page_title: Islam in the United Kingdom
section_title: Politics
hierarchical_section_title: Islam in the United Kingdom / Politics
caption_attribution_description: English: An image of Baroness, Manzila Pola Uddin
context_page_description: Islam is the second largest religion in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with results from the United Kingdom 2011 Census giving the UK Muslim population in 2011 as 2,516,000, 4.4% of the total population. The vast majority of Muslims in the United Kingdom live in England: 2,660,116. 76,737 Muslims live in Scotland, 45,950 in Wales. London has the greatest population of Muslims in the country. The majority of Muslims in United Kingdom adhere to Sunni Islam, while smaller numbers are associated with Shia Islam.
  During the Middle Ages, there was some general cultural exchange between Christendom and the Islamic world, however, there were no Muslims in the British Isles. During the Elizabethan age contacts became more explicit as the Tudors made alliances against Catholic Habsburg Spain, including with Morocco and the Ottoman Empire. As the British Empire grew, particularly in India, Britain came to rule territories with many Muslim inhabitants; some of these, known as the lascars are known to have settled in Britain from the mid-18th century onwards.
context_section_description: Muslims are playing an increasingly prominent role in political life. Nineteen Muslim MPs were elected in the December 2019 general election, and there are nineteen Muslim peers in the House of Lords.
  The vast majority of British Muslims vote for the Labour Party, however there are some high-profile Conservative Muslims, including former Minister for Faith and Communities and former Co-Chairman and the Conservative Party Sayeeda Warsi, described by The Guardian as a 'rising star' in the Tory party. The Guardian stated that "The treasury minister is highly regarded on the right and would be the Tories' first Muslim leader." Salma Yaqoob is the former leader of the left-wing Respect Party. Sayeeda Warsi, who was the first Muslim to serve in a British cabinet, was appointed by David Cameron in 2010 as a minister without portfolio. She was made a senior minister of state in 2012. In August 2014 she resigned over the government's approach to the 2014 Israel-Gaza conflict.
  Muslim political parties in Britain have included the People's Justice Party (UK), a Pakistani and Kashmiri party that won city council seats in Manchester in the 2000s, and the unsuccessful Islamic Party of Britain, an Islamist party in Bradford in the 1990s.
  In the 2017 general election, 15 Muslim MPs (12 Labour and 3 Conservative) were elected, up from 13 Muslim MPs in 2015 general election. In the 2019 general election, a record number of 19 Muslim MPs were elected (15 Labour and 4 Conservative), including Imran Ahmad-Khan.
caption: Pola Uddin, Baroness Uddin was the first Muslim female to sit in the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
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