The workplace should become a secular space where religion plays no part. The only way to stop these confrontations is to stop the religious proselytisers in their tracks and make it a term of employment that they will not bring religious issues to work.

“Instead of this, we are going down the road of trying to satisfy activists who will not be happy until religious practice is mandatory for everyone on the shop floor. We will soon have the situation that applies in America, where all employees are required to pray together at the beginning of the working day.”

Mr Sanderson said that the provision of prayer rooms, special washing facilities, and even toilets specially dedicated to one particular religious tradition must be making a significant impact on the economy of some employers.

The Extraordinary Case Of The Pagan And The Multicultural Prayer Room

National Secular Society

An extraordinary — one might almost say unbelievable — industrial tribunal case in Manchester in March gave a rare insight into how attempts to accommodate “multicultural” religious needs at work actually appear only to apply to Muslims. It developed around a spat between Muslim employees at the Royal Mail and a member of the Odinist Fellowship (a group that apparently worships the old Nordic gods).

The case — Royal Mail group PLC versus Donald Holden — was described in a document posted on the TUC website by Robin Jackson, the information officer of the Odinist Fellowship, who attended both days of the hearing. Mr Jackson reported:

“Many of you will be surprised, as I was, to learn that, increasingly, employers with a large proportion of Muslim staff are being obliged to set aside rooms in the workplace for Muslim prayers, and to allow their employees to take time away from their duties to engage in these prayers. At the Mail Centre where Donald worked, there was just such a room, which was designated as a ‘Multicultural Room’. That is important, because never, at any time, did the Royal Mail claim that the Room was solely for Muslim use, or that non-Muslims might not use it for their own purposes.”

Mr Holden tried to use the room for his own religious purposes – which is ostensibly what it was for – but it quickly became apparent that it was, in reality, a Muslim Club Room, full of Korans and prayer calendars. Mr Holden left sheets of paper about Odinism in the room, on a chair by the sink.

One item of evidence at the tribunal was a book which required users of the room to sign for a key on entering and leaving. Mr Holden’s visits were always of short duration, and mainly on a Saturday, when the place was mostly empty. Mr Jackson takes up the story:

“I was able to see for myself, that certain names and signatures, evidently belonging to Muslim employees, recurred time and time again in the signing-in book, sometimes three or four times in a single shift, and that the duration of their stays was half an hour or more. Some would call this ‘skiving’.”

Obviously Mr Holden’s use of the room was not welcomed by the Muslim employees and eventually an anonymous complaint was made to the management that a “muddy footprint had been left on the carpet of the Multicultural Room.” As Mr Jackson reports: “What could this mean? There could be only one possible interpretation: quite clearly, the culprit had intended to attack the Muslim religion. And not only was it, self-evidently, an anti-Muslim footprint, but on closer examination it became obvious that it must have been an anti-Islamic boot; and no doubt that anti-Islamic boot had been wielded by an Islamophobic foot. And who else could that Islamophobic foot belong to? The principle suspect had to be Donald, of course!”

Incredibly, the Royal Mail set up hidden cameras in the room to trap the culprit who was causing the ‘damage’. After five months of this surveillance – no doubt costing thousands of pounds – the management admitted that they had nothing on Mr Holden. In fact, during the tribunal hearing, no-one could be found who had actually seen the muddy footprint.

But the Royal Mail management did see Mr Holden in the room, leaving his literature on the chair by the sink and briefly appearing to pray. Then, on 23 February 2005, Mr Holden was hauled before the Royal Mail management to explain his actions. He was unsure at this point what he had done that needed explanation. None of the managers could agree what exactly his offence had been. Nevertheless, despite the vagueness of it all, he was suspended from work, accused of “religiously aggravated harassment directed against the Muslim faith”.

The investigating officer claimed it was because he was leaving his Odinist literature in the room, and suggested to Mr Holden that he was not a real believer and that there was no such religion as Odinism. He also confiscated Mr Holden’s religious literature and destroyed it. Imagine what would have happened if he had done that to Islamic literature!

However, Mr Holden’s suspension from the Royal Mail continued, and after a failed appeal, he eventually took action under the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003. The Royal Mail then dismissed him. He had worked for them for thirty-three years with a completely unblemished record. He lost his pension rights and his livelihood. And all because, the Royal Mail said, he walked on the carpet in the “Multicultural Room”, with his shoes on.

The Tribunal heard this tale with incredulity and decided that Mr Holden had been unfairly dismissed, and ordered the Royal Mail to pay a substantial compensation package likely to run into six figures.

Another outcome of this extraordinary case is that Odinism is now a legally recognised religion – and, by extension, so are all pagan religions.

