Faith is a great starting point for politics - Stephen Timms MP

Faith is a Great Starting Point

for Politics - Stephen Timms MP

Dr. Mozammel Haque

  

“Faith is a great starting point for politics – perhaps the best starting point there is. Because religious faith is the source of the values we need to make politics work: responsibility, solidarity, patience, persistence, compassion, truthfulness. The erosion of these values has led to an erosion of trust in politics. To rebuild trust in politics, as we must, we need to rebuild those values – and religious faith is a very promising source from which to do so,” said Rt. Hon. Stephen Timms, Member of Parliament (MP) representing the diverse community in the East End of London and also the chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Faith and Society at the event organised by the Forum for International Relations Development to celebrate UK Parliament Week and Interfaith Week at the Houses of Parliament on Tuesday, the 13^th of November 2018.

Stephen Timms MP particularly extended his thanks to  Umar Mahmood from the Forum for International Relations Development for putting together the programme for today’s event by managing to bring the following illustrious panel which included Dr. Harriet Crabtree OBE, Executive Director, The Inter Faith Network;  Afzal Khan CBE MP, Shadow Minister (Home Office) (Immigration); David Clark – Head of Education and Engagement, UK Parliament; Dr. Rosena Allin-Khan MP – Shadow Minister (DCMS) (Sport) and Jehangir Malik, CEO Muslim Aid.

I had the opportunity to be present at the event on behalf of Dr. Ahmad al-Dubayan, the Director General of the Islamic Cultural Centre & London Central Mosque, as one of his Advisor. I listened carefully and attentively and found Mr. Stephen Timms noticed after a lot of discussions with faith groups that they did not have a very good relationship with their Local Authority and came out with a Covenant.

Timms MP for East Ham since 1997 said, “We drew up something we call the Covenant for Engagement. Eleven local authorities have adopted it. It hopes to be a vehicle for building trust between faith groups on the one hand and local authorities on the other. I’m hoping that model will be adopted across the country as increasingly councils recognise the value and the potential that faith groups can make.”

At the beginning of his speech, Stephen Timms MP mentioned, “I represent a very diverse community in the East End of London. People who are not familiar with communities like the one I represent assume it must be fragmented. But this morning I met a young civil servant who has just moved in to our community who was commenting on how cohesive she is finding our community to be.”

He mentioned, “I think the way it works is that almost everyone in our community belongs to a faith group; and, as long as each of them is clearly part of our wider community, belonging to one of them extends to a sense of belonging to our community. Fragmentation doesn’t happen because people all belong to lots of different things. Fragmentation happens when lots of people doing belong to anything at all.”

“It is often said that “you shouldn’t mix faith and politics”. Those who say it point to trouble in any number of parts of the world to explain their argument. And you can see what they mean,” said Rt. Hon. Timms and added, “But I think they are drawing the wrong conclusion. The truth is that faith is a great starting point for politics – perhaps the best starting point there is. Because religious faith is the source of the values we need to make politics work: responsibility, solidarity, patience, persistence, compassion, truthfulness. The erosion of these values has led to an erosion of trust in politics. To rebuild trust in politics, as we must, we need to rebuild those values – and religious faith is a very promising source from which to do so.” 

Speaking about Britain and Faith communities, Stephen Timms, who is chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Faith and Society, mentioned, “Britain tends to think of itself as a pretty secular country these days. And yet it has turned out, at the beginning of the 21st century, that it has been faith groups which have uniquely been able to take on the sudden challenges of inequality of poverty which we have seen in recent years.”

Citing an example, MP Timms draw the attention to the food poverty and said, ““Let’s look at food poverty. It is perhaps not surprising that faith groups have had the motivations to run food banks. More striking is that they have also had the capacity – when no other network or institution has been able to. It has been a remarkable achievement, illustrating an important truth about where the capacity to change things for the better in Britain today can really be found.”

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As a chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Faith and Society, MP for East Ham, Timms, mentioned that he has got the chance to look into the relationships between the Local Authority and Faith Groups. “We have looked closely in recent years at the relationships between Local Authorities and faith groups in their area. We would like to see a lot more examples of Local Authorities commissioning services from faith based organisations who are wanting to provide services,” said Mr. Timms and mentioned, “As part of our work, we have had a lot of discussions with faith groups – on a variety of topics, such welfare to work, children and young people, about oversees development. A very common theme of those discussions was faith groups feeling they didn’t have a very good relationship with their Local Authority.”

MP. Timms said, “The councils were suspicious of them, there was a fear that if they did give money to a faith based organisation to provide a service, then either that money be used to convert people instead of delivering the service, or the service would be delivered in a way that was biased and only for that particular group. But local authorities have a lot of anxiety and nervous about all this. And that is what our covenant is aiming to address.”

Mr. Timms, MP and a chair of All Party Parliamentary Group for Faith and Society talked about a Covenant which is aiming to address the issues presently facing. He mentioned, “So we drew up something we call the Covenant for Engagement. Eleven local authorities have adopted it. It hopes to be a vehicle for building trust between faith groups on the one hand and local authorities on the other. I’m hoping that model will be adopted across the country as increasingly councils recognise the value and the potential that faith groups can make. I imagine many of us sitting in this room recognise this potential. Let’s hope others do too! I hope the discussion today will give this collaboration a new impetus and energy for the future.”