A full veil, covering the face, is an abomination and it should bebanned

I believe that all of us have the right to dress as we choose - within the boundaries of decency and commonsense. So if women for whatever reason want to dress all in black from head to toe, like Queen Victoria once did, that's fine by me. HOWEVER the issue of the veil, the full covering of the face, is not about dress. The covering of the face is a negation of individuality and it removes that person’s distinctness and personality. I lived in the Middle East for many years and I saw many women who covered their hair and wore traditional Islamic dress but who never covered their faces. I never had a problem with this. The face is the person – it is the principal source of identity and it is with the face that we communicate. This is my position on the subject:

"The only bit of Islamic dress that should be banned is the veil over the face. Covering the hair and having a loose fitting black garment over the body is in no way objectionable. There is confusion over terminology here so it is best to keep it simple. The face is the visible manifestation of our personality and our character. Cover it and we become anonymous human ciphers. If some nation states want to insist that their mature women wear veils in public I deeply regret it – but it is their call. In Britain it is our call and it should be disallowed. There is also, of course, the security point. The one thing that distinguishes us from one another is our face and that is the one part of our anatomy that identifies us. If it is right to monitor us with security cameras – I think that it is – then these cameras have to be able to identify us which means that they must record our faces."

Covering the face is an abomination and the French were 100% right to ban this practice – and we should follow suit.