Criticisms of Islam
In 2009, Lord Pearson and cross-bencher Baroness Cox invited the Dutch Freedom Party leader, Geert Wilders, to show the anti-Islam film Fitna before the House of Lords. Jacqui Smith, then Home Secretary, subsequently excluded Wilders from entry to the UK. In response, Pearson and Cox accused the then Government of "appeasing" militant Islam. Wilders appealed successfully against his exclusion, and the film was eventually shown in the Lords in 2010.
Pearson warned in 2013 that UK Muslim communities were home to "thousands of potential home-grown terrorists". He said Sharia law was "running de facto in our land" and that calls for violence were not simply coming from a "few extremists", stating: "These people hate us with frightening religious fervour and we are right to fear them." His comments were condemned by Sayeeda Warsi, the Minister of State for Faith and Communities, who responded by stating: "It points at best to an ignorance about Islam and at worst a deliberate attempt to perpetuate a distorted image of the faith."
In 2014, Pearson suggested that the Quran had inspired the murder of Lee Rigby, referring to "the violence in the Qur'an – and indeed in the life and the example of Muhammad". Member of Parliament Yasmin Qureshi called Pearson's words "lies" and "nonsensical rubbish", while another MP, Khalid Mahmood, called them Islamophobic and said: "Obviously he hasn't read the Qur'an. Islam is about submission to the Almighty. It is not about war against anybody else."
Pearson invited Tommy Robinson to Parliament in 2018. A UKIP spokesperson said that Pearson had invited journalists to report on a question he asked in the House of Lords about grooming gangs and that Robinson was one of 160 people contacted by Pearson.
On 14 May 2019 he spoke to Baroness Cox's debate in the Lords "To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress has been made in the prevention of grooming gangs in Rotherham and elsewhere; and what assistance they have offered to victims and their families", during which he said:
I fear we must start by accepting the perpetrators are indeed radical Muslims.They should not be confused with other, decent men of Pakistani and Asian origin. Noble and Islamophiliac Lords may not like me saying that, but the excellent Quilliam Foundation found that it is true of 83% of the criminals concerned. If anyone is in any doubt, they should read Peter McLoughlin’s 2016 masterpiece Easy Meat: Inside Britain’s Grooming Gang Scandal, which should be compulsory reading for the Government.
I have mentioned before in your Lordships’ House the tenets of abrogation, Taqiyya, Al Hijra, the lesser jihad and the pursuit of a world caliphate. However, there is another, which may lie at the root of the grooming gang scandal: namely, the radical Muslim tenet known as, ‘what your right hand possesses’. I am advised that this allows Muhammad’s followers to have sex slaves among their captives and among non-Muslim, or kuffar, girls. The trouble is that as soon as you start talking about radical Islam, you are immediately accused of Islamophobia, even if you can say what you like about any other religion. … If we turn a blind eye to the fact that the vast majority of grooming gang criminals are radical Muslims, we fuel the voices of extremism. That is exactly what is happening.
In 2023, it was revealed that Pearson and Baroness Cox were members of a secret group called the New Issues Group, which had been operating out of the House of Lords for over a decade and collaborated with far-right, anti-Muslim activists. Pearson has been described as a part of the counter-jihad movement.
