My pick for the pious political hypocrite of the week award

I would like to propose Labour MP Tulip Siddiq as the winner of the pious political hypocrite of the week badge for her response to President Trump’s temporary immigration halt. From today’s Guardian we learn that Ms Siddiq is one of a number of Labour MPs who have warned that the UK Prime Minister’s allegedly ‘feeble’ response to President Trump’s recent immigration order risks making UK Muslim communities feel ‘disenfranchised and disillusioned.’ Apparently the consequences of this failure could be ‘played out on our streets’ and ‘turning a blind eye to the reality of this ban we run the risk of losing the trust of an entire generation of young British Muslims.’

Now of course one might ask what it is about any group of people that makes them so available for street disturbances. I cannot think of any other group in society of whom this would be said. Does not the very suggestion that young Muslims might rise up on the streets of Britain over such a far-away political issue actually suggest a certain validity to the argument some people make that Muslims are unusually bad at integrating and continuing to import them in very large numbers is a mistake in the long term? Does it not, in other words, go some way to justifying what rationale appears to exist behind Trump’s Presidential order?

I park the thought in order to award the prize. The reason why Tulip Siddiq’s comments stand out are because of something rather closer to home than US border politics. For as well as being MP for Hampstead and Kilburn Ms Siddiq is also the niece of the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina – a woman to whom I understand she is very close.