Britain has 85 operational Sharia courts. Has it become 'western capital' of Islamic councils?
57/100
Verdict
Low Trust
Mixed Reliability — Core Sourced Claims Broadly Corroborated, but Contested Figures Presented as Fact and Critical...
The article is a second-hand aggregation (WION, published on or about 18 December 2024) of a paywalled investigation by The Times into sharia councils in England and Wales.
✓ 8 checks out
✕ 4 disputed
? 8 unverified
Full analysis The complete summary ⌄
The article is a second-hand aggregation (WION, published on or about 18 December 2024) of a paywalled investigation by The Times into sharia councils in England and Wales. Its central factual planks — that the first British sharia council was founded in Leyton in 1982, that roughly 100,000 Islamic marriages in Britain are unregistered under civil law, that Professor Mona Siddiqui chaired the 2018 independent Home Office review, and the verbatim quotations from National Secular Society chief executive Stephen Evans and preacher Haitham al-Haddad — are corroborated by parliamentary, governmental and reputable secondary sources. Two problems drag the score down. First, the headline figure of '85 operational Sharia courts' is a contested and dated estimate: it originates with a 2009 Civitas report that itself said the true number was 'indeterminate' and counted online forums, while the 2018 Home Office review gave a range of 30 to 85 and stressed the absence of reliable data. Presenting it as a settled count of 'operational' courts is misleading. Second, and more seriously, the article repeatedly calls these bodies 'courts' and describes a 'parallel legal system' without ever stating the decisive legal fact — confirmed by the 2018 review — that sharia councils have no legal jurisdiction in England and Wales, and that only bodies operating under the Arbitration Act 1996 can produce binding outcomes, and then only in civil/financial disputes. The claims unique to The Times (the Islamic wills app with a drop-down for up to four wives, 'sharia court approval' of that app, and Muslims travelling from Europe and North America to use British councils) could not be independently verified from primary evidence and rest on a single unlinked, unnamed original; they are marked Unverified rather than false. Presentation issues include zero hyperlinks to the underlying Times report or the 2018 review, no named authorship, heavy unrelated navigational clutter scraped into the body, and a single-sentence right of reply for al-Haddad. Emotive language is restrained (emotion_score 0.09), but the framing is selective, and the reader is left with a materially inflated impression of the legal authority of these bodies.
What checked out (8)
- 'The first such court was first established in the country in 1982' — Corroborated: the Islamic Sharia Council was formed in 1982 in Leyton, east London, and is consistently described in parliamentary written evidence and reference sources as the first such body in the UK. Sources: https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69029/html/ ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Sharia_Council ; https://www.npr.org/2008/10/27/96162078/sharia-councils-spark-debate-in-britain
- 'Around 100,000 Islamic marriages have been conducted in the country that are not registered officially with the civil authorities' — Corroborated as an established estimate: parliamentary written evidence cites an estimate of as many as 100,000 couples living in Islamic marriages not recognised by English law, and the 2018 Siddiqui review is widely reported as concluding that about 100,000 Muslim women had had religious ceremonies without being legally married. Supporting survey data: a Channel 4/True Vision Aire survey of British Muslim women found around 60–61% had only a nikah. Sources: https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/68996/html/ ; https://lawandreligionuk.com/2018/03/14/breaking-news-government-to-publish-green-paper-on-integration-and-sharia/ ; https://www.channel4.com/press/news/new-channel-4-survey-reveals-truth-about-muslim-marriage ; https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8747/
- 'Theologian and Professor Mona Siddiqui, in an official review...' — Corroborated: Professor Mona Siddiqui of the University of Edinburgh chaired the independent review into the application of sharia law in England and Wales, published by the Government on 1 February 2018 (Cm 9560). Sources: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-statements/detail/2018-02-01/HLWS432 ; https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/the-independent-review-into-the-application-of-sharia-law-in-engl/ ; https://divinity.ed.ac.uk/news-events/latest-news/archive/2018/professor-mona-siddiqui-leads-independent-review-i
- Attribution of the 'classical period' of Islamic jurisprudence to roughly the 7th to 13th centuries — Corroborated as a standard scholarly periodisation of the development of Islamic legal doctrine. Sources: https://www.britannica.com/topic/sharia/Development-of-different-schools-of-law ; https://www.anthroencyclopedia.com/printpdf/1201
