Labelling this phenomenon an “Asian” crime is therefore an evasion. It also insults the largest single ethnic minority group in the UK – Hindu Indians – who consider themselves Asian, and the many East Asians who have made the UK their home. Neither group has been even remotely associated with these crimes.

What the perpetrators have in common is their proclaimed faith. They are Muslims, and many of them would claim to be practising. It is not Islamophobic to point this out, any more than it would be racist to point out that the most active persecutors of LGBT people come from countries where most people are, like me, black.

If we are going to call a spade a spade, then we should do so without embarrassment. But our elites have replaced their old fear of being called racist with a new bogey. It comes to something when the BBC prefers to risk being condemned for racism than expose itself to the charge of Islamophobia.

Trevor Phillips is the former chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission