Geert Wilders is banned from entering the UK, due to the fact that the British government thinks he is inciting hatred. He is saying that Islam ‘is not a religion, it’s the ideology of a retarded culture’. He has compared the Koran to Hitler’s Mein Kampf and has demanded that the Islam Holy book is banned. ‘Not all Muslims are terrorists, but almost all terrorists are Muslims’ he told the Guardian newspaper a year ago.

So now Mr. Wilders has been out of the UK media for a while. Fortunately for him, he was invited to show his controversial film Fitna, in which is links the Koran to terrorism. The Dutch PM has said that the sole purpose of the film is to offend. Mr. Wilders won’t be showing his film there either, he is being prosecuted in the Netherlands for hate speech.

Is it right to ban people from entering the country just because we don’t like what they are saying? Doesn’t that clash with our firm belief in freedom of speech? Some people say yes, others no. I find little comfort in the fact that people from both sides are banned. Muslim clerics who incite hatred are expelled from Britain and banned from entering the country, but a Jamaican reggae singer was allowed in despite his homophobic lyrics. If the government insist on censorship, then censor them all. Not only the ones that will win you more votes.