Once again, politicians are debating what Muslim women should and should not wear, without ever thinking to consult us.

Pontificating about what Muslim women wear is nothing new in this country. It feels like every year or so, there’s a new round of cries to “ban the burka!” or save us from the cloths on our heads or faces.

This latest instance was ignited by a question asked by Reform MP Sarah Pochin in Prime Minister’s Questions earlier this month, who asked whether Keir Starmer was intending to follow European countries in banning face veils. Kemi Badenoch, clearly desperate to stay relevant to rightwing voters, then bizarrely suggested the burka be banned in the workplace — despite so few British Muslim women wearing it in the first place, let alone in the office.

At times like these, I am harshly reminded that what politicians argue over in the halls of power has real repercussions for the lives of visibly Muslim women like me. As they discuss the intricacies of which types of veils are acceptable and which should be rendered illegal, they push Muslim women further and further from the fringes of society. We are already disenfranchised and maligned, statistically some of society’s lowest earners and most overlooked for job opportunities, but as politicians rationalise our humanity, we become a symbol of anti-Britishness itself. And that renders us actively unsafe as we go about our everyday lives.

We saw that instances of islamophobia rose by 374% in the aftermath of Boris Johnson infamously referring to covered Muslim women as “letterboxes” in 2018. Friends of mine who wear the niqab actually had “letterbox” hauled at them as a slur in the street, and it inspired a new wave of casual islamophobia towards anyone who looked identifiably Muslim.

As, once again, our religious dress becomes a political football to pander to the extreme views of certain voters, I am fearful of what this will mean for visibly Muslim women in our everyday lives and in the workplace.

Khadijah, a lawyer in central London who wears the hijab and abaya (a long, loose dress), has identified a marked difference in the way clients have interacted with her in the past couple of weeks, with one even asking to be seen by an “English lawyer” instead. Iman, an anti-abuse campaigner, has been met by those in her close circle, suggesting that Islamophobia in the UK is fabricated and exaggerated. Halima, a mother of three who covers her face on a daily basis had racist abuse hurled at her children in a park. In a climate in which Islamophobia has already risen by 73% in the last year, national discussions like this make Muslim women even less safe than we already were.

What’s ironic is that a common reason for banning face veils is that they are misogynistic. But I have felt more controlled and silenced by white feminists who assume I have no bodily autonomy than I ever have by a cloth on my head. Likewise, safety concerns about what malicious things could be hiding under a burka dwindle into insignificance compared to the very real safety concerns that Muslim women like me have when islamophobia is at a record high in Britain.

Covered Muslim women are the most hypervisible and controversial face of Islam. In the public eye, we symbolise everything that makes Muslimness antithetical to Britishness, and as political discourse continues to sour towards us, it is women who wear the hijab and niqab who are disproportionately impacted by rising Islamophobia. What politicians do in the name of supposedly protecting us, actually demonises us and makes us a public enemy to rally around.