A charity that has worked for 37 years for greater cohesion between different UK faith communities is expected to close down next week after the government signalled it would scrap its funding.
The Inter Faith Network (IFN) is due to close after Michael Gove, the communities secretary, said he was “minded to withdraw” £155,000 of provisional funding over concerns about a trustee connected to the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB).
In a letter to the network’s co-chairs on 19 January, Gove said: “It has come to my attention that a member of the MCB has been appointed as a trustee of the Inter Faith Network.
“Successive governments have had a longstanding policy of non-engagement with the MCB. The appointment of an MCB trustee to the board of the Inter Faith Network – a government-funded organisation – poses a reputational risk to government. I am therefore minded to withdraw the provisional offer of £155,000 of new funding for 2023-24.”
In 2009, the then Labour government suspended cooperation with the MCB after accusing its leaders at the time of supporting violence against Israel. The policy has been continued by Conservative ministers, despite a change of leadership at the MCB.
Hassan Joudi, a former assistant secretary general of the MCB, was appointed as one of 22 trustees of the IFN last July. The network said due diligence checks were made when appointing trustees.
The IFN said it had never been told that government funding was conditional on not having a trustee with links to the MCB. “The IFN has also never been advised … to seek to expel the MCB from membership on grounds such as the government’s position of non-engagement,” its co-chairs said in their reply to Gove’s letter.
They said that more than 500 national, regional and local Muslim organisations, mosques, charities and schools were members of the MCB. “Although the government can choose not to engage with it, that is not a sensible option open to the IFN if it is to achieve the purposes for which the government funds it in the first place.”
The IFN receives almost two-thirds of its annual funding from the government, with the rest coming from trusts, faith communities and individual donors. The network includes Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Sikh, Hindu, Buddhist, Bahá’í, druid, Jain, Latter-day Saints, pagan, spiritualist and Zoroastrian organisations among its members.
It strives to “advance public knowledge and mutual understanding of the teachings, traditions and practices of different faith communities in Britain … and to promote good relations between people of different faiths in this country”.
The network said it could not continue to operate without government funding, despite other fundraising efforts.
Narendra Waghela, one of the IFN’s co-chairs, said: “It would be a very serious loss to the UK for the Inter Faith Network to be forced into closure – particularly during these turbulent and difficult times, which throw into sharp relief the importance of work to encourage and support dialogue and cooperation between people of different faiths and to increase religious literacy and tackle prejudice.”
A spokesperson for the MCB said: “At a time when communities in our country should come together, there is a desperate need for independent initiatives such as the the IFN who, for over 30 years have forged dialogue and cooperation between faiths.
“Many will find it baffling that the government would choose to do so much damage to interfaith relations as it pursues an ideologically vengeful campaign based on spurious grounds.”
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, which Gove is in charge of, said all funded organisations were subject to due diligence processes. A spokesperson declined to comment on the IFN funding.