Greggs Bakery gives Muslims their own loo, though none work there.

BAKERY giants Greggs have installed a Muslims-only toilet at their new Scottish headquarters – despite the fact that no Muslims work there.

By Paul Gilbride – Daily Express

Workers at the state-of-the-art factory were shocked when they were given a tour of the building and told a cubicle had been fitted for the use of Muslim employees. The staff said they are baffled at the decision because they are not aware of any Islamic workers at the base in Cambuslang, near Glasgow.

Last night, management at the bakery said they had received several requests from all over the country for the exclusive facility. All their new buildings will now be fitted with the specialised toilet regardless of the number of Muslims in the workforce.

But staff at the new £15million plant labelled the decision “political correctness gone mad”.

One said: “We were being given a guided tour of the new factory before moving there when they told us that they had a toilet for use only by Muslims.

“I couldn’t believe, everybody was stunned because we don’t know of any Muslims who are working here. I don’t think anybody is really angry about it, but there just doesn’t seem to be any need for it. This sort of things is just political correctness gone mad.”

Another worker said: “The toilet just looks like a ceramic hole in the ground. I don’t think it will be getting much use and I don’t see why we couldn’t all just use the same toilet anyway.

“This sort of thing creates divisions between the workers.”

The Islamic faith has particular rules regarding personal hygiene when going to the toilet, including squatting, washing feet, remaining silent and limited use of toilet paper. However, these rules are not compulsory to all Muslims and many believe they are outdated since, in modern times, toilets have become clean tiled areas.

Alan Greenshields, general manager for Greggs in Scotland, said the move was a pre-emptive measure in the company’s attempts to cater for all religions.

He said: “In many of our bakeries across the country, we have had requests for toilet facilities that cater for different religions. In order to future-proof our facilities we try to incorporate them where possible and have therefore introduced in our new bakery at Cambuslang.”

Greggs have spent £15million moving their production base to Cambuslang from nearby Rutherglen.

Last month, it was revealed that bosses at two Scottish NHS boards had banned staff from eating at their desks to avoid offending Muslims during Ramadan.

NHS Greater Glasgow and NHS Lothian also recommended that vending machines and lunch trolleys be removed from hospitals, offices and clinics during the 30-day fasting period.

Muslims tell Christians: ‘Make peace with us or the survival of the world is at stake’

Prominent Muslim scholars are warning that the “survival of the world” is at stake if Muslims and Christians do not make peace with each other.

In an unprecedented open letter signed by 138 leading Muslim scholars from every sect of Islam, the Muslims plead with Christian leaders “to come together with us on the common essentials of our two religions.”

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, and Pope Benedict are believed to have been sent copies of the document which calls for greater understanding between the two faiths.

The letter also spells out the similarities between passages of the Bible and the Koran.

The Muslim scholars state: “As Muslims, we say to Christians that we are not against them and that Islam is not against them – so long as they do not wage war against Muslims on account of their religion, oppress them and drive them out of their homes.”

The phrasing has similarities to the New Testament passage: “He that is not with me is against me” – a passage used by President George Bush when addressing a joint session of Congress nine days after 9/11.

The Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought, a non-governmental organisation based in Amman, Jordan, has organised the letter.

The Institute said: “This historic letter is intended by its 138 signatories as an open invitation to Christians to unite with Muslims over the most essential aspects of their respective faiths – the principles of love of one God and love of the neighbour.

“It is hoped that the recognition of this common ground will provide the followers of both faiths with a shared understanding that will serve to defuse tensions around the world.”

It continues: “Finding common ground between Muslims and Christians is not simply a matter for polite ecumenical dialogue between selected religious leaders.

“Together they (Muslims and Christians) make up more than 55 per cent of the population, making the relationship between these two religious communities the most important factor in contributing to meaningful peace around the world. If Muslims and Christians are not at peace, the world cannot be at peace.”

Among those launching the letter in the UK will be David Ford, Regius Professor of Divinity, and Fellow of Selwyn College, University of Cambridge and founding director of the Cambridge Inter-Faith Programme.

Aref Ali Nayed, a leading theologian and senior adviser to the Inter-Faith Programme, will also take part at the event in central London.

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Come on, isn’t this acknowledgement that religion causes conflict between peoples?

WILL POSH TURN TO SCIENTOLOGY?

David Beckham could be facing a few arguments with his wife over Scientology when they settle in Los Angeles this summer. He knows senior figures in the cult religion will be looking to sign Victoria and himself up as big cash donors and there could even be an appeal for aid from a celebrity supporter – the couple’s new best friend Tom Cruise.

