A plurality of Muslims under 35 support there being areas of the UK where some elements of sharia law are introduced

A friend of Coffee House is in touch to point out that the numbers from the ICM poll for Peter Oborne’s Dispatches programme last night, show that a plurality of Muslims under 35 are in favour of there being some parts of the UK where elements of Sharia are introduced. Here are the numbers:

“Would you support or oppose there being areas of Britain in which some element of Sharia Law is introduced?”  

                    All         34 and under         35 and over
Support:     38              44                        30
Oppose:     46              39                        54

These numbers are worrying. As Paul Goodman, the Tory shadow minister for Communities and Local Government, said in a Spectator interview last summer: ‘Moderate Islam has as its core not wishing to see different people living under different law. Not wishing to see sharia incorporated into British law.’

Now, obviously not all these people who would like to see elements of sharia introduced are extremists. Many are probably thinking of sharia-compliant mortgages and the like. But it does show just what trouble the Archbishop of Cantebury and the Lord Chief Justice are stirring up with their ill-thought out remarks on the subject.

PS Clive Davis has some reflections on last night’s Dispatches.