Equalities committee hamstrung by lack of Islamophobia definition, says chair
Labour MP Sarah Owen says UK’s failure to define Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hatred has led to underreporting of attacks on women
The government’s failure to adopt a standardised definition of Islamophobia is preventing women’s experiences from being properly reported or addressed, the chair of the women and equalities select committee has said.
The warning comes after the cross-party House of Commons committee launched an inquiry on gendered Islamophobia in February exploring the barriers faced by women and girls in reporting such incidents.
Labour MP Sarah Owen, who was elected chair of the committee in 2024, told Hyphen that the need for a definition had been heard “loud and clear” following oral and written evidence submitted to the inquiry.
“It’s impossible to tackle something you cannot define. It’s like trying to nail down jelly — you can’t do it. We need that definition,” she said.
A 2024 report by Tell Mama — an Islamophobia reporting service whose funding was pulled by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government in March — found that almost 65% of all reported Islamophobic incidents over a four-month period had been directed against Muslim women and girls.
“It’s really difficult because different organisations like regional police forces, healthcare organisations and businesses don’t have a standard definition to work from. So people will adopt their own, or not adopt one at all, and we can’t then target resources because the data just isn’t there,” said Owen.
Owen, who also chairs the all-party parliamentary group on British Muslims, highlighted the “huge” underreporting of Islamophobic abuse. “People may complain about Islamophobia but it may not be recorded as such,” she said.
Dr Irene Zempi, associate professor in criminology at Nottingham Trent University, echoed concerns about underreporting of hate crime in her own evidence to the inquiry. She noted that Islamophobia often intersects with other layers of identity such as race or gender, and said: “There is that perception that, because you are a Muslim woman, you are passive — you are an easy, weak target and therefore you are more easily abused and offenders think they can get away with it.
“These experiences are so normalised that they become part and parcel of women’s experience, and they think: ‘What is the point of reporting that?’ They sometimes do not even know that it is a form of hate crime. There are additional obstacles too, whether that is an insecure immigration status, accessibility issues or language barriers.”
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Owen said that, in her own Luton North constituency, “a large number” of complaints about Islamophobic abuse were from women, including experiences of people having their hijab pulled off, online abuse and workplace discrimination.
She said a standardised definition was something she had “fought for for a long time”. Reflecting on last year’s far-right riots, which included attacks on mosques and hotels housing people seeking asylum, she added: “The summer showed that even the most critical person couldn’t deny that there’s a problem.”
The committee plans to publish rolling recommendations from its inquiry into gendered Islamophobia to ensure that affected sectors — including education and healthcare — get the same attention as broader discussions on community cohesion.
In February, the government launched a working group tasked with delivering a definition of what it refers to as “anti-Muslim hatred/Islamophobia” — individually, both terms have been controversial among different political camps — within six months. It came after Hyphen revealed in 2024 that Labour, after taking office, had quietly backed away from support for an earlier Islamophobia definition that it backed while in opposition.
“It’s about making sure that we are flexible and quick enough to deal with new forms of hatred when it rises,” Owen said.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government did not respond to Hyphen’s questions about the progress of the working group’s definition of Islamophobia.
