The fact that FGM apparently takes place here is a disgrace. It is yet another demonstration on the negative impact of allowing mass immigration from the third world. Our country has been dragged backwards by politicians allowing mass immigration and pursuing a policy of turning a blind eye to avoid racial tensions, etc. The law must be upheld for all - including the Arab boy racers in Knightsbridge - who appear to be immune from prosecution presumably because the government doesn't want to upset the high spending oil rich states?

It's getting to the stage where the law only applies to white British people who are non-violent! The law has been undermined by political incompetence and as a result our country is becoming corrupt.

I think the number is actually an estimated 66,000 females in the UK have had FGM performed on them. This is the estimate of all women who have had FGM and are now in the UK. This will include a lot of women who had FGM performed on them as children and later emigrated to the UK.

It's a estimate. Some estimates are roughly accurate and some are miles off. The truth is we really don't know how many women in the UK have FGM and we're never likely to know. And it will be difficult to determine how many UK residents are taken to Africa or the Middle East to have the procedure performed.



Because you know the answer. No one else is prosecuting parents for it, it hasn't been used as a way to combat FGM anywhere.



You want the UK to combat FGM in ways that no other countries do. France has prosecuted people for FGM before, but they have all been practitioners, not parents.

The only way parents are going to be found to have committed offences is if social services and the police actively target this issue as a child abuse issue. But IMO for social services and the police to do that they will insist on the Home Office signing off that that is their instruction to go down this route. IMO the Home Office will never do this and nobody but one or two backbenchers would even dare suggest it.



Rather than pleading to the "authorities", I'd like you to nominate which authority should be placed in charge of eradicating FGM. Then write to them making your case and see what response you get.



IMO victims of FGM would chose for a blind eye to be turned rather than treating this as a child abuse issue.

I frankly forgot that you know the stats for FGM related prosecutions in every country on the globe. Ooops - 0.00007 seconds on Google and already I have found rlthisrl. Oh well, maybe Tanzania doesn't count. Wait - what's this - rlprosecutions in Ethiopiarl? Maybe that doesn't really matter either, I suppose.


In July a certain David Cameron - not, currently, a backbencher - said parents will be prosecuted if they fail to prevent their daughter being cut.

On the contrary. The fact that immigration has taken place between Africa and Europe means that the first world has been informed about appalling treatment of women in the third world.

The fact that the first world countries are taking an interest in this issue means that the world will hopefully be made better for the women of Africa because these practices will be eradicated.

Neither of those stories actually make any mention of parents being prosecuted.



He announced the introduction of new legislation that would prosecute parents for failing to stop FGM being performed on their daughters. I have reservations about the basic premise of that legislation. For example you've written many times that everyone should be the same under the law. So what would you think to a law which said that British parents should be prosecuted if their children suffer from sexual abuse? It suggests that they struggle to gain acceptable evidence over who is responsible for FGM so they are trying to get round that by forcing parents to remain responsible.

That's all well and good if the families are perfect and all live together in harmony, but what happens when families are fractured and children spend time living with grandparents, aunts, friends etc?



To be honest most of the recommendations and policies seem very good. The Govt have definitely stepped up in response to the campaigning and produced a pilot project which seems very positive.

But the fact that they are now setting up pilot projects and offering new instructions to doctors and police shows that the system wasn't equipped to deal with the problem in the past.



The government would never come up with a fantastic report and pilot project which was then ignored, would it?



I support the victims of FGM.

I do not believe in the vilification of the perpetrators if they are not evil but are merely acting upon how they are brought up.

I am also unsure whether the governments response to the issue is a response to the problem or a response to the publicity. Just looking at the numbers of girls born in England and Wales to mothers who have undergone FGM and that number is 60,000. Given that these girls are British African and will mostly be raised as British I'd question how many of them are actually going to be sent over to Africa to have this performed anyway. FGM is not something that is valued in GB at all and one would suggest that if they were going to be brought up under traditional African values then they wouldn't be here in the first place. Given that no actual estimates were made to how many UK girls are at risk of FGM I suspect that the number is left out because it's so small it would kill the attention it's getting. I suspect that the UK government is being pushed to solve a problem it really doesn't have because by doing that it will help eradicate it from Africa. I applaud this if it is true because it's pretty much genius and I hope it works.

It would be absurd. It is not a crime if your children suffer from anything. It is a crime if you abuse them, or are complicit in them being abused.

Also, it makes no difference whether they are British or anything else. Just that they live here, under our law.


A ludicrous interpretation, to most people it will suggest no such thing. And would be futile as it is the CPS who will decide in any given case whether or not there is sufficient prospect of conviction, and whether it is in the public interest that there be a prosecution. You know, like they do for any other alleged offence.


I am glad you at least accept that.


It actually doesn't. There could have been - indeed always could be - improvements in ANY systems, but the lack of action in the past is down to a lack of willingness to bite the bullet, and a dismal failure for unacceptable reasons of various agencies to do their job. Many young girls have paid the price.


Sadly, governments do so all to often. It will be the task of FGM campaigners to keep the pressure on and amke sure they walk the walk.


In what way?


Another straw man. I advocate and suggest a number of things. "Vilification" isn't one oif them, vile though FGM abuse indisputably is.


I'm damn sure it is a response to the publicity. Sadly that is how things often have to get pushed to the top of agendas nowadays. Frequently politicians need to be shamed or bullied into action.


Well, the plan is: none.

And this is the problem, in that this is the sort of fairy story, idealistic multiculturism that those left leaning folk seem to believe in....If it was really like this then I don't believe anybody wold have any problem with immigration.

Yet, in reality, its nothing like this - Multiculturism has seen large towns and cities divided into 'areas' for those of certain race or religion.... You can visit many Northern towns and not see a white face in certain areas. The idea of people living happily side by side, sharing in the advantages of each other's cultures, is a completely false one.

As I say , the thought of living in cod'ead's type of multiculturism is an idyllic and splendid idea, but, unfortunately, human doubt and human suspicion means it will never happen.

The street where I live has hardly any white faces in it, though there are still some. We do indeed live very happily side by side, keep an eye when some household or other is on holiday, that sort of thing.

We don't share in the advantages of each others' cultures much, I don't think. Although the lady next door does regularly give me some of her samosas or pakoras. But I don't share in the "white faces" culture any more. People mostly do what they do, come and go, and just generally muddle on.

But you have me worried now, if the idea is completely false, what is happening here? Am I in mortal danger? Or maybe some warp in the spacetime continuum? Please say I don't have to move.

Don't you get it though?
You're supposed to be hidden behind your sofa waiting for the dark-faces to go past before you can come out of your house.
They might bomb you you know.
Or take your job.
Or steal your money.

You're not supposed to be friendly with "them".

Don't interrupt, we're waiting an incoming from Dita's to explain why the idea of people living happily side by side is "completely false", when we are doing precisely that.

I do hope I haven't overloaded Dita's knee-jerk circuits, maybe he can't get close enough to the desk, that may be the reason for the silence.

Maybe you should ask why there are no ethnics placed by Bradford council on estates such as Ravenscliffe? Or why the lack of harmony in Page Hall in Sheffield? You might be the only white man in Lidget Green, hence the reason it works. Could I suggest if the split were nearer 50/50 then tensions might be more stretched.

Well, maybe because Bradford Council transferred all its council houses to Incommunities over a decade ago?

A quick search on 192.com seems to show literally hundreds of (just for example) Khans and Hussains in BD10

Another quick search on a random postcode in Ravenscliffe shows census passport information as followsPassport(s) Held
United Kingdom 66
Republic of Ireland 2
Europe (including European Union) 73
African Countries 14
Middle East or Asia 19
North America or Caribbean 1
Central America 1
South America 0
Oceania
(Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia and nearby islands)
1
None 24'"

I live in a 'multicultural' area, and actual integration is almost nil. There are swathes of predominantly white locals, several large communities of mainly Pakistani origin and a large and growing community of Eastern Europeans. For the most part they simply do not mix to any great degree, even when living side by side.

Whether that's down to cultural differences I don't know. But the fact is the immigrant communities are extremely insular, while the local indigenous population gets on with the usual pastimes of shopping, drinking, playing sports, etc. It's a strange situation. In my gym I often hear nothing but Urdu or Polish (I assume!), similarly in my nearest supermarket I'm often in the minority as a white native English speaker. However, go to the sports clubs, or out into the bars, pubs and restaurants, or round many of the shops or events such as music festivals and you will hear nothing but English accents.

