The Telegraph reported a few days ago that the Law Society will be giving a training course in sharia this summer.
Wtf?
A new training course being run by the Law Society this summer is described as an “introduction to Islamic Sharia law for small firms”.
What the hell. Sharia is not law in the UK. Period. In the UK, law is what is enacted by Parliament, it’s not any old thing that’s called “law” by one group or another. Sharia is a religious thing, not a legal thing. It’s not something the Law Society should be giving “training” in.
Critics said the fact that the Law Society was offering training in Sharia law created the “perception” that it was now “a legal discipline”.
Exactly; I say the same thing.
The Sharia Law event at the Law Society’s headquarters on Chancery Lane, central London on June 24 has already sold out.
It offers training in Sharia law covering wills and inheritance, family and children and corporate and commercial law.
The course is billed as “a forerunner to a planned future seminar series on Islamic law”, the Law Society said.
The Society said: “This event will set you thinking on an important area of client service as our expert and authoritative speakers highlight some basic concepts and requirements of the Islamic Sharia applicable to these practice areas.”
Some basic “requirements” – which are not requirements at all unless you buy into the religion and into the idea that the religion’s laws are “requirements” for you. Religious “laws” have no powers of enforcement to back them up; they are wholly dependent on the religions that purport to issue them, thus they have nothing to do with the Law Society and the Law Society should not be meddling with them.
The Telegraph apparently asked Charlie Klendjian about it.
Charlie Klendjian, a spokesman from the Lawyers’ Secular Society said: “It creates an ever increasing perception to the public and also to the legal profession that Sharia law is a legal discipline.
“Sharia law is not a legal discipline, it is theology and we can’t constantly keep giving it this credibility and it is certainly not for the Law Society to be doing that.
“It is damaging to the perception of the primacy of English law, and that is what the Law Society don’t appreciate.”
Which is quite astonishingly obtuse of them. Is the sharia training going to deal with how old a girl should be before she can marry? Is it going to deal with forced marriage? “Honor” violence? Children’s rights? Women’s rights? It will be interesting to find out.