- Stephen Evans is chief executive of the National Secular Society and the quoted words ('undermine the principle of one law for all'; 'Sharia councils only exist because Muslim women need them to obtain a religious divorce. Muslim men do not need them because they can unilaterally divorce their wife') are reproduced identically in independent contemporaneous coverage of the same Times investigation. Sources: https://www.gbnews.com/news/britain-sharia-law-courts-western-capital ; https://www.secularism.org.uk/opinion/authors/845 ; https://www.battleofideas.org.uk/2018/speaker/stephen-evans/
- The al-Haddad quotation ('A man should not be questioned why he hit his wife because this is something between them. Leave them alone. They can sort out their matters among themselves.') is documented in evidence submitted to a UK parliamentary committee and repeated by third-party commentators, so the words attributed to him are genuine in substance. Sources: https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69029/html/ ; https://christianconcern.com/comment/government-says-sharia-courts-in-line-with-british-values/
- The article's core sourcing claim — that a Times investigation described Britain as the 'western capital' for sharia courts — is corroborated by multiple independent outlets reporting on the same Times piece in December 2024, including coverage of political reaction to it. Sources: https://www.gbnews.com/news/britain-sharia-law-courts-western-capital ; https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-shadow-justice-secretary-slammed-demanding-end-sharia-courts-uk
- That polygamous marriage cannot lawfully be contracted in the UK (the implicit premise behind the article's 'normalised polygamy' framing) is accurate: bigamy is a criminal offence and polygamous marriages may not be performed in the UK, though those validly contracted abroad may be recognised. Sources: https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN05051/SN05051.pdf ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygamy_in_the_United_Kingdom
Disputed claims 4 claims ⌄
- DISPUTED (not false): 'There are 85 operational Sharia courts or councils in Britain.' The figure derives from a 2009 Civitas report that said 'at least' 85 while conceding the true number was indeterminate and while counting online forums; Full Fact has challenged its use, University of Reading research identified around 30 councils in England and Wales in 2012, and the 2018 Home Office review put the range at 30–85 with an explicit caveat about the lack of accurate statistical data. Presenting 85 as a current, precise count of 'operational' bodies is not supported. Sources: https://fullfact.org/law/are-there-80-sharia-courts-britain/ ; https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CDP-2019-0102/CDP-2019-0102.pdf ; https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69030/html ; https://www.sochfactcheck.com/there-are-not-over-100-sharia-courts-in-the-uk/
- DISPUTED/MISLEADING (not false): repeated use of the word 'courts' and the framing of 'parallel legal systems'. The 2018 Home Office review confirmed that sharia councils hold no legal jurisdiction in England and Wales; they are informal advisory/religious bodies, and only arbitration under the Arbitration Act 1996 can bind parties, and then only in civil or financial matters. The article never supplies this context. Sources: https://theconversation.com/sharia-law-isnt-taking-over-britain-its-an-inevitable-legacy-of-its-colonial-legal-history-267262 ; https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69151/html/
- DISPUTED (not false): the opening claim that in Britain 'men are allowed to end their marriages just by uttering the word "divorce" thrice'. Unilateral talaq by a husband is a real and widely criticised feature of religious divorce practice, but 'allowed' overstates matters — such a pronouncement has no effect in English civil law, and the Islamic Sharia Council has told Parliament that it refuses to accept the validity of triple talaq pronounced in one sitting. Sources: https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/75507/pdf/ ; https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8747/
- NOTE (page-integrity, not an article claim): the captured text contains a large block of unrelated navigational headlines, including celebrity, disaster and geopolitical items. These are site furniture rather than assertions of the piece, but their presence in the body degrades the readability and auditability of the article and should not be scored as claims.
Unverified claims 8 claims ⌄
- The existence, identity and functionality of the Islamic wills application with a drop-down menu for the number of wives (one to four) — reported only via The Times and outlets recycling it; the app is never named, and no primary artefact (app store listing, screenshot, developer statement) was located. Corroborating but non-independent echoes: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/sharia-courts-exploit-britain-rich-070000707.html ; https://www.gbnews.com/opinion/muslim-sharia-courts-uk-growth
- 'The Sharia court has approved this application' — no named council, no approval document, and no council response located; the approving body is unidentified and therefore unverifiable.