The only racial tensions to speak of are normally between youngsters, or died in the wool locals. Points of disquiet are the local drugs scene which has been almost entirely taken over by young Pakistani men who tear the streets up in high-powered cars, often distributing via the taxi firms run by predominantly Pakistani men. A Bangladeshi driver told me he was being leaned on to distribute but wanted to stay out of it. At least one baby of Pakistani origin has been found dead, dumped in someone's garden, a matter of 'honour'. I would describe the situation as 'underlying friction', although seeing as the communities don't really mix there's not actually that much bother.

I'm sure someone will tell me I'm making it all up or imagining it. You're welcome to come and see for yourself.

I wonder if FA recalls the race riots in Bradford about 12 or so years ago?

As I recall one incident, there was a predominately white Working Mans Club being bricked by an Asian mob, prior to them attempting to set fire to it with the terrified members trapped inside.

Not that someone so grand as FA would possibly spend time in such an establishment.....

You see the idea of "integration" is to me just plain wrong. I know enough about Muslims to know that they view much of what I regard as normal activity as "un-Islamic" and a commonly held view is that time spent on socialising and entertainment may be a waste of time and frowned upon.

In the case of women, we have probably one of the biggest populations of the stricter flavours of Islam in Bradford than in many places in the world - Pakistan included - judging by the large number of females who now are seen in full black veil including face.

I am broadly speaking aware that in some sections of their religion, them even speaking to a non-family male is not permitted and as I have no way of knowing, my default position is not to engage with such women in any way unless they speak to me. I would agree that the Muslim religion does very much tend to "insular", therefore, because of restrictions on women to varying degrees, and because of restrictions on what is "islamic" behaviour for all muslims. What I don't understand is how successive governments failed to seemingly grasp that Islam IS different, and because it provides a code on all aspects of its adherents' lives, the sort of "integration" that you talk about in terms of drinking, playing games etc. was never going to happen as muslims don't see watering down their religious requirements as optional. (And yes i do know that there are very many and varied versions and interpretations of what Islam actually says, and yes I do know that as many muslims commit crimes, behave antisocially etc as those of any other religion or none). As for drugs, of course one major reason the Pakistani communities are so involved is where the drugs they sell originate from. However each area of every city and town in the land has its own drug supply infrastructures and the fact that there are many Pakistani drug dealers in a mainly pakistani area is no shock, but there are major drug dealers both locally and across the country from all sorts of ethnicities as I'm sure you know.

I am vehemently anti-religion, and hate the idea of the veil in particular, I also think that these women and girls must in many cases have been pressurised and brainwashed into conforming into their lifestyle but then haven't we all, and it is not for me to tell such a woman how to live her life, nor will anyone ever stop parents indoctrinating their children into whatever religion they choose if that is what they choose to do so it is an immutable fact of life that I have to accept.

But no, I don't spend a lot of time (well, in fact pretty much no time at all) in other neighbour's houses, we all just live our lives and rub along like probably most city dwellers everywhere. It ain't Wisteria Lane with coffee morning rotas, we nod and say hello if meeting in the street, as I said, we look out for each other and where required on occasions offer mutual help, but in the main I don't have much contact with any of them, and the same is for white neighbours as those whose skin is of any other pigmentation.

So I do't believe in this silly idea of "integration" if by that is meant everybody slowly turning into some weird meld of each other and having weekly street parties.

I am also not under any delusion that I "mix" in any real sense. Even if I go to, say, a concert where there may be thousands of people, while I may strike up a conversation or two, the huge majority won't encounter me, nor I them. Same in a pub or club, I'd naturally talk to the regulars that I know, and the people I'm with, but the groups on the next tables or stood nearby may be there all night without exchanging any words with my group. Is this or is this not "integration"?

So no, I don't think you're "making it up" or "imagining it" at all. Your account is much more representative of how people actually choose to live their lives than the rosy Utopia probably imagined by people like Camoron with quaint cottages in the Cotswolds and no idea what they are talking about. What I am saying is that despite my street being a mix of English, Poles, Romanians, Indians, Pakistanis etc. we all rub along just fine, there is no bother, and how they carry on doesn't affect the way I carry on.