While Becks shows a healthy scepticism about the cult, the former Posh Spice appears more likely to lend a sympathetic ear.

At Hollywood star Cruise’s Scientology wedding to Katie Holmes in Italy last November, Victoria spent some time getting to know David Miscavige, 46, Cruise’s best man and the head of the “church”.

And in what may have been music to the ears of Scientologists, Becks had warm words for Cruise, 44, when he announced his move from Real Madrid to LA Galaxy for an eye-popping £128million.

Becks, 31, even called Cruise to get some tips on life in LA and called the Mission Impossible star a “very wise man and a very good friend”.

Victoria said recently: “I’ve spoken to Tom about Scientology. I’m quite inquisitive but I don’t know anything about it. They do what they do and they’re cool.”

Cruise and Katie, 28, regularly entertain friends at the Scientology Celebrity Centre in Hollywood, which boasts a spa, gym and gourmet dining room as well as five-star bedrooms for members or guests.

A former Scientologist said: “Anyone who’s in it will do anything to bring other members into the church. At the very highest level, it’s a honeypot, because the facilities are luxurious and celebrities are treated like royalty.

“Unfortunately, that’s what appeals to many of them and before they know it, they’re being trained in Scientology classes every week.”

The Scientology issue has already caused some arguments between the Beckhams, according to their friends. One said: “David is not so keen on the whole celebrity jetset, certainly not as keen as Victoria.

“She is far more receptive to the idea of Scientology and has been reading up on it while David is dead set against it.

“He doesn’t mind being friends with Tom and Katie but he is not interested in Scientology. He is worried that once you become a part of it, it is difficult to extricate yourself.”

Victoria also faces a tough time if she starts throwing her money around in front of the WAGS (wives and girlfriends) of her husband’s LA Galaxy teammates.

The pop star turned fashion designer won’t even be the stand-out glamour queen there. Model and actress Bianca Kajlich, 29, has just married Galaxy captain and US World Cup star Landon Donovan and landed a plum role on a CBS TV series called Rules Of Engagement.

Swimsuit model Shannon Foster, 26, is the girlfriend of dreadlocked midfielder Cobi Jones and has just been cast in her first film. Another model, Leah Imperatore, has become the talk of the WAGS after flying to Philadelphia to marry Galaxy defender Chris Albright.

Even they seem like small-time players alongside the real queen of the LA sporting scene – Vanessa Bryant, wife of 28-year-old LA Lakers basketball star Kobe Bryant. Like Posh, she started in showbusiness as a backing dancer in pop videos.

For her 19th birthday, Bryant bought her a Lamborghini Murcielago, worth more than £410,000. When she told him she couldn’t use a gearstick, he spent another £61,000 converting it to an automatic.

Becks also showers his wife with gifts but last night a friend of one of the Galaxy players’ wives said: “There’s already resentment among the girls towards Victoria because of how much more David will be making than their husbands.

“If she thinks she’s going to walk in here like the Queen of England she’s going to find herself in for a very, very rude awakening.”

Top doctor calls for 16-week limit on social abortions

The time limit on “social” abortions should be cut from 24 weeks to 16, a senior doctor said yesterday.

Dr Vincent Argent, who works for the country’s biggest state-funded abortion service, said there should be an earlier cut-off point in cases where the woman’s health is not seriously at risk.

Currently, 98 per cent of terminations are carried out for socalled “social reasons” – danger to the woman’s overall physical or mental health, or to the health of her other children.

Giving his personal opinion on abortion provision, the former medical director of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service said that GPs are routinely flouting the law by signing abortion consent forms without even seeing or examining patients.

In some cases, doctors rubber-stamped the forms after the termination had been performed.

The intervention of Dr Argent, one of Britain’s most respected obstetricians, is bound to pile pressure on the Government to lower the upper limit for social abortions which are carried out under clauses C and D of the 1967 Abortion Act.

In a written submission to the Commons science and technology committee, Dr Argent stated: “Recent public opinion polls suggest that the public would like to see improved and easier access for early abortion but that the upper limit should be reduced, or that later abortions should be subject to greater counselling and stricter approval criteria.

“The debate on the upper limit is often polarised between pro-choice campaigners – who would keep the limit as it is – and the anti-abortion activists who would like a drastic reduction in the upper limit.

“A pragmatic middle-of-the-road view does not have a very strong voice. In practice, it would seem reasonable to reduce the 24-week upper limit for section C and D abortions [for 'social reasons'] to 16 weeks.”

Dr Argent did not propose imposing any time limit on abortions carried out under clauses A and B of the 1967 Act.

