CapX: Why does the Prevent counter extremism strategy ignore Northern Ireland?

Earlier this month the Counter Extremism Project put on an event to examine how to maintain the momentum of ‘Prevent’, the national counter-radicalisation security strategy.

The event was a response to an independent government review, which found this strand of our counter-terrorism plan severely wanting.

It may surprise readers to know that Prevent and its legal obligation for public authorities to pay ‘due regard’ to stopping people getting involved in terrorism does not apply at all in Northern Ireland.

The explanation is that Prevent was set up to counter radicalisation from international terrorism, not the domestic sort which died down in the Province after the Good Friday Agreement, but has never been fully extinguished.

Indeed, new research by Queens University Belfast reveals ten areas across NI where paramilitary crime and the coercive control it exerts left ordinary people scared, intimidated and unsafe.

Routinely, well over half of those interviewed by the ‘Communities in Transition’ survey said a better relationship with police including greater police presence would make them feel safer.

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