Al-Madinah School, Derby: UPDATE

Britain's first Muslim free school is controlled by religious hardliners who ban children from singing or reading fairy tales and force staff to wear headscarves - according to the former head teacher and deputy who claim they were forced to leave.

Andrew Cutts-McKay resigned from his role as head of al Madinah School in Derby in August, two months after deputy Suzanne Southerland stepped down from her post. Both allege they were 'bullied and sidelined' by members of the school's trust, which is predominantly Muslim. The school strongly denies the pair's claims.
But earlier this week, concerns were raised by teachers who complained they were being ordered to wear the hijab – even if they are not Muslim.

Now claims have been made that alongside the strict dress code, the school's 200 pupils are banned from playing stringed instruments, which are forbidden in the Islamic faith.

Singing is also forbidden unless it involves Islamic faith songs, while youngsters are not allowed to read fairy tales as these are 'non-Islamic'.


A staff member told The Sunday Times: 'When teaching children the alphabet, you could not associate the letter 'p' with pig.' We were told that we couldn't read the children a story about a witch because it's seen as being non-Islamic.'

Other staff have highlighted ‘concerns’ over the school's practices, which include banning non-halal food and forcing female pupils as young as four to sit at the back of the class away from boys.

Female members of staff, some of whom are not Muslims, say they have been told to sign new contracts which force them to wear the hijab. These also ban them from wearing jewellery on the school’s premises in Derby.

One woman, who had been interviewed for a position, claimed she was told she was not allowed to shake hands with male teachers to avoid ‘insult’.  

Another staff member, speaking anonymously to the Mail, said the school was ‘like being in Pakistan’. She said: ‘Girls are treated very separately from boys, the girls sit at the back of the classroom. Boys go and eat first at lunchtime and then the girls are allowed to go. It is like being in any school in Pakistan. That is why it was founded, that is the idea.’

The decision to make all female members of staff, regardless of religious beliefs, wear the Islamic headscarf – which covers the head but not the face – was apparently introduced over the summer. But some female members of staff have been spotted removing the headwear immediately after stepping out of the school building during their lunch hour. And around half a dozen teachers at the free school, who could face losing their jobs if they refuse to comply with the rules, are now seeking legal advice from the National Union of Teachers.

Regional NUT officer Nick Raine said: ‘We are very worried about the school and the education of the 200 children there. There are worries over practices concerning the discrimination between male and female pupils in the school, with the girls being told to sit at the back of the class regardless of whether they can see the board properly.' He added: ‘It’s one thing to have a dress code which we can challenge and quite another to build it into a contract. The school is publicly accountable so there needs to be a greater level of transparency.’

As a free school, Al-Madinah operates outside local authority control but still qualifies for government funding. It was set up in September last year.

Sue Arguile, branch secretary of the Derby National Union of Teachers, said the new demands stem from the Al-Madinah’s free school status. She said: ‘We have always had a number of concerns about this school ever since it was first set up, as essentially they can do what they like. There is no buffer between them and the state and no protection for staff and pupils. Free schools set their own rules, curriculums and dress codes, and so long as pupils and staff are aware of them before joining, then there is no upset. But forcing people to agree to contractual changes or face being out of work could breach employment law.’

Former head teacher Andrew Cutts-McKay, who left after less than a year in the post, previously said the school would ‘honour all faiths’. However he admitted that he thought at least half of the school’s pupils would be Muslims.

The school’s acting principal Stuart Wilson, who began his job on September 5, denied claims of bullying towards his former colleagues. He also disputed that there was anything within staff contracts requiring women to wear the hijab or a headscarf. However, he added: 'The expectation for female staff, raised in adverts and interviews, is that the head is covered while on site. To date, no complaint has been raised with the governing body relating to female staff wearing the hijab or headscarf.'

Derby Islamic School's Teachers Forced To Wear Hijab

Female teachers at a Muslim school have been told to cover their heads with Islamic scarves during school hours - even if they are not Muslim.

Staff at Al-Madinah School, Derby, claim they have been told to sign new contracts agreeing to wear hijabs and even make girls sit at the back of classes.

The Muslim faith school, which caters for 200 students aged four to 16, is also thought to have forbidden teachers from bringing in non-Halal food or wearing unacceptable jewellery.