These cover terminations where there is a risk the mother will die or suffer a serious permanent injury.

But Dr Argent did say there were too many abortions under clause E – where the child would be born “seriously handicapped”.

He said terminations were being offered “for minor abnormalities which would not cause serious handicap … such as cleft palate and lip”.

Dr Argent also claimed many doctors “misinterpreted and abused” the requirement for two signatures before an abortion could go ahead.

He said doctors saw the consent form as “just an administrative process”.

But rather than toughening up the rules, he said only one signature should be required for abortions before 13 weeks.

He also called for nurses to be allowed to sign the forms, because “in practice, many nurses carry out the whole of early medical abortions”.

The Commons committee is examining whether the law should provide women with easier access to early abortions and whether there is any scientific case for the 24-week upper limit to be lowered.

Activists have pointed out that just 6,087 abortions were carried out between 16 and 24 weeks last year.

Julia Millington, of the ProLife Alliance, called for the two-signature law to be strictly enforced.

“Dr Argent submits that the fact that the law is being routinely flouted by doctors shows that this legal requirement should be abolished,” she said.

“Surely the appropriate response is to ensure that doctors comply with the law.”

A spokesman for Marie Stopes International, a major abortion provider, said lowering the limit “will not end demand for later abortion, but will merely increase the hardship and emotional suffering of women seeking them. Women never make the decision to terminate later in pregnancy lightly.”

One in three pregnancies in Europe ends in abortion, according to a report in The Lancet today.

But the number of terminations worldwide dropped from 46million to 42million between 1995 and 2003.

Anger over plan to dig up 350,000 bodies in historic London cemetery for Muslim burial site

It is a peaceful resting place for 350,000 souls – an historic graveyard which now serves as a nature reserve.

But plans are afoot to dig up the ancient graves at Tower Hamlets Cemetery – and reopen it as a 21st century burial site.

Officially it would be known as a “multi-faith” cemetery but it is likely that it would principally answer calls for a Muslim graveyard in the largely-Asian East London borough.

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Under threat: Historic Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park could be dug up to make way for a 21st century ‘multi faith’ burial site

The local newspaper has been bombarded with letters from historians and nature lovers declaring: “There is no way we’ll allow them to dig up our ancestors.”

But the Labour-controlled council’s environment spokesman Abdal Ullah appeared to be in no doubt about the feasibility of the plan when he said: “To preserve the respect and dignity for everyone, I think most of the graves would have to be cleared out and we’d start afresh.”

He said a corner of the cemetery would be reserved for Muslims who are buried in shrouds at a depth of 6ft and on their side facing Mecca.

By law, any graves more than 75 years old can be removed.

At the cemetery yesterday, liaison officer Ken Greenway – the only paid member of staff tending the 33-acre site – said he was astonished that anyone would even contemplate such a move.

“I’m against it and I have to stand up for that because of the huge value of this site today,” he added.

“It’s a beautiful haven for wildlife and people.”

The City of London and Tower Hamlets Cemetery was opened in 1841 by an Act of Parliament.

During the Second World War it was bombed five times and some headstones still bear the marks of shrapnel hits.

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Back to nature: Paul Barham of the ‘Friends of Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park’ observes the abundant wildlife through binoculars

Historic: The cemetery in Tower Hamlets is a treasure trove of family history

Other markers have gone altogether, torn down when the graveyard was deconsecrated as a Church of England cemetery by another Act of Parliament in 1966 when it was deemed to be full.

The intention was to create an open space for the public, which led to two bomb-damaged chapels being demolished and a swathe of graves cleared.

In 1986 ownership passed from the Greater London Council to Tower Hamlets and in 1990 the Friends of the Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park was set up.

Seven years ago the park became the borough’s first nature reserve and it is now tended by 1,600 volunteers.

It is home to 27 species of butterfly, a rare bumble bee, woodpeckers, sparrowhawks and the elusive firecrest.

Some 8,000 schoolchildren visit every year for outdoor nature lessons.

Professor David Bellamy, who is patron of the Friends of Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park, said: “Tower Hamlets Cemetery is still a place of peace and reflection as it has been since it was saved from becoming just another part of East London’s urban sprawl.

“Now in its new guise as a local nature reserve and green lung, people of every colour, creed and kind share their humanity with that of other living things.

“I can only pray that the wisdom of all faiths can together discover the right way ahead for this very special part of East London’s heritage.”

Last night the council was insisting there were no plans to re-open the park as a cemetery.

“It is a popular and historic nature park and if there were any proposalsto alter the look or the functionality, there would be a full consultation with interested parties,” said a spokesman.

