The People’s Review of Prevent is an alternative review to the Government Shawcross Review.
This review provides a voice to the people most impacted by the Prevent Duty.
Prevent is described as ‘safeguarding’ children from harms. However, under Prevent, safeguarding is focused on protecting the wider public from children believed to be ‘risky’, rather than protecting children from harms.
Throughout our report we present case studies that show how real these harms can be and the distress they cause to children and their families and carers.
New legal child-specific terrorism orders should be brought in to tackle the growing numbers being arrested, the official adviser on terrorism law has told the UK government.
The Prevent strategy of the UK’s counter-extremism policy is out of step with the realities of British society, and its placing of religious communities of belonging under suspicion is counter-productive
The Department for Education has released its new Prevent Duty Self-Assessment Tool for Schools, designed to help Designated Safeguarding Leads and wider Senior Leadership Teams implement Prevent.
Communities Secretary Michael Gove and the Independent reviewer of the Prevent strategy William Shawcross addressed a profit-making pro-Prevent lobbying group, with mysterious funding, the Byline Times has revealed.
RICU, a mysterious communications unit within the Home Office, dedciated to “behaviour change activity in support of national security priorities”, has signed a £1m deal for “media monitoring and evaluation
Following the Trojan Horse Affair in Birmingham and the collapse of the Department of Education’s attempt to ban teachers under claims that they had an Islamist agenda, the 2015 version of Prevent, the UK government’s counter extremism strategy, included a statutory duty on schools to promote ‘British values’. This became part of the national curriculum on the back of the Birmingham Trojan Horse Affair, a deeply problematic precursor to any notion of ‘British values’. During this event it was claimed that teachers at Park View School were guilty of ‘Islamicising’ the school. In fact, no charges of extremism were brought against teachers, and the cases against the senior leadership team collapsed due to an ‘abuse of process’ by lawyers acting for the Department of Education, including non-disclosure of relevant evidence. The Trojan Horse Affair demonised an outstanding Muslim-majority school and made it the means to justify the teaching of the
Pro-Prevent lobby groups are currently arguing that the focus of Prevent should be redirected toward Islamism and away from the far-right, but is this just an excuse to play down their far-right agenda? The argument that Prevent is ‘failing’ and that it needs to refocus on so-called ‘Islamist extremism’ should be viewed in light of the ostensible justification of the ‘British values’ underlying Prevent. When ‘British values’ are linked to ‘national security’ The need to teach ‘British values’ as conceived by the government, frames the implementation of the Prevent pre-crime programme in schools. These values – on paper – are democracy, rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance of different religious faiths and beliefs. Their designation as ‘British’ is, of course, problematic. It implies that these ‘British values’ must be inculcated in ethnic minority citizens, yet we have seen that the claim is that most British Muslims share
Reappointed communities secretary Michael Gove opposes settling on a definition of Islamophobia, claiming it would bring ‘dangers’. The Independent’s home affairs editor Lizzie Dearden writes on Twitter that “Gove said he wanted to target “political Islam”, which he called a “virus”. He claimed there was “resistance in Whitehall”. Source: Government drops work towards official Islamophobia definition promised to combat anti-Muslim hatred in 2019 | The Independent
Suella Braverman is under pressure to answer fresh questions about alleged “security breaches”, as a former head of parliament’s intelligence and security committee warned the row threatened to undermine officials’ confidence in sharing sensitive information with her. Government insiders and a senior Conservative MP have challenged the account given by the home secretary and backed up by the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, saying that Braverman only owned up to it when she was confronted with the evidence, and not the other way around, as claimed by Sunak. Source: Doubts arise over Braverman’s claim to have come forward about code breach | Suella Braverman | The Guardian
Home Secretary Suella Braverman says the new Public Order Bill being put to MPs this week will stop demonstrators holding the public “to ransom”. But activists said they would not be intimidated by law changes aimed at “silencing non-violent people”. More than 350 Just Stop Oil protesters – demanding halts to all new oil and gas licences and consents – have been arrested in London since the start of October, according to Home Office figures. The new legislation – which will be put to MPs next week – will also see jail sentences of up to six months or unlimited fines for protesters accused of “locking-on” to people, objects or buildings. It would create a new criminal offence of interfering with infrastructure, which would carry sentences of up to 12 months in prison. In addition, police will be given new powers to take a more “proactive” approach to some protests.