Non-Asian staff have been spotted removing the headwear immediately after stepping outside the school building during lunch hour, but today refused to reveal the extent of the school’s demands.

It is thought that at least five teachers at the school have complained to union bosses about the dress code change - which was introduced over the summer.

Stunned staff at the free school - who faced losing their jobs if they did not agree - are now working with the National Union of Teachers to seek legal advice.

Sue Arguile, branch secretary of Derby National Union of Teachers (NUT), insists that the possible breach of employment law is a result of the Al-Madinah's status as a free school.

She said: 'We have always had a number of concerns about this school ever since it was first set up as essentially they can do what they like. There is no buffer between them and the state and no protection for staff and pupils. Our understanding is that the teaching staff were told about the contractual changes over the summer in time for the new academic year. But at least five teachers - both male and female - have made complaints to the union of concerns about the school breaching employment law. We will now be seeking legal advice in order to determine what action to take - but it may very well be that teachers have to bite the bullet and agree. Free schools set their own rules, curriculum and dress codes and so long as pupils and staff are aware of them before joining then there is no upset. But forcing people to agree to contractual changes or face being out-of-work could breach employment law.'

Nick Raine, regional NUT officer, said: 'We are very worried about the school and the education of the 200 children there. It's one thing to have a dress code which we can challenge and quite another to build it into a contract. The school is publicly accountable so there needs to be greater transparency.'
However, acting Principal, Stuart Wilson, says he has not received any complaints from staff.

He said: 'I've been told not to speak about the school's policy. I haven't received any complaints from members of staff.'

The school, which caters for primary-age children and secondary children, was set up in September 2012.

 

It is based in two different locations in Derby - one in Midland House, Nelson Street and the other in Norman House, Friar Gate.
The then head teacher Andrew Cutts-Mckay, who has left after less than a year in post, said at the time that the school was being set up so that ‘the timetable will be flexible with time for Islamic teaching but pupils will be able to opt out of this and there will be a chance to learn about other faiths’.

He said the school would ‘honour all faiths’ and that he envisaged a school where 50 percent of pupils are Islamic and the other half were not.

The free school was initially scheduled to admit 120 reception and year-one children, together with 180 pupils into years seven and eight. Eventually, the all-groups school will have up to 1,100 pupils.

Al-Madinah is a new type of free school, which the government is allowing groups of parents, or interested parties, to set up. These operate in much the same way as private schools, outside local authority control but qualifying for government funding.

Sue Arguile, the branch secretary of Derby National Union of Teachers, added: 'There are worries over practices concerning the discrimination between male and female pupils in the school, with the girls being told to sit at the back of the class regardless of whether they can see the board properly. This school was first launched as based on Muslim principles and not as a Muslim school. If the school is not sticking to the original reasons behind why it was set up, then it does call into question whether public money is being used properly and for its intended purpose.'

The school has yet to receive an inspection by the Office for Standards in Education, but is due one this academic year. However, the inspection could be brought forward in view of representations from the teaching unions and the city council.

An Ofsted spokeswoman said: 'As schools are only notified the afternoon before inspections begin, we would not be able to let anyone know when the school is being inspected.'

3 Out Of 4 New London Homes Sold To Foreigners

Most new homes in London are being sold to foreign buyers at overseas events before they are built or advertised in the UK, according to a property group. Three-quarters of new homes in the centre of the capital were sold to overseas buyers in 2012, with more than half going to those in the Far East.

Data from Knight Frank showed a rising proportion of mid-market homes were being sold to foreign buyers, who have traditionally favoured the most expensive properties, but that prices were rising. The worrying trend means British housebuyers, particularly first-time buyers, could find themselves priced out of London, where house prices have risen to a three-year high.

Tom Rundall, from Knight Frank, told the Financial Times that foreign buyers were buying average-priced homes in the capital as well as high-end properties. He said: 'We have seen a sea change over the past year in terms of the kind of price point foreign buyers are chasing, whether it's a studio apartment in Clerkenwell or a one-bed flat in Kings Cross.  This is not the jet-set but rather the working middle classes expanding into the world.'