- 'Across Europe and North America, a lot of Muslims are seen to be going to these Sharia courts in Britain' — no caseload data, council records or academic study located to quantify or confirm cross-border demand; the assertion traces solely to The Times summary. Echoed without new evidence at https://thenationalpulse.com/2024/12/19/islams-western-capital-at-least-85-sharia-courts-in-uk-100000-sharia-marriages-conducted/
- That Haitham al-Haddad 'founded one such court' — parliamentary written evidence describes him as having sat as a judge on the Islamic Sharia Council (founded 1982 by other organisations) and as now running a separate body, while some commentators call him a founder; the founder attribution is inconsistent across sources and is not established. Sources consulted: https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69029/html/ ; https://christianconcern.com/comment/government-says-sharia-courts-in-line-with-british-values/ ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitham_al-Haddad
- That the al-Haddad lecture was delivered specifically 'in an online lecture in 2009' — the quotation is documented, but the 2009 date and online format were not confirmed against a dated primary recording or transcript.
- The anonymous testimony (women saying hadiths were cited to compel sexual relations; an elder suggesting a 'pleasure marriage') — unverifiable anonymous single-source accounts behind a paywall; plausible and consistent with themes in the 2018 review, but not independently confirmable.
- That daughters receive exactly half the inheritance of sons under the specific app's default settings — the 2:1 male-to-female share is a well-known classical rule, but the app-specific implementation could not be independently inspected.
- The article's implied currency: no publication date, byline or dateline is present in the supplied text, so its recency relative to the December 2024 Times investigation cannot be confirmed from the content itself.
Sources & how we checked Search journal, source grades, confidence ⌄
Confidence
Medium-High (0.74) — Confidence is high for the claims testable against primary UK parliamentary and governmental material: the 1982 Leyton founding, the 100,000 unregistered-marriage estimate, the Siddiqui review's authorship and publication date, the councils' lack of legal jurisdiction, and the contested provenance of the '85' figure were each confirmed against multiple dated primary or authoritative sources. Confidence is lower for the material unique to The Times — the wills application, its drop-down for up to four wives, the claimed approval by an unnamed council, the anonymous women's testimony, and the assertion of cross-border demand from Europe and North America — because the original is paywalled, the app is never named, and every corroborating item located derives from the same upstream report rather than independent verification. That single-source dependency, together with the article's missing byline and date, is the principal constraint on the assessment. Consistent with the guardrails, no claim has been adjudicated False; contested items are marked Disputed with the contradicting dated sources identified, and unconfirmable items are marked Unverified. The trust score would move upward if the underlying Times investigation were made inspectable and the app and approving council were named, and downward if the app claim were shown to have been mischaracterised.
Search journal
Times investigation sharia courts Britain western capital Islamic councils
- https://www.wionews.com/world/britain-has-85-operational-sharia-courts-has-it-become-western-capital-of-isl...
- https://www.gbnews.com/news/britain-sharia-law-courts-western-capital
- https://ground.news/article/britain-becomes-western-capital-for-sharia-law-courts-as-85-open-throughout-the-uk
how many sharia councils in UK estimate 85 research
- https://fullfact.org/law/are-there-80-sharia-courts-britain/
- https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CDP-2019-0102/CDP-2019-0102.pdf
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69030/html
- https://www.sochfactcheck.com/there-are-not-over-100-sharia-courts-in-the-uk/
Islamic Sharia Council Leyton founded 1982 first in Britain
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69029/html/
- https://talkabout.iclrs.org/2025/09/02/islamic-law-in-the-uk/
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Sharia_Council
- https://www.npr.org/2008/10/27/96162078/sharia-councils-spark-debate-in-britain
unregistered nikah Islamic marriages England Wales 100,000 estimate
- https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8747/
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/68996/html/
- https://www.kingsleynapley.co.uk/insights/blogs/family-law-blog/islamic-marriages-are-you-really-married-un...
- https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-8747/CBP-8747.pdf
Mona Siddiqui independent review into the application of sharia law in England and Wales 2018 findings
- https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-statements/detail/2018-02-01/HLWS432
- https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/the-independent-review-into-the-application-of-sharia-law-in-engl/
- https://divinity.ed.ac.uk/news-events/latest-news/archive/2018/professor-mona-siddiqui-leads-independent-review-i
- https://www.theyworkforyou.com/wms/?id=2018-02-01.HCWS442.h
Haitham al-Haddad lecture wife beating 2009 quote sharia council
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69029/html/
- https://christianconcern.com/comment/government-says-sharia-courts-in-line-with-british-values/
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitham_al-Haddad
Stephen Evans National Secular Society sharia councils one law for all quote
- https://www.secularism.org.uk/opinion/authors/845
- https://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2016/05/theresa-may-launches-review-of-sharia-law-in-england-and-wales
- https://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2024/05/nss-signs-statement-opposing-religious-courts
The Times December 2024 sharia courts investigation Islamic wills app polygamy daughters half inheritance
- https://uk.news.yahoo.com/sharia-courts-exploit-britain-rich-070000707.html
- https://slguardian.org/britain-becomes-sharia-capital-with-easy-divorces-and-polygamy/
- https://www.wionews.com/world/britain-has-85-operational-sharia-courts-has-it-become-western-capital-of-isl...
sharia councils are not courts legal status arbitration England Wales Arbitration Act 1996
- https://theconversation.com/sharia-law-isnt-taking-over-britain-its-an-inevitable-legacy-of-its-colonial-le...