However the council admitted it had been looking at “options” for burial sites.

And Lib Dem group leader Stephanie Eaton said she had received a letter from the council chief executive admitting the park was one of the options being considered

Minister blocks ‘£400,000 pay-off’ for chief of hospitals where superbug killed 90

The boss of the health trust where at least 90 patients died in a superbug outbreak could be in line for a £400,000 pay-off, it emerged yesterday.

News of the “golden goodbye” immediately prompted Health Secretary Alan Johnson to make an extraordinary intervention into the row over filthy NHS wards.

He ordered the health trust in Kent to withhold any payment to Rose Gibb, who was chief executive there during the deadliest hospital superbug outbreak in NHS history.

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‘Golden goodbye’: Rose Gibb, the NHS trust’s former chief

Miss Gibb resigned her £150,000-a-year post less than a week before the publication of a damning report into the ward conditions which allowed the infection to spread like wildfire through three hospitals managed by the trust.

In all, appalling hygiene standards across the hospitals contributed to the deaths of up to 270 patients and the infection of more than 1,100.

As police began an unprecedented investigation into possible manslaughter charges, campaigners demanded to know exactly how much money Miss Gibb will receive after leaving her post last Friday.

Last night Mr Johnson stepped into the row, saying: “I have instructed the trust to withhold any severance payment to the former chief executive of Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust, pending legal advice.”

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Infection outbreak: The Maidstone Hospital

Trust sources last night confirmed that Miss Gibb has been promised a pay-off of ‘more than £100,000′.

One source said she could be paid as much as £400,000.

A pay-off of that scale would be in line with common practice that a person agreeing to leave such a position would receive between two and three years’ pay.

A spokesman for the Department of Health said the Health Secretary had the legal right to require a trust to suspend payment to a former chief executive. Legal advice was being sought over whether any pay-off could be completely refused.

Officers from Kent Police are already reviewing whether mismanagement by chiefs at Kent and Sussex Hospital in Tunbridge Wells, Pembury Hospital and Maidstone Hospital amounted to a criminal act.

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Dirty conditions: Cups in a sink of a ‘clean’ utility room on Culpepper ward, Maidstone Hospital

Crammed : Beds sit so close they’re almost touching

As Miss Gibb refused to comment from her £700,000 home near Cobham in Kent, it also emerged she had failed to honour a pledge made in 2004 to clean up her wards.

Her hollow promise followed an undercover BBC investigation in 2004 which exposed poor cleaning and infection control even before the first major outbreak began.

After the TV programme was screened, Miss Gibb promised to sort out hygiene in “six to nine months” – but nothing was done to stop the biggest recorded outbreak of C Diff the NHS has seen.

Despite assurances from the current management that the problem is now under control, Kent Air Ambulance yesterday announced that it had suspended all flights to Maidstone Hospital for the foreseeable future.

It said it had a “duty to patients” to avoid the hospital.

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Patient: Jackie Mason with a picture of her father, Joe Nixon, who died after contracting chlostridium difficile at Maidstone

Last night the trust continued to refuse to say how much Miss Gibb had received after she agreed to step down by mutual consent, saying the “financial arrangements are confidential”.

But Geoff Martin, of campaign group Health Emergency, said: “I have heard from Maidstone NHS staff that Rose Gibb is rumoured to have received a massive payoff from the trust.

“If it’s true, we have a right to know how much taxpayers’ money is involved and it would fuel the scandal even more if it turns out that senior managers have walked away from this carnage with their pockets stuffed with NHS cash.”

He said people at the trust had told him that the pay-out was in the region of £300,000 to £400,000.

The undercover BBC investigation in June 2004 at the Kent and Sussex Hospital revealed bloodstained walls, overflowing skips of clinical waste and a “culture of laziness” among cleaning staff.

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Hazard: A container for sharp medical equipment is left open

Dirty: A toilet seat has stains on it

Microbiologist Professor Hugh Pennington said of the footage: “It is a dirty hospital, the worst I’ve ever seen.”

At the time Miss Gibb said hygiene would be up to scratch within “six to nine months”.

“That’s six to nine months of intensive work around a range of areas around recruitment, refurbishment, cleaning standards, further investment in cleaning itself, and in putting local management back in to each of the hospitals,” she said.

But despite her words, little was actually achieved because a little more than a year later – between October and December 2005 – the first major outbreak occurred.

The Healthcare Commission found that the board did not even realise there was anything amiss during this outbreak, meaning they could not put procedures in place to avoid the second outbreakin 2006.

