MP tells of shocking levels of racist abuse

Member for Gorton says more needs to be done about online hate

- DAN O’DONOGHUE

MP Afzal Khan has spoken out about the “many racist threats” he has had to report to police - and how on one occasion he was subjected to a tirade of online abuse after taking a parliamentary oath in Urdu.

The shadow Labour minister and MP for Manchester Gorton criticised the Government for refusing to accept the All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims’ definition of Islamophobia.

And he blasted “the Prime Minister’s shocking comment about Muslim women and letterboxes”.

It comes as recently published Home Office statistics revealed more than 45 per cent of religiously motivated hate crime in England and Wales have been targeted at Muslims in the past year. Even in recent weeks, there have been attacks or planned attacks on mosques in Manchester, East London and Scotland.