The Free Speech Union launches legal challenge against Government over Islamophobia definition

Max Thompson, Campaigns Officer

16 March 2026

Last week the Government published its long-awaited official definition of Islamophobia — now repackaged as “anti-Muslim hostility” — and announced that it will appoint an “anti-Muslim hostility tsar”.

The proposal forms part of the Government’s new action plan, Protecting What Matters, which ministers say is intended to “strengthen social cohesion” and “tackle division”.

The Free Speech Union — which was not consulted despite raising serious concerns about the impact the definition could have on freedom of speech — is launching a legal challenge against the Government.

The FSU has long warned that the definition would have a chilling effect on free speech and revive Britain’s blasphemy laws.

In practice, the definition amounts to a Muslim blasphemy law via the back door — 18 years after Parliament voted to abolish such laws. Writing recently in The Times, the former chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Baroness Falkner, described the proposal as “a two-tier policy — the enemy of equality and of community cohesion — in its purest form” and “a key step towards a blasphemy law”.

The definition is vague and subjective, and the Free Speech Union fears that it will be weaponised to silence legitimate debate about Islam, Muslims, and Islamic beliefs, practices and history.

Although the Secretary of State, Steve Reed, has insisted the definition will not have a chilling effect on free speech, early reactions suggest otherwise. Within 45 minutes of the announcement, the pro-Gaza independent MP Iqbal Mohamed asked whether the definition could be incorporated into the Seven Principles of Public Life — the standards that public office holders, including MPs, are expected to follow.

In effect, this raised the possibility that MPs could be sanctioned for comments made in Parliament if they were deemed to constitute “anti-Muslim hostility”.

Rather than reminding the MP that everything said in the House of Commons and House of Lords is protected by parliamentary privilege, Reed responded that Mohamed was “right to point to the huge concern we should all share” about parliamentarians being “Islamophobic”.

Andrew Gilligan, a senior fellow at the think tank Policy Exchange, captured the point perfectly in his article in The Spectator. Gilligan wrote of the definition: “If this were not a threat to free speech, the government would not need to say so.”

The Free Speech Union’s General Secretary, Lord Young of Acton, said: “This is the most serious threat to free speech the Government has come up with so far — the only area in which it’s achieving any success. If we don’t win this fight, tens of thousands of people a year could lose their jobs at the say-so of a Labour-appointed ‘tsar’. It’s dystopian.”

Although the definition is technically non-statutory, critics expect public bodies to adopt it with the same zeal the police have shown in recording and investigating non-crime hate incidents (NCHIs).

Baroness Gohir was a member of the working group tasked with drafting the definition. In a recent investigative briefing by the Free Speech Union’s Director of Policy and Research, David Rose, it was revealed that all five members of the group had links to Islamist organisations, including the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) and Muslim Engagement and Development (MEND) — two groups successive governments have declined to engage with since 2009 because of concerns about their views.

As the Government prepares to appoint its new “anti-Muslim hostility tsar”, Baroness Gohir is widely seen as a potential candidate for the role.

Even without a formal definition, there is already a powerful cultural expectation around what constitutes “Islamophobia”. Employees in many sectors — as well as university students — already face scrutiny over comments that may be perceived as offensive to Muslims.

At the time of writing, the Free Speech Union is currently supporting at least a dozen members facing disciplinary action after comments that some Muslims have taken offence at.

In a free society, no religion should be shielded from legitimate criticism or debate. By placing one faith in a specially protected category, critics argue the Government risks achieving the opposite of its stated aim of reducing social division.

The Free Speech Union’s legal challenge is based on two principal grounds.

First, the definition relies on vague and legally undefined concepts such as “negative and prejudicial stereotyping of Muslims”, making it incoherent, irrational and open to abuse.

Second, adopting such a definition cuts across legislation already enacted by Parliament and therefore breaches the public law principle known as “occupying the field”. Under this doctrine, ministers cannot introduce new regulatory frameworks that effectively replace existing legislation.

In this case, the body responsible for protecting individuals from religious discrimination is the Equality and Human Rights Commission — not a government-appointed “anti-Muslim hostility tsar”.

Parliament abolished blasphemy laws 18 years ago. The Free Speech Union believes the Government is now attempting to resurrect them through the back door.

This is one of the most significant battles that the Free Speech Union has taken on in its six-year history — and we need your help. Judicial reviews are expensive, but this is a fight we believe must be taken on.

Read more in The Telegraph and donate to our crowdfunder.