Her case fuelled the debate on full-face veils, originally sparked when Commons leader Jack Straw said he asked Muslim women to remove veils when they visited his constituency advice surgeries.

Prime minister Tony Blair also added his voice to the debate saying the full-veil was a "mark of separation".

I think this is a really interesting issue. A woman was fired from her teaching job for wearing a full face veil. She is suing (of course), but the Prime Minister got involved and made some comments about the need for dialog about the integration of British Muslims into society.

On the one hand, you've a right to freedom of religion. But I think it goes without saying that wearing these things goes beyond simple religious expression to the point where it becomes deliberately anti-social. I've been told that Muslim women want to wear them. I'm concerned that this is a bit like the arguement that southern slaves were comfortable and didn't want to be free. The objective truth about the social position of these people is not justified by the fact that they have grown accustomed to it and find it comfortable or even desirable.

I think its probably reasonable to ask that these things not be worn in particular professional contexts. If my religion required me to wear a dead rat on a chain around my neck I imagine I would also have trouble getting a job.

I'm generally interested in the dialog between British Muslims and the rest of their society. There is a radical fringe there. The people who attacked the underground summer before last were locals. They grew up in Leeds. There seems to be, on some level, a unhealthy lack of rejection in regard to certain events by some of the spokesmen for the British Muslim community. There was a press release put out just a few days after the airplane "liquid bombers" were arrested which essentially said "this wouldn't happen if your foreign policy conformed with our views." Something worries me that having grown up in England these people have looked at the IRA as a model for how to behave. In any event, I think that the global dialog between western and Islamic society is going to start here. This is the space to watch.

BBC NEWS | Politics | MP tells veil woman 'let it go'