Excerpt:
When I found out that Geert Wilders was planning to come to Britain and that Baroness Cox and Lord Pearson wanted to show his film, I wrote to the Home Office, the leader of the House of Lords and Black Rod to say that his presence would lead to the incitement of religious and racial hatred, which constitutes a public order offence.
I pointed out that Wilders is already facing a serious charge in his home country for inciting racial hatred. Furthermore, Cox and Pearson could hardly use an argument for free speech to justify giving him this platform because Wilders himself is calling for the banning of the Qur'an.
Wilders' film, Fitna, takes a lot of Qur'anic verses out of context and relates them to some terrible terrorist events, connecting them as though such acts are a religious teaching. I thought this would lead to extremist groups from both sides – far-right organisations like the BNP and extremist Muslims – rallying behind him.