The BBC undercover reporter, Danielle Glavin, posed as a cleaner for a week at Kent and Sussex Hospital. She was given just 45 minutes training before being put to work, and found that infection control systems were poor.

When she noticed that the A&E department was low on paper towels – vital for drying hands to ensure that infections are not passed on between patients – she was told it would be three days before a new batch would arrive.

The cleaners were supposed to wash the water jugs of patients with C. Diff with hot, soapy water. But Miss Glavin saw one simply swill them out in cold water before returning them at random.

Other examples of poor hygiene included a bloodstained gown left on a trolley in an A&E operating theatre for 24 hours, and ingrained streaks of blood on a resuscitation room wall.

The Healthcare Commission said the trust was so obsessed with meeting Government A&E waiting time targets that it took the eye off the ball on hygiene.

But speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme yesterday, Mr Johnson said: “To suggest that this particular incident reflects what’s happening in the NHS across the country is absolutely wrong.

“There are nurses and clinicians across the country who have dealt with the targets but kept the highest safety standards.”

A ‘deep clean’ at every hospital will help overcome the superbug crisis, Alan Johnson insisted yesterday.

His plan had been lambasted by senior doctors, who said it would not work and was just “pandering to populism”.

Around £50million has been set aside so the walls, ceilings, ventilation shafts and fittings in every NHS ward can be thoroughly cleaned next year.

But a highly-critical editorial in the medical journal Lancet last week said the plan will have little impact.

“They would be better employed making sure doctors, nurses and visitors wash their hands properly, the proven way to stop hospital acquired infections,” it added.

If Muslim doctors are intolerant, let them go

By Andrew O’Hagan, The Telegraph

In the place where I grew up – a particular square in one of the nicer Northern housing estates – there was a young Muslim doctor who lived with his wife and children.

I never found out why this gentleman had come to live among us, but he must have known when he made the decision that he and his family might suffer some racial abuse. They duly did suffer it, and I still feel ashamed when I remember how people spoke to them (and about them) in those years.

The older daughter was very smart: the family were probably the only middle-class people we knew at the time, though that didn’t mean anything very much, and the whole community expressed a terrible degree of contempt towards them – all the more terrible for seeming so natural.

Our Pakistani doctor did something that has now gone quite out fashion – he rose above it.

I imagine that he, as an educated man, felt quite sorry for many of the people around him. In any event, he forgave them. He and his wife worked very hard and they alone taught us a crucial lesson in liberalism – that sometimes we must tolerate other people’s intolerance.

Our neighbour, the doctor, treated everyone’s ailments and sought not only to face reality but slowly to change it. His tolerance was much greater than ours and, in some part, he taught a congenitally racist little community how to behave. That is a British story not often told, but none the less true.

This all came back to me when I read of the Muslim medical students who won’t have anything to do with patients with alcohol problems or sexually transmitted diseases.

It should be stated immediately that this is not a large group and it mercifully does not apply to all Muslim trainee doctors. But the British Medical Association has confirmed there are students who are refusing to attend lectures on these matters and that the refusal is being made on religious grounds.

Has the world gone mad? It was only last week that Sainsbury’s said it would permit Muslim employees who worked at its checkouts to refuse to scan alcohol if doing so offended their religious beliefs.

Other Muslim students are refusing to examine female bodies and still more, working in high street pharmacies, refuse to supply the Pill.

A friend of mine recently went to a wine warehouse in London. He didn’t have a car, so he asked the local minicab firm to come and pick him up, but it declined on account of the fact that the driver on duty refused to have alcohol in the car or to touch it.

Let me ask a simple question. Why do people who wish to train to be doctors choose to do so in a culture they find so objectionable as to make their jobs impossible?

It’s like someone yearning to be a carpenter, only to admit later that he actually has a horrible aversion to wood. Do these enlightened young doctors also hate the ethanol they put into their cars? Do they detest anti-freeze to the same degree that they abhor the sight of women’s naked bodies?

Britain might have many problems, but it is nevertheless a society with a broad understanding of people’s vulnerabilities and conditions, whether that means alcohol-related illnesses or thrush.

Are we to de-liberalise in order not to offend the Muslim trainees? Are we to make ourselves more like many of the Muslim countries those young doctors’ families fled from in order to have a life in Britain?

It’s impossible to comprehend this. I’m against those war-mongering fools who imagine that Islamo-fascism pervades every corner of the Muslim consciousness. I’m against those who allow Muslim extremism to colour their entire view of that ancient – and medically innovative! – culture. They would never allow the murderous antics of some abortion-hating Christian fundamentalists to colour their entire view of Christianity, would they?

