The ‘hate speech’ complaint against Lee Anderson reveals the censorious power of the charge of Islamophobia.

Why can’t they say the i-word? Last week, when House of Commons speaker Lindsay Hoyle spoke about the ‘frightening’ death threats against MPs that led him to rip up the parliamentary rule book, he could not bring himself to say who was making them. This week, UK prime minister Rishi Sunak warned of ‘mob rule replacing democratic rule’, as ‘increasingly and intimidatory behaviour’ prevents ‘elected representatives from doing their job’. He gestured to the protests over Gaza, but he did not say anything too specific about the makeup of these mobs.

Home secretary James Cleverly was similarly tongue-tied when he unveiled £31million worth of additional security measures for MPs to protect them from ‘intimidation, disruption or subversion’. As was Harriet Harman, mother of the House of Commons, when she proposed letting MPs debate and vote from home, like they did during lockdown. She said politicians should be able to avoid going out in public if they’re feeling ‘vulnerable’ and ‘under pressure’. But ‘under pressure’ from whom? She could not say. Why would you even ask?

The threat the political class dare not name is, of course, Islamism. The same violent, reactionary and fascistic ideology that inspired the murder of Tory MP David Amess in 2021, the killing of PC Keith Palmer outside parliament in 2017 and the stabbing of Labour MP Stephen Timms in 2010. The same ideology that has led to the deaths of nearly 100 Britons in terror attacks.