The UK’s wide-eyed welcome to Islamic banking
by Tim Dieppe, The Conservative Woman:
IN 2013, then Prime Minister David Cameron said: ‘I want London to stand alongside Dubai and Kuala Lumpur as one of the great capitals of Islamic finance anywhere in the world.’
His wish is fast coming true. Western financial institutions in the UK have welcomed Islamic finance with open arms. Today, more banks are compliant with Islamic finance in the UK than in any other Western country. The UK also tops the world league table as the largest provider of Islamic finance courses, with offerings at around seventy educational institutions.
In 2014, Britain made history by becoming the first non-Muslim country to issue a sovereign Islamic bond.
So what exactly is ‘Islamic finance’? It is based on the idea that the Qur’an prohibits all forms of interest. But this is actually a modern, radical interpretation of the Qur’an. The truth is that Muslims have borrowed and lent money with interest throughout history, and most still do so today. What the Qur’an historically prohibits is usury, or extortionate interest, and that is how the Qur’an has been interpreted in mainstream Islamic thought, and how it is still understood by most Muslims today.
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