# Britain ‘sleepwalking to catastrophe’ over race: Trevor Phillips

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Trevor Phillips says people are increasingly scared to talk about race Credit: Oli Scarff/Getty Images

Britain risks “flames” of racial and religious conflict because of a “liberal self-delusion” over the impact of mass immigration, the former head of the equality watchdog Trevor Phillips claims today.

In a startling assault on decades of official multiculturalism and diversity policy, the founding chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission argues the UK is being allowed to “sleepwalk to catastrophe” by leaders too “touchy”, “smug”, “complacent” and “squeamish” to talk about race.

Drawing a direct parallel with Enoch Powell’s notorious “rivers of blood” speech, he likens Britain’s politicians, media and educated elite in general to the Emperor Nero fiddling while Rome burned, unable even to recognise the “dark side of the diverse society”.

Enoch Powell, the former Conservative MP, speaking in 1971 Credit: Anthony Marshall

Ominous “muttering in the pub or grumbling at the school gate” about foreigners could, he insists, be the first signs of a backlash many thought could not happen in Britain because of a history of relative success in integrating new arrivals.

Significantly, he claims the arrival of some Muslim groups in particular who are actively “resistant to the traditional process of integration” threatens to shake the foundations of “liberal democracy” itself.

In a 100-page paper, published by the think-tank Civitas set to provoke uproar, he argues that a new brand of “superdiversity” is bringing challenges to the Western way of life, far removed from those of immigration of the past.

Crucially, he says, race is no longer a “purely black and white affair” but a divide between the majority and people with different “values and behaviours”.

But, he argues, liberal opinion in Britain has been almost unique in its unwillingness even to speak about the issue – possibly because of the backlash to Enoch Powell a generation ago.

Rome may not yet be in flames, but I think I can smell the smouldering whilst we hum to the music of liberal self-delusion Trevor Phillips

“Squeamishness about addressing diversity and its discontents risks allowing our country to sleepwalk to a catastrophe that will set community against community, endorse sexist aggression, suppress freedom of expression, reverse hard-won civil liberties, and undermine the liberal democracy that has served this country so well for so long,” he insists.

Race does, he says, rear its head in rows about the use of supposedly racist language or concerns about practices such as female genital mutilation.

“But these are not the topics that generate public unease,” he says.

“Rather it is the appearance of non-English names above the shop-fronts in the high street; the odd decision to provide only halal meat in some schools; evidence of corruption in municipal politics dominated by one ethnic group or another.

“Such headlines, frequently misreported, but often grounded in some real change, provoke muttering in the pub, or grumbling at the school gate.

“They become gathering straws in a stiffening breeze of nativist, anti-immigrant sentiment.

“And still, our political and media elites appear not to have scented this new wind.

Trevor Phillips, the founding chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission Credit: Graham Jepson

“We maintain a polite silence masked by noisily debated public fictions such as ‘multiculturalism’ and ‘community cohesion’.

“Rome may not yet be in flames, but I think I can smell the smouldering whilst we hum to the music of liberal self-delusion.”

He pointedly draws comparisons between his remarks and those of Enoch Powell.

“He too summoned up echoes of Rome with his reference to Virgil’s dire premonition of the River Tiber ‘foaming with much blood’,” said Mr Phillips.

“This much-studied address is, simultaneously, lauded as an epic example of the use of political rhetoric – and also as a ghastly testament to the power of unbridled free speech. Either way, it effectively put an end to Powell’s career as an influential leader.

“Everyone in British public life learnt the lesson: adopt any strategy possible to avoid saying anything about race, ethnicity (and latterly religion and belief) that is not anodyne and platitudinous.”

An inquiry revealed that 1,400 minors were sexually abused in Rotherham over a 16-year period Credit: AFP/Getty

Citing the examples of the Rotherham and Rochdale grooming scandals, the sexual assaults in Cologne at New Year and earlier findings from Sweden he calls for frank and open discussion of the possibility of a link between rape and the perpetrators’ “cultural background”.

“The typical response of Britain’s political and media elite confronted with awkward facts has been evasion, because – we say – talking about these issues won’t solve the problem; instead, it will stigmatise vulnerable minority groups,” he said.

“Any attempt to ask whether aspects of minority disadvantage may be self-inflicted is denounced as ‘blaming the victim’.

“Instead, we prefer to answer any difficult questions by focusing on the historic prejudices of the dominant majority.

The picture is by no means as grim as Phillips paints Hope Not Hate

“In short, it’s all about white racism.”

A spokesman for the anti-racism campaign group Hope Not Hate said: "Attention does need to be paid to extremists on all sides, and also to the plight of the white working class in de-industrialised areas, who are often abandoned to the likes to Ukip.

"But the picture is by no means as grim as Phillips paints."

He added: " Yes, a diverse society does face problems and yes we do need to talk openly about the issues ahead.

"But people are already talking, across the divide.

"Certainly we believe that the majority of people want to solve the problems our society faces constructively and peacefully, and the Muslim community – or rather, the Muslim communities – are also evolving rapidly."

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