by Poppy Wood, Telegraph
A Church of England school is at the centre of a row after claims that children were asked to participate in a Muslim prayer.
Richard Tice, the deputy Reform UK leader, has written to Dame Sarah Mullally, the Archbishop of Canterbury, over allegations that a primary school in his Lincolnshire constituency encouraged seven-year-old pupils to kneel and bow their heads in the style of an Islamic prayer.
Mr Tice received a complaint from a parent in his Boston and Skegness constituency last week, who claimed that seven-year-old pupils were “coerced, manipulated and cajoled” into the act “despite none of the children in the classroom being of the Islamic faith”.
The father claimed his seven-year-old daughter’s class was shown a video of people kneeling on prayer mats in the direction of Mecca and reciting a prayer to Allah during a religious education lesson last Wednesday, before being told to “have a go” themselves.
He said he was shocked when he was putting his daughter to bed last week and she said: “We did prayers to Allah yesterday.”