Giving Compass' Take:

• Imogen Calderwood highlights issues that face Muslim women in England, emphasizing economic issues over the burqa debate. 

• How can funders help support Muslim women in culturally sensitive ways? What challenges do minority women face? 

• Learn how to support Muslim-American communities. 

In total, there are around  2.7 million Muslim people in the UK. While there are no official estimates of the number of women who wear veils, it’s reportedly very few. In France, for example, which has a larger Muslim population than the UK, it’s no more than a couple of thousand women.

But this debate about burqas stretches significantly further. Against a background of Brexit, which has already divided the nation, it’s become about migration, integration, and Islamophobia — with some raising concerns that it has the potential to encourage violence.

For James Kirkup, director of the Social Market Foundation, an independent London-based think tank, the “suggestion that this is a debate about the welfare and freedom of Muslim women is a little hard to swallow.”

“There are social and economic problems that affect far more Muslim women: They’re more likely to be in poor health, less likely to be employed, and less likely to speak functional English than any other group,” he added, in an article for CNN.

“If a fraction of the political energy expended on the burqa debate focused on those issues, things might just improve for those women, and the country as a whole," he said.

One of these issues, for example, is that Muslim women are the most economically disadvantaged group in British society, according to the women and equalities committee.

“We have found the reasons behind this to be varied and complex,” the committee said in a 2016 report. “They include: discrimination and Islamophobia, stereotyping, pressure from traditional families, a lack of tailored advice around higher education choices, and insufficient role models across education and employment.”

Read the full article about Muslim women in England by Imogen Calderwood at Global Citizen.