New government documents obtained by Rights & Security International (RSI) in relation to Prevent monitoring show what they believe is an incoherent and underinformed approach among officials toward the referral of autistic people to the Prevent and Channel counter-terrorism programmes.
RSI states that these documents also point to incoherent and, in their view, careless approaches to assessing Prevent’s other equality impacts, particularly where race and religion are concerned. These deeply flawed practices showing a seeming indifference to potential ableism, racism, Islamophobia and other discrimination have persisted for years.
RSI obtained a report on Channel and autism that the Home Office commissioned from a market research firm then known as Ipsos MORI (now Ipsos) and that was completed in 2021. It also obtained three EIAs from 2023 that pertain to Prevent, Channel, and the Home Offices response to an external review of Prevent completed by Sir William Shawcross in February 2023.
Read the full statement here.
