Counter-terrorism — House of Commons, 2015-03-24
Topic: Law and Crime
Diana Ruth Johnson (Labour, Centre-left): During the Bill’s passage, as the hon. Gentleman will know, members of the Scottish National party made a great deal of fuss about the involvement of the Scottish Government in consultation about the public institutions in Scotland that would be affected by the Prevent agenda. I was pleased to hear the Minister refer to the level of consultation that had taken place with the Scottish Government. I may be presuming too much, but perhaps the absence of members of the Scottish National party this afternoon means that they are fully content with what is being proposed. Obviously we must wait and see, but there is no one here to put an alternative case Let me now deal with some of the areas in which the revisions of the guidance have not addressed some of the shortcomings that I considered to be present in the first draft of the document. I believe that they have been raised both here and in the other place, and also in the responses to the consultation. The Minister said that there had been more than 1,700 responses, which is a very large number The first of those areas is the definition of extremism, which remains unchanged in the guidance. It is still defined as, basically, "an opposition to British values". The failure to define extremism is central to other problems that the Prevent agenda encounters, as was recognised in the 2011 Prevent review. Front-line professionals do not properly understand what extremism is. There is considerable evidence of that poor understanding. A survey conducted for the Department for Education in 2011 revealed that 70% of schools felt that they needed more training and information in order to build resilience to radicalisation. That was picked up repeatedly in the consultation responses, and it is also a clear issue in relation to the Prevent agenda. We know that only 20% of the people who have been referred to the Channel programme have been accepted. The overwhelming majority are incorrectly referred, because front-line professionals have misunderstood the nature of the issues involved It was a failure of the Government not to fulfil the commitments made in the 2011 Prevent review to improve front-line understanding of extremism, and it is disappointing that they are repeating their mistake by failing to include in the guidance either a detailed explanation of what constitutes extremism, or an explanation of how a risk assessment for extremism should be conducted. In Committee, I gave the analogy of child abuse