On September 25, Tanweer “Tan” Ikram, Deputy Chief Magistrate of England and Wales, refused bail to Daniel Thomas, the anti-immigration activist better known as Danny Tommo, at Basingstoke Magistrates’ Court. Thomas has pleaded not guilty to criminal damage over an allegation that he punctured a small boat by organized criminals to ferry migrants across the English Channel. The migrants had already left it, with only one rescue worker who appeared to be in no danger still aboard. Nevertheless, Ikram said he was “satisfied there is a real possibility of an immediate custodial sentence in this case.” The trial is listed for March 2027.
With far more serious criminals, many of them migrants, being granted bail on a regular basis, the decision reignited the longstanding debate in Britain over “two-tier” justice, with Ikram, in particular, often being accused of treating suspects perceived as politically incorrect or right-leaning with disproportionate harshness. Significantly, he is one of the most senior magistrates in the country, a prominent diversity official, a member of the commission that selects judges, and an adviser to a Pakistani organization that attacked Reform MP and former Home Secretary Suella Braverman for calling out Pakistani grooming gangs.
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Beginnings.
Tanweer Ikram was born in Slough, west of London, to Pakistani parents. A 2018 profile in Counsel magazine, unearthed by independent journalist Steven Edginton, reveals that he grew up partly in Pakistan and then had to “re-integrate during his primary school years.”
His early career was not promising: he switched to law from engineering, graduated with a lower second-class degree, and initially failed to pass the Bar. He entered the legal profession eventually, however, admitting to using his ethnicity as “a bit of an advantage.”
Soon after reaching the bench, he became the Deputy Lead Diversity and Community Relations Judge. Under former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative government, he was made a CBE—Commander of the Order of the British Empire—“for services to judicial diversity.” In December 2023, still under the Conservatives, he joined the Judicial Appointments Commission for a three-year term, allowing him to help select new judges.
EXCLUSIVE: Tan Ikram, deputy chief magistrate, is an adviser to a Pakistani organisation that referred to “so-called ‘grooming gangs’” and called Suella Braverman’s comments about British-Pakistani gangs “reprehensible”.
My investigation reveals:
• He targeted Bradford to…
— Steven Edginton (@StevenEdginton) September 30, 2026
“We Need You.”
On July 15, 2024, speaking to Women in Law Initiative Pakistan, Ikram described a recruitment trip to Bradford, a city in northern England known for its large Pakistani population. “Bradford is one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the UK. [There are] lots and lots and lots of Pakistani practitioners in practice in that area, and I specifically went there to reach out to that particular group of lawyers,” Ikram said, adding: “I’ve worked with the British Pakistani Professionals Forum… to try to reach out to Muslim Pakistani background lawyers to try to encourage them to apply.”
The British Pakistan Foundation lists him as an adviser, and in a 2021 foundation webinar, he stated: “The judiciary has to represent the community it serves. We want there to be true diversity in the judiciary and as an old adage goes, we need you.”
Significantly, the foundation’s public line on Pakistani Muslim grooming gangs in Britain is highly contentious. In 2023, after Suella Braverman, then Home Secretary, spoke about the involvement of British-Pakistani men in group sexual exploitation of girls, the foundation objected to what it called “so-called ‘grooming gangs.’” In an open letter to then-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, it wrote: “The divisive and dangerous way in which the Home Secretary is seeking to portray all British Pakistani males and insinuating that the community is complicit in their actions is reprehensible.”
Fiona Goddard, a survivor of Pakistani-led grooming gangs, told Edginton: “I find Tan Ikram’s association with the British Pakistan Foundation deeply concerning as a survivor of Pakistani grooming gangs.” She added: “To call them ‘so-called grooming gangs’ is an insult to all survivors. Why is a senior judge connected to such a partisan group?”
Ikram is also listed as visiting faculty at the Pakistan College of Law. At an event in Pakistan in October 2018, he complained to an audience of Pakistani politicians and jurists about media attacks on the judiciary for its rulings against Brexit during the EU withdrawal negotiations, complaining, “One cannot underestimate the power of [the] media, but problematically the Government stayed silent, giving into the right of [the] media’s freedom of speech.”
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‘Two-Tier’ Tan.
Ikram is most infamous for what his critics perceive as “two-tier” sentencing, handing down draconian punishments to alleged racists while treating ethnic minority terrorists with a light touch.
In February 2024, he handed non-custodial sentences to three women convicted of a terrorism offense for glorifying Hamas paragliders after the October 7 massacres in Israel. “You crossed the line, but it would have been fair to say that emotions ran very high on this issue,” he told them, confirming that he had “decided not to punish” the defendants.
Soon afterward, it emerged that he had ‘liked’ a strident pro-Palestinian post on his LinkedIn account. He received a formal misconduct warning in June 2024.
In December 2024, he handed a suspended sentence to Victoria Thomas Bowen after she pleaded guilty to assault by beating and criminal damage for throwing a milkshake over Nigel Farage, leader of the Reform UK party. Farage said at the time, “We now live in a country where you can assault a Member of Parliament and not go to prison. The latest example of two-tier justice.”
In August 2023, Ikram acquitted transgender activist Sarah Jane Baker of intentionally encouraging an offense. Baker had told a rally: “If you see a TERF [Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist], punch them in the fucking face.” Ikram insisted that it was possible Baker had been seeking attention and publicity without intending anyone to act on the words.
Meanwhile, in June 2022, he handed a former police officer James Watts a 20-week prison sentence for sharing allegedly racist memes in a private WhatsApp group.
Setting the Tone.
As Deputy Lead Diversity and Community Relations Judge, Ikram helps oversee a national network of diversity judges. In 2018, he cited Labour lawmaker David Lammy’s review of racial disparity in the criminal justice system and asked: “Why is it that a country which prides itself on diversity, equality and justice has so many people of colour languishing in prisons?” He added: “We don’t reflect the face of the society that we serve.”
He has also organized meetings between Islamic clerics and judges, and discussed his Islamic faith in official channels.
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Ikram holds a leadership rank in the magistrates’ courts, a seat on the commission that chooses judges, and an advisory role at a foundation that downplays “so-called” grooming gangs. Coupled with his seemingly unequal treatment of the people appearing before him, many will question whether he is truly suitable for the bench.
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