Many of the new homes are sold 'off-plan' - before they are built - at glamorous events in Singapore, Hong Kong, China and Malaysia, where developers can sell more properties in a weekend than they do in the UK in a month.

Buyers who get a house 'off-plan' usually get a discount, while receiving payment before building starts helps developers who can struggle to get funding for a project without evidence of committed buyers.

Rob Perrins, chief executive of Berkeley Homes, told the Financial Times: 'For a lot of developers, if you can't show that you can pre-sell enough to cover the construction costs, the banks simply won't finance you. It would be suicide to put £100m of your own money into the ground without forward sales.'

Electoral Fraud in Derby - Four Women Sentenced

Four women involved in casting a fraudulent vote during last May’s local elections in Derby have been sentenced for their part in the crime. The sentencing, which took place at Derby Crown Court today (Friday, July 26) sees the conclusion of the first case of its kind in the UK. The Electoral Commission has confirmed that this is the first case where a polling clerk has been involved in an attempt of electoral fraud.

Nasreen Akhtar (46) of Rosehill Street, admitted misconduct in a public office and was sentenced to 14 months in prison. Tameena Ali (27) and Samra Ali (28), both of St Chad’s Road, admitted personation and were given eight months suspended for 18 months and 250 hours of unpaid work.
Noshiela Maqsood (23), of Holcombe Street, pleaded guilty to attempting to pervert the course of justice and was given the same sentence as the Alis.

Officers launched an investigation into allegations that the two Alis and their aunt Akhtar, who was a polling clerk, worked together to cast fraudulent votes at the polling station in Rosehill Street, Normanton during last May’s local elections. People present at the polling station that day became suspicious when the two Alis came in to vote, despite not living in the Arboretum ward.

Tameena Ali cast a vote in the name of Nosheila Maqsood, whereas Samra Ali left before marking the ballot paper. Akhtar gave Tameena the ballot paper, knowing she was not Maqsood.
Maqsood later lied to officers, telling them that she had personally voted. Fingerprints on the ballot paper proved that it had been touched by Tameena and Maqsood.

Police worked closely with Derby City Council’s Democratic Services Division throughout the investigation.

Investigating officer Detective Constable Richard Foster, of the East Midlands Special Operations Unit, said: “This is an incredibly serious crime that strikes at the heart of our democratic process.
“These women worked together to try and influence the election in that ward. Akhtar’s offence is all the more serious because she was in a position of authority and trust as a polling clerk.”

The BNP give the BBC a taste of their own medicine

Asians attack EDL in Tower Hamlets

Latest Police Harrassment Police Raid Home of Derby Organiser

Police today launched a dawn raid on the home of Derby British National Party Organiser Paul Hilliard, arresting him at 5.30 in the morning.

The explanation for the arrest? On Sunday an argument broke out in Paul’s street between two of his neighbours and a black woman living in the area who is notoriously troublesome and loud-mouthed. Paul went out to calm things down and persuaded his English neighbours to go back inside.

The woman was still shouting on the street when Paul left his house to begin his leafleting session. His neighbours emerged again, and Paul advised them to avoid the woman and go back inside. Paul then met up with his leafleting team and continued about his business, thinking nothing further of the incident – that is until police raided the family home at 5.30 in the morning!

Paul’s wife was informed that Paul would only be held for an hour or so. When she called the police station at 11.30, they confessed that they had still not even begun interviewing Paul.

“It’s an outrage,” says Nick Griffin, who is now in constant correspondence with Paul’s wife and key officials in the area. “It’s obvious too that this 'incident' is being used as an excuse. Paul and his team are very active in Derby, and the city is tense following the fatal stabbing of a notorious black drug dealer, Johnny Assani,
by a gang of Muslims at the weekend."

This arrest is the latest in a campaign of harassment against British National Party activists launched by police in the wake of the riots and looting that has shamed Britain and exposed the gross inadequacy of the politically correct police in dealing with this crime epidemic.

“We obviously have sympathy with the police as they struggle with the difficulties involved in keeping the peace in a city that has been turned into a multi-cultural powder keg by the policies of successive Labour and Conservative governments. But they do not have the right to abuse their power in an attempt to silence legitimate and peaceful criticism of those multi-cultural policies by the activist of a completely legal political party. Such police-state tactics are an attack not only on the British National Party but on the entire democratic process for which generations of our bravest and best fought
and died.”

The British National Party will fight political police harassment!

Show your support for Paul Hilliard – Call the cusody suite at St Mary's Wharf, in the centre of Derby, now, and politely
vent your disgust.

Call 0345 123 3333

David Starkey says Enoch Powell was right

Historian David Starkey sparked outrage last night by claiming that Enoch Powell’s ‘rivers of blood’ speech had been right and blaming ‘black culture’ for the riots.

He said white youths had adopted a black culture which promoted the violence and looting.

Mr Starkey claimed Powell’s infamous 1968 speech had been right in one sense, but it wasn’t inter-communal violence that was the problem.

‘What's happened is a substantial section of the chavs have become black, the whites have become black,’ he told Newsnight on BBC 2.

‘A particular sort of violent, destructive, nihilistic gangster culture has become fashion, and the black and white, boy and girl, operate in this language together.

'This language is wholly false. It is a Jamaican patois that has intruded in England, which is why so many of us have this sense that we are literally living in a foreign country.

‘It is about black culture, that is the enormously important thing, it is not skin colour, it is culture.’

When challenged by fellow guest Dreda Say Mitchell, a black author and broadcaster, Mr Starkey defended his comments by saying: ‘At these times we need plain speaking.’

Derbyshire activists complete leafleting session despite being detained by PC police

Five Derbyshire British National Party activists carried out a successful leafleting session in the town of Ripley yesterday despite being detained Britain’s Stasi-like PC police force and accused of ‘inciting racial hatred’ for delivering leaflets that tell the truth about the riots.

One of the arrested men, Derbyshire sub-regional organiser Paul Hilliard, reports on the incident:

'Five of us went to Ripley town centre yesterday to distribute the Britain Stripped of All Dignity leaflets, an anti-riot leaflet that calls for action to restore order and save lives, which the public warmly welcomed.

'Things were going very well, with us handing out around 500 to 600 leaflets in around an hour or so, when PCSO Becky Davis came along to look at our leaflets after receiving just two complaints regarding all of the leaflets distributed.

'There was a question mark over the use of two words, ‘black gangs’. I was astonished to find we were being questioned about telling the truth, a truth the public already knew about regardless of the attempts from the media to cover up the race of the gangs involved in the riots.

'Within minutes, there were three police officers asking us to accompany them to the station for questioning about the leaflet. I told them we were not breaking the law by using facts, but the police said that we were ‘inciting racial hatred’ so we could either go with them voluntarily or we could be arrested.

'We were then detained for around an hour while the police looked over the leaflet and made phone calls for advice on the issue. PC Reddish, who took us in for questioning and was in charge at the time, came to me as the spokesman for the team to say that the police didn’t really know what to do with the leaflet and had to send it for further investigation but were prepared to let us go provided we leave our literature at the station so we can’t deliver any more.

'I politely refused to do so because, by leaving the literature, we would be admitting guilt of wrongdoing, which we deny. I also told PC Reddish that we would discontinue distributing these leaflets until our legal team checked the legalities of the wording used, and, if we are in the right, then we will be back to carry on distributing these leaflets at another date.

'PC Reddish was happy for me to take our literature away with us and let us go without charge on the basis we stop delivering them. Before our team and I left the station, I told the police that we were going back to the spot where they took us from to carry on so we could show the public we have done no wrong and will not be driven out of the town by PC bullying. We continued campaigning with the ReferendumNOW petition, which also went down very well with the public, from whom we collected a good number of petition signatures.

'The police were polite, pleasant and made us all a cuppa, but I feel their time is being wasted by political correctness, which again seems to hide criminal facts from the public – which is half of the problem in this country.'

Nick Griffin on the recent riots

Britain's liberal intelligentsia has smashed virtually every social value by Melanie Phillips

So now the chickens have well and truly come home terrifyingly to roost. The violent anarchy that has taken hold of British cities is the all-too-predictable outcome of a three-decade liberal experiment which tore up virtually every basic social value.

The married two-parent family, educational meritocracy, punishment of criminals, national identity, enforcement of the drugs laws and many more fundamental conventions were all smashed by a liberal intelligentsia hell-bent on a revolutionary transformation of society.

Those of us who warned over the years that they were playing with fire were sneered at and smeared as Right-wing nutters who wanted to turn the clock back to some mythical golden age.

Now we can see what they have brought about in the unprecedented and horrific scenes of mob violence, with homes and businesses going up in flames, and epidemic looting.

Clearly, there is some as yet unidentified direction and co-ordination behind the anarchy. But what is so notable and distressing is that, after the first day when adults were clearly involved, this mayhem has been carried out in the main by teenagers and children, some as young as eight.

The idea that they should not steal other people’s property, or beat up and rob passers-by, appears to be as weird and outlandish to them as the suggestion that they should fly to the moon.

These youths feel absolutely entitled to go ‘on the rob’ and steal whatever they want. Indeed, they are incredulous that anyone should suggest they might pass up such an opportunity.

What has been fuelling all this is not poverty, as has so predictably been claimed, but moral collapse. What we have been experiencing is a complete breakdown of civilised behaviour among children and young people straight out of William Golding’s seminal novel about childhood savagery, Lord Of The Flies.

There has been much bewildered talk about ‘feral’ children, and desperate calls upon their parents to keep them in at night and to ask them about any stolen goods they are bringing home.

As if there were responsible parents in such homes! We are not merely up against feral children, but feral parents.

Of course these parents know their children are out on the streets. Of course they see them staggering back with what they have looted. But either they are too drunk or drugged or otherwise out of it to care, or else they are helping themselves to the proceeds, too.

As David Cameron observed yesterday, there are clearly pockets of society that are not just broken, but sick.

The causes of this sickness are many and complex. But three things can be said with certainty: every one of them is the fault of the liberal intelligentsia; every one of them was instituted or exacerbated by the Labour government; and at the very heart of these problems lies the breakdown of the family.

For most of these children come from lone-mother households. And the single most crucial factor behind all this mayhem is the willed removal of the most important thing that socialises children and turns them from feral savages into civilised citizens: a father who is a fully committed member of the family unit.

Of course there are many lone parents who do a tremendous job. But we’re talking here about widespread social collapse. And there are whole areas of Britain, white as well as black, where committed fathers are a wholly unknown phenomenon.

In such areas, successive generations are being brought up only by mothers, through whose houses pass transitory males by whom these women have yet more children — and who inevitably repeat the pattern of lone and dysfunctional parenting.

The result is fatherless boys who are consumed by an existential rage and desperate emotional need, and who take out the damage done to them by lashing out from infancy at everyone around them. Such children inhabit what is effectively a different world from the rest of society. It’s a world without any boundaries or rules. A world of emotional and physical chaos.

A world where a child responds to the slightest setback or disagreement by resorting to violence. A world where the parent is unwilling or incapable of providing the loving and disciplined framework that a child needs in order to thrive.

Yet instead of lone parenthood being regarded as a tragedy for individuals, and a catastrophe for society, it has been redefined as a ‘right’.

Instead, it introduced the sexual free-for-all of ‘lifestyle choice’; claimed that the idea of the male breadwinner was a sexist anachronism; and told girls that they could, and should, go it alone as mothers.

This was the outcome of the shattering defeat of Tony Blair, in the two years or so after he came to power, at the hands of the ultra-feminists and apostles of non-judgmentalism in his Cabinet and party who were determined, above all, to destroy the traditional nuclear family.

Blair stood virtually alone against them, and lost.

One of these ultra-feminist wreckers was Harriet Harman. The other night, she was on TV preposterously suggesting that cuts in educational allowances or youth workers had something to do with young people torching and looting shops, robbing and leaving people for dead in the streets.

But Harman was one of the principal forces in the Labour government behind the promotion of lone parenthood and the marginalisation of fathers. If anyone should be blamed for bringing about the conditions which have led to these appalling scenes in our cities, it is surely Ms Harman.

And this breaking of the family was further condoned, rewarded and encouraged by the Welfare State, which conceives of need solely in terms of absence of money, and which accordingly subsidises lone parenthood and the destructive behaviour that fatherlessness brings in its train.

Welfare dependency further created the entitlement culture that the looters so egregiously display. It taught them that the world owed them a living. It taught them that their actions had no consequences. And it taught them that the world revolved around themselves.

Once, children would have been rescued from their disadvantaged backgrounds by schools which gave them not just an education but structure and purpose to their lives.

But the liberal intelligentsia destroyed that escape route, too. For its onslaught upon marriage — the bedrock institution of society — with a tax system that penalises married couples with a wife who doesn’t work, was replicated by an onslaught upon the understanding and very identity of that society. Instead of transmitting knowledge to children, teaching was deemed to be an attack upon a child’s autonomy and self-esteem.

Thus it was that teachers adopted the ‘child-centred’ approach, which expected children not only to learn for themselves but also to decide for themselves about behaviour such as sexual morality or drug-taking.

The outcome was that children were left illiterate and innumerate and unable to think. Abandoned to wander through the world without any guidance, they predictably ended up without any moral compass.

All of this was compounded still further by the disaster of multiculturalism — the doctrine which held that no culture could be considered superior to any other because that was ‘racist’.

That meant children were no longer taught about the nation in which they lived, and about its culture. So not only were they left in ignorance of their own society, but any attachment to a shared and over-arching culture was deliberately shattered.

Instead of forging social bonds, multiculturalism dissolved them — and introduced instead a primitive war of all against all, in which the strongest groups would destroy the weak.

Closely related to this was ‘victim culture’, in which all minority groups were regarded as victims of the majority. So any bad behaviour by them was excused and blamed on the majority.

In similar vein, all criminal wrongdoing was excused on the basis that the criminal couldn’t help himself, as he was the victim of circumstances such as poverty, unemployment, or as yet illusory cuts in public spending. The human rights of the criminal became seen as more important than the safety and security of his victims. Punishment became a dirty word. So the entire criminal justice system turned into a sick joke, with young hoodlums walking off with community sentences or Asbos which they held in total contempt.

Mr Cameron has declared that all those convicted of violent disorder in these riots will go to prison.

Really? Isn’t it more likely that they will end up on some community penalty which will see them taken on trips to Alton Towers to make up for their disadvantaged upbringing? This is the normal response of our sentimentalised and addle-brained criminal justice officials.

In short, what we have seen unfolding before our horrified gaze over the past four days in Britain is the true legacy of the Labour years.

The social and moral breakdown behind the riots was deliberately willed upon Britain by Left-wing politicians and other middle-class ideologues who wrap their utter contempt for the poor in the mantle of ‘progressive’ non-judgmentalism.

These are the people who — against the evidence of a mountain of empirical research — hurl execrations at anyone who suggests that lone parenthood is, in general, a catastrophe for children (and a disaster for women); who promote drug liberalisation, oppose selective education (while paying for private tutors for their own children) and call those who oppose unlimited immigration and multiculturalism ‘racists’.

And the real victims of these people ‘who know best’ are always those at the bottom of the social heap, who possess neither the money nor the social or intellectual resources to cushion them against the most catastrophic effects of such nonsense.

Britain was once an ordered society that was the envy of the world — the most civilised, the most gentle and law-abiding.

Can Broken Britain be put together again? David Cameron is commendably talking tough: but will he have the stomach for tough action?

Will he, for example, remove the incentives to girls and women to have babies outside marriage? Will he dismantle the concept of entitlement from the Welfare State? Will he vigorously enforce the drug laws? Will he end the kid-glove treatment of ‘victim groups’, and hold them to account for their behaviour in exactly the same way as everyone else?

Repairing this terrible damage also means, dare I say it, a return to the energetic transmission of Biblical morality.

Anyone heard from the Archbishop of Canterbury about the riots? Anyone care to guess what he will eventually say about them? Quite.

When church leaders stop prattling like soft-headed social workers and start preaching, once again, the moral concepts that underlie our civilisation, and when our political leaders decide to oppose the culture war that has been waged against that civilisation rather than supinely acquiescing in its destruction, then — and only then — will we start to get to grips with this terrible problem.

Until then, within the smouldering embers of our smashed and burned-out cities, we can only look upon the ruins of the Britain we have so dearly loved; the Britain that once led the world towards civilisation, but is now so tragically leading the way out.