Businesses should dictate on burka ban, Badenoch says
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has said employers should be able to decide if their staff can wear burkas in the workplace.
Badenoch also said people who come to her constituency surgeries must remove their face coverings “whether it’s a burka or a balaclava”.
Badenoch posted a video on X of part of her interview with the Telegraph, in which she said: “My view is that people should be allowed to wear whatever they want, not what their husband is asking them to wear or what their community says that they should wear.
“I personally have strong views about face coverings.
“If you come into my constituency surgery, you have to remove your face covering, whether it’s a burka or a balaclava.
“I’m not talking to people who are not going to show me their face.
“Organisations should be able to decide what their staff wear for instance, it shouldn’t be something that people should be able to override.”
She added that France has a ban and has “worse problems than we do in this country on integration”.
Reform’s new MP triggered fresh row
On Wednesday, Reform’s newest MP Sarah Pochin asked Sir Keir Starmer during Prime Minister’s Questions whether he would support such a ban.
Reform UK deputy leader Richard Tice said his party has “triggered a national discussion”.
Asked if he wants to ban burkas, Mr Tice told GB News on Sunday: “We’ve triggered a national discussion. I’m very concerned about them (burkas).
“Frankly, I think they are repressive. I think that they make women second-class citizens.
“We’re a Christian nation. We have equality between the sexes, and I’m very concerned, and if someone wants to convince me otherwise, well come and talk to me.
“But at the moment, my view is that I think we should follow seven other nations across Europe that have already banned them.”
He called for a debate on the topic to “hear where the country’s mood is”.
Meanwhile, shadow home secretary Chris Philp said “employers should be allowed to decide whether their employees can be visible or not”, when discussing face coverings.
Asked on the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme if the Conservative Party’s position is not to speak to people who cover their face, Mr Philp said of Mrs Badenoch: “Well she was talking specifically about her constituency surgery I think, and it is definitely the case that employers should be allowed to decide whether their employees can be visible or not.
“But I don’t think this is necessarily the biggest issue facing our country right now.
“There’s a legitimate debate to have about the burka.
“You’ve got, obviously, arguments about personal liberty and choice and freedom on one side, and arguments about causing divisions in society and the possibility of coercion on the other.
“That is a debate I think we as a country should be having, but as Kemi said, it’s probably not the biggest issue our nation faces today.”
Asked if he would talk to people who would not show their face, the Croydon South MP said: “I have in the past spoken to people obviously wearing a burka – I represent a London constituency – but everybody can make their own choices, that’s the point she was making, each employer should be able to make their own choices.”
By Jordan Reynolds, PA