‘I have never seen anything like it’: MP warns of rise in extreme views on race and identity

Zubir Ahmed, a health minister, tries not to read the comments under his social media feeds, but sometimes curiosity gets the better of him.After performing a transplant on Christmas Day, the vascular surgeon scanned a post about the operation.He recalled: “It went viral on the internet, but I have also never seen anything like the abuse. There was one comment that stuck out for me that just said: ‘Thanks for the transplant, now go home.’”For the MP, who, as parliamentary undersecretary of state for health innovation and safety, is one of two Muslims in government, such comments reflect the Islamophobic abuse that he says has got worse in recent decades.He warned that there had been a further shift over the past nine months in the Overton window – the range of ideas deemed acceptable in the mainstream population – in terms of the “extraordinary conversations” being had about identity and race.“We now find ourselves in a space where, to be honest, I’ve got young children and I can’t confidently say their lives, in terms of living in society on an equal footing, [are] better than what I was growing up. That’s a really sad thing to see,” he said.However, he told the Guardian that the government’s announcement this week of a definition of anti-Muslim hostility was a turning point that could mean a better future for his children and others.“It’s telling them that there is an issue and validating their existence in this country,” said Ahmed.The new three-paragraph definition says anti-Muslim hostility includes engaging in criminal acts directed at Muslims because of their religion, or at those perceived to be Muslim. Prejudicial stereotyping and unlawful discrimination were also cited in the definition, which was launched alongside a new action plan to strengthen social cohesion.But it has been criticised by opponents including the Conservatives, who described the definition as too broad and said it risked creating a back-door blasphemy law.Ahmed insisted that the language is “the right diagnosis for the illness” – Islamophobia. He recalled how he and friends experienced racism based on the colour of their skin growing up in the Govan area of Glasgow before it felt like British society was on what he described as “an irreversible pathway to progress” in the 2000s. This changed after 9/11, the war on Iraq and terror attacks, he said.“They were not the only things – vested interests were attempting to dehumanise Muslims,” he said, but he noted that those events reverberated through wider society – “and then you found yourself in the midst of a storm.”The definition, he insisted, captured the sort of Islamophobia increasingly encountered by him and other British Muslims since the Iraq war and other events. Recorded anti-Muslim hate cases have also surged in recent years. Of religious hate crime offences recorded by police in England and Wales in the year ending March 2025, 4,478 (45%) targeted Muslims – compared with 3,866 in 2023-24.Responding to the Tory criticism, Ahmed said: “It’s not about blasphemy laws or anything like that. This is about anti-Muslim hatred, which has a racial element to it. This is about appearing visibly Muslim or if you have, for example, a ‘Muslim-sounding name’ then you’re less likely to get picked for a job.”Ahmed said he sometimes gauges the mood in the street by wearing “visibly Muslim garb” and monitoring reactions.“It still manages to turn heads in a way that it would not [have done] so 10 years ago. If I’m out on the streets with relatives who wear headscarves, you can see the change from people. The looks just linger a bit longer than they used to.“I don’t blame people, because they are being inundated and attacked every minute of the day with algorithmic content driving them towards questioning the role of Muslims in society. That’s why this [social cohesion strategy] is a multi-pronged approach and the definition of the diagnosis is one part.”