But I’m afraid the actions of this small group of Muslim medics are playing right into the hands of those who want to see Islam as a fundamentally life-hating, reality-hating theocracy.

There are millions of believers who know it is not, but the lesson of the militant trainees is that they not only hate the country in which they seek to thrive but that they hate people who aren’t them.

The good doctor in my youth showed us the desperate limits of our own intolerance, and there is no way he would have encouraged us to stay like that.

Sainsbury’s and company may think they are being politically correct, but they are simply being stupid and encouraging discrimination where it need not exist. I perfectly understand if people don’t want to have anything to do with alcohol, but the remedy is simple: don’t work in Sainsbury’s.

I’m afraid to say I would take those workers off the shop floor immediately and the junior doctors I would send down without a moment’s hesitation.

I would say exactly the same if a bunch of Catholic pharmacists refused to let people buy condoms, or if a pack of Christian medical students refused to treat women who agreed with abortion. I’d sack them tomorrow morning and feel fine about it long before lunchtime.

I dislike the way that those who shout the loudest or create the most fuss always get the bigger share of people’s sympathy – it’s almost a definition of childishness.

How often in life do we fool ourselves into thinking it is fine for the more irrational person in a relationship to hold the reins, just because they grab them, just because they say so, just because we’re too troubled by the possible consequences of our firmly saying no.

Extremists are just that: they rely on the fact that people in the centre will be too soft to come out and disarm them or scorn their sense of entitlement.

Well, I’m scorning it. Despite all their efforts to become educated and make a contribution to human wellbeing, junior doctors who refuse to treat female patients or people with cirrhosis are too ignorant to do the job, unless they wish to do it in an environment where such ignorance is held to indicate some kind of religious nobility. Off you go, then. Be my guest. Your plane awaits.

There’s a limit to what people should do to please fanatics.

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Osama bin London’ Muslim fanatic ‘trained 21/7 bombers

A Muslm fanatic who mockingly called himself “Osama bin London” radicalised and trained the July 21 bombers, a court heard yesterday.

Mohammed Hamid is said to have taken his brainwashed followers on paintballing trips and training camps in the English countryside to prepare them for fighting.

Under his instruction, the young men allegedly performed military-style training, brandishing sticks as if they were guns and practising tactics to counter an armed ambush.

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‘Corrupter’: Mohammed Hamid is said to have given his followers weapons training

One of the paintballing trips, attended by July 21 bombers Ramzi Mohammed and Hussain Osman, took place just four days before the July 7 attacks and two weeks before the two men carried out their own attempt.

On the night of July 7, 2005, after the terrorist attacks earlier that day, Hamid allegedly texted Osman: “We fear no one except Allah, we will not change our ways, we are proud to be a Muslim and we will not hide.”

One of Hamid’s expeditions was even filmed by a BBC television crew making a documentary called “Don’t Panic, I’m Islamic”.

‘PREPARING FOR JIHAD’

Hamid, who ran a stall on London’s Oxford Street, is accused of recruiting disaffected young men by handing out extremist literature and issuing invitations to prayers at his house.The 50-year-old encouraged his pupils to become terrorists and train for “jihad” against non-believers, the jury was told. At meetings, Hamid allegedly spoke of there being six or seven atrocities before the 2012 Olympics in London and praised the “magnificent” 9/11 hijackers.

After the 7/7 London bombings in 2005 which killed 52 people, a tape recording of Hamid allegedly has him scoffing at the death toll, saying “52, that’s not even breakfast for me”.

The prosecution claims that there was also discussion of extremist preacher Abu Hamza and Finsbury Park Mosque.

Woolwich Crown Court was told that Hamid’s accomplice, 43-year-old Atilla Ahmet, has already pleaded guilty to soliciting to murder and will be sentenced later.

Hamid, who is married with children, was put under covert surveillance in September 2005. In April 2006, an undercover police officer visited his stall, posing as a disaffected young man, and was recruited by Hamid.

His evidence of what happened at the Friday prayers and training camps will be presented to the jury. Hamid, Ahmet and four others were arrested in September 2006.

‘TAPES OF BEHEADINGS’

After the arrests, police raided their homes and found extremist videos and tapes featuring beheadings and suicide bombings.David Farrell QC, prosecuting, said: “Hamid, assisted by Ahmet, was a recruiter, groomer and corrupter of young Muslims.

“His purpose was to convert such men to his own fanatical and extreme beliefs and having given them foundation, thereby enabling them to move on to join others in other pursuits of jihad by acts of terrorism.

“The fact that some did exactly as he desired is highly relevant to his real purposes and his continued purpose in training others after July 21.”

