Racial and Religious Hatred Bill

My Lords, I have a better recollection. My noble friend asked me to apologise to the Muslim community for having upset them. There is a very small distance between having upset people and having incited hatred, especially once this Bill is passed. People will easily leverage upset into hatred. I genuinely was at the wrong end of that experience, and as noble Lords know, whenever I speak I do incite controversy. I know that my time is running out. Lastly I would say this one thing. I am worried about the imams. I am seriously worried about the imams who are now accused of preaching hatred. I am worried about their free speech. I mean that genuinely. People have a right to believe what they believe. I can stand up and denounce anything I like. They may want to denounce Christians or Jews or Hindus—whatever it is. Most religion is involved in hating other religions. That is essential religion. If you are a monotheist then you believe that your God is true and every other God is false, and therefore you go around saying, ““These people believe in this false God. They are idol worshippers””. Unless those acts of speech really lead to violent acts or a reason to believe in violence, why should we stop them from preaching whatever they preach? If they want to preach their religion, let them preach their religion. I am afraid that this Bill will be much worse for Muslims than for anybody else.