Don't Act So Surprised, Warsi

Seriously, Baroness Warsi, you've got some nerve.

Prejudice against Muslims has "passed the dinner-table test" and become socially acceptable in the UK, a senior Conservative is to say.

Baroness Warsi will say anti-Muslim prejudice is now seen by many Britons as normal and uncontroversial, and she will use her position to fight an "ongoing battle against bigotry".

So then, what else do you think is going to happen when you scare a country witless?

In the last decade, we have been subjected to hysterical 'security measures', from stop and search powers under the Terrorism Act to body scanners at airports. We've seen the abandonment of historical liberties such as habeas corpus by way of detention without charge and control orders, not to mention RIPA. As a result, institutions are so spooked by it all that nail clippers are confiscated from hand luggage and you can't now even take a fork into the Natural History Museum to eat your lunch with.

All this - we are told - because the likelihood of a terrorist attack is "highly likely".

And you wonder why the public are prejudiced against a religion which contains some who have prompted the government to take away our freedoms, thereby hugely inconveniencing our way of life on a daily basis?

"It's not a big leap of imagination to predict where the talk of 'moderate' Muslims leads; in the factory, where they've just hired a Muslim worker, the boss says to his employees: 'Not to worry, he's only fairly Muslim'," she will say.

"In the school, the kids say: 'The family next door are Muslim but they're not too bad'.

Well, Warsi, if you want to see such attitudes evaporate, perhaps government could take the lead by putting a stop to the perpetual scaremongery, and returning the civil liberties which over-reactive politicians have stripped away.

Ready when you are, dear.