The prosecution do not claim that Hamid knew about the July 21 bombers’ plans.

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Accused: (left to right) Mousa Brown; Kader Ahmed; Kibley da Costa; Mohammed Al Figari

Instead he is accused of soliciting to murder, providing weapons training, providing training for terrorism and possessing a record of information of a kind likely to be useful to a terrorist.

He is standing trial with four other men: Mousa Brown, 41, of Walthamstow, North London, Kibley da Costa, 24, of West Norwood, South London, Kader Ahmed, 20, of Plaistow, East London, and Mohammed Al Figari, 43, of Tottenham, North London.

All the men deny all the charges brought against them in the first use of the Terrorism Act 2006.

Hamid came to the attention of police in October 2004 when he and July 21 bomber Muktar Ibrahim were arrested at his “dawa” stall on Oxford Street.

They had been behaving aggressively toward members of the public and when police arrived, Hamid racially abused one of the officers.

The court heard that he told police that his name was “Osama bin London” and on the way to the police station he said to an officer: “I’ve got a bomb and I’m going to blow you up.” He was later convicted of public order offences.

COVERT SURVEILLANCE

The court heard that in September 2005, after Ibrahim’s arrest for 21/7, Hamid was questioned by police then put under covert surveillance.There was also “extensive” telephone contact between Hamid and the July 21 bombers between Autumn 2004 and July 2005.

He called or texted Osman, Mohammed, Ibrahim and fourth bomber Yassin Omar 173 times in total.

On the evening of July 7, after the terrorist attacks earlier that day, Hamid allegedly texted Osman and Mohammed.

In the early hours of July 22, 2005, the day after the failed attacks, allegedly trained at the East Sussex Jameah Centre, an Islamic school near Crowborough.

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Guilty: 21/7 bomber Ramzi Mohammed on a training camp allegedly run by Hamid

Hamid took a group, including the July 21 bombers Osman, Mohammed, Ibrahim and Omar, to a training camp at Baysbrown Farm, near Elterwater in Cumbria, on at least three occasions in 2004.

The court heard that Osman took his son to make the trip look like a family outing.

The men were watched by surveillance officers who saw them carrying sticks as if practising holding a rifle, doing sit-ups and press-ups and moving in military-type formation.

They pretended to fire imaginary weapons and remove pins from grenades before throwing them. They were also seen leopard crawling through streams and up hills. At night they practised “ghost walking” – how to walk with minimum noise.

Farmer Bruce Rowland, who owned the site, called the group “My Taliban” and was not initially concerned by them.

But when Osama Bin Laden became headline news, he told them to stop using the field.

On a trip to a paintballing centre near St Albans, Hertfordshire, in March 2006, the men asked to play separately from other people. The manager said she thought it looked like an Al Qaeda training camp.

On another trip that month, they travelled to Bournemouth and ran up and down steps leading to the beach.

‘KILL NON-BELIEVERS’

On July 3, days before 7/7, Osman and Mohammed went on a paintballing trip with Hamid to the Springwood Centre in Tonbridge, Kent.Hamid held Friday prayers at his house in Clapton in East London where, the prosecution claims, he, along with Ahmet, encouraged his pupils to murder non-believers. The talk, it is claimed, was anti-Semitic and anti-American.

Hamid was said to have prepared the men for life as a mujahideen, a soldier, and they discussed future camping trips.

The court heard that at the meetings, mobile phones were turned off, collected and put in a box.

The group would eat and pray and discuss how to target other Muslim youths.

At meetings after the July 21 bombings, discussions centred on the arrest of the bombers.

The prosecution say there is no doubt that Hamid and the others knew only too well that the bombers had attended his training sessions.

In one meeting, Ahmet spoke of his dislike of the Muslim Council of Britain and the Muslim Association of Britain and said they needed “to be taken out”.

Hamid was recorded in East Sussex allegedly saying: “Remember this people that never get caught right, don’t let your ego go forward.

“Let your intelligence go forward for the sake of Allah, use your hikmah [wisdom] and be effective, effective, see how long you can last out, then if you have to go, then you’re going for a good reason.”

‘BRING ON THE JIHAD’

Brown is said to have been recorded as saying: “Bring the Jihad on, brother” and expressing the desire to be a sniper after the group discussed a report on a sniper who had shot 100 U.S. soldiers in Baghdad, said Mr Farrell.Brown also praised the 7/7 bombers, calling them “the fantastic four” and denouncing moderate Muslim women.

Ahmet could be heard boasting about a CNN news report in which he was labelled “the number one Al Qaeda in Europe”.

The trial continues.