[jambutty]

I define an immigrant student Gayle as someone who has either been born abroad or born in the UK to a family that has come from abroad. I suppose that strictly speaking that is incorrect. It should be a student born to an immigrant family. However the general assumption of immigrant or ethnic minority includes those born in the UK from immigrant families. To argue semantics on this point is pointless.

Many years ago when I attended Blackburn College on a variety of courses the majority of the students (mainly young) were none British and in the main Pakistani. As most Pakistani people are Muslims it is not unreasonable to assume that most of the students at Blackburn College are Muslims.

Today as I drive past the various college premises the bulk of the students that I see are from what people call the ethnic minority. In other words the children or now grandchildren from immigrant (Pakistani) families.

An immigrant garinda is surely just the person who arrives on our shores from abroad with the intention of settling here. Any offspring are British born from immigrant families. In the early part of WWII thousands of people from Europe (Poles in particular) sought refuge in the UK from the Nazi tyranny. They integrated and stayed on after the war ended. Even some German prisoners of war stayed on and integrated into British society.

When I served at a British naval shore wireless station in South Africa during the apartheid era for nearly three years I conformed to the SA law without question whilst off station. I only sat in the seats reserved for white (blankes) on buses, trains and even benches and only drank from ‘whites only’ water fountains. In other words I and my shipmates integrated.

On station where we had four Bantu labourers/cleaners and a black cook (I can’t remember where he came from) and I and most of my shipmates treated them as one of our own. We would often spend an evening sat outside their quarters drinking a coke or tea or something (no alcohol) whilst we chatted and got to know each other. I learned a lot about the apartheid oppression and also about the bush. One of the four, called Bethel, saved me from getting bitten by a cobra. It had slithered up a drainpipe and I was about to put my hand in to grab the tail and yank it out with a view to caving its head in. Well you can’t have snakes slithering around our living quarters can you? When Bethel stopped me, he poked a stick into the drainpipe only to find that the head came out first. Somehow the snake had turned round in the narrow confines. He knew and I didn’t. He dispatched the cobra with one quick blow.

In Bahrain where I served for nearly two years at the naval base we conformed to the local laws when off station particularly during Ramadan. We didn’t walk around town smoking a fag or drinking a bottle of coke. We respected the local customs. On station was a different matter though. So why can’t the Muslims do the same in the UK?

I am not basing my argument purely on colour Gayle, although a person’s appearance is a good indication of where they come from even if it is one or two generations removed. A person’s colour is only an indication of where they come from and not who they are.

But to get back to the ‘veil’ issue. When a motorcyclist enters certain premises s/he is asked to remove the crash helmet so that s/he can be identified. You can’t sit in a job interview wearing a crash helmet. If a veiled driver is stopped by the police for something and they produce their driving license the cop will ask them to remove the veil for identification purposes. Otherwise how will he know if the license really belongs to the person showing it?

Where a crash helmet protects the head and face in the event of an accident it still hides the face and so does a veil even if you can see the eyes. Refusal to remove the veil on pseudo religious grounds is an affront to our laws and could be seen as confrontational. For me the choice is simple – either conform to our laws and requirements or do not put yourself into a situation where your religious beliefs will clash with our laws and requirements.

British laws and way of life has priority if there is a culture clash.