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/69151/html/
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/68996/html/
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/73895/pdf/
triple talaq UK Muslim men unilateral divorce sharia council 2018 review
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/75507/pdf/
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/75507/html/
- https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8747/
- https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=acdbb98d-0b57-47df-a928-34c2cca83446
"western capital" sharia courts Times investigation Fariha Karim December 2024
- https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-shadow-justice-secretary-slammed-demanding-end-sharia-courts-uk
- https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news/britain-is-the-western-capital-of-anti-women-sharia-courts/
- https://thenationalpulse.com/2024/12/19/islams-western-capital-at-least-85-sharia-courts-in-uk-100000-shari...
Channel 4 survey 2017 Muslim women nikah not legally married 60 per cent
- https://www.channel4.com/press/news/new-channel-4-survey-reveals-truth-about-muslim-marriage
- https://academic.oup.com/ojlr/article/7/3/427/5075173
polygamy illegal UK bigamy Offences Against the Person Act polygamous marriage abroad recognition
- https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN05051/SN05051.pdf
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygamy_in_the_United_Kingdom
- https://vardags.com/law-guide/legal-marriage-requirements/bigamy-and-polygamy
2018 sharia review classical period seventh to thirteenth century jurists definition sharia report
- https://www.britannica.com/topic/sharia/Development-of-different-schools-of-law
- https://www.anthroencyclopedia.com/printpdf/1201
2018 independent review sharia "100,000" couples unregistered Islamic marriages estimate Home Office
- https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/68996/html/
- https://lawandreligionuk.com/2018/03/14/breaking-news-government-to-publish-green-paper-on-integration-and-sharia/
Article metrics
The article we checked Full text as retrieved ⌄
Britain is said to be emerging as the “Western capital” of Sharia Courts, where men are allowed to end their marriages just by uttering the word "divorce" thrice.
In an investigation carried out by The Times, it was discovered that polygamy has been normalised and there is an application in which Islamic wills can be created by Muslims living in England and Wales.
The application has a drop-down menu in which the men fill in how many wives they have, which generally ranges between one and four.
Add WION as a Preferred Source[](
The Sharia court has approved this application, which gives daughters half of the amount of inheritance that is given to the sons.
There are 85 operational Sharia courts or councils in Britain. The first such court was first established in the country in 1982.
Across Europe and North America, a lot of Muslims are seen to be going to these Sharia courts in Britain that work like informal organisations and issue religious rulings on family life and marriage, reported The Times.
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As per the report, around 100,000 Islamic marriages have been conducted in the country that are not registered officially with the civil authorities.
Theologian and Professor Mona Siddiqui, in an official review, said that Sharia was defined as jurisprudence on the basis of the opinions expressed by jurists in the classical period of Islam, which is from the 7th century till the 13th century.
Most Muslim countries have modified various aspects of Sharia, however, in the case of marriage and divorce, they have generally observed the classical rulings.
## **Experts and women raise concerns over Sharia courts**
The National Secular Society expressed their concern over the existence of such parallel legal systems in Britain.
Society's chief executive Stephen Evans issued a warning that such councils "undermine the principle of one law for all" and the rights of women and children are negatively impacted.
"It should be remembered that Sharia councils only exist because Muslim women need them to obtain a religious divorce. Muslim men do not need them because they can unilaterally divorce their wife," Evans said.
**Watch:Iran Pauses Crackdown On Strict Hijab Laws Amid Ongoing Protests**
Meanwhile, women complained that religious texts were being used to control them and hadiths were being quoted by men to force their wives into sexual relations.
A woman said that an elder had also suggested that she should enter a religiously sanctioned "pleasure marriage".
Radical preacherHaitham al-Haddad, who founded one such court, in an online lecture in 2009 said, “A man should not be questioned why he hit his wife because this is something between them. Leave them alone. They can sort out their matters among themselves.”
Speaking to The Times, Haddad said that he does not preach not questioning men for beating their wives but only explains why marriages should be preserved.
_(With inputs from agencies)_