.... He must have known, from the experiences of the Archbishop of Canterbury, that no matter what he said, his speech would be inflammatory; as Usama Hasan, an imam and an adviser to the Islamic Sharia Council here said at the time, it is very difficult to have a sensible discussion about sharia here because the subject is “like a red rag” to the public mind.
So, if such an important Establishment figure as Phillips takes it upon himself to stir up this nest of hornets, he must surely have something extremely important to say or to recommend. Yet – and this is the mystery – he appeared to be saying nothing new at all.
The headlines following his speech sounded predictably alarming: “British Muslims should be allowed to live by sharia law”, “Law chief backs the use of sharia law to solve disputes in UK”, “Sharia law could have UK role” and so on. No one quite said “sharia to be let in through back door shock”, but that was the general impression. [Times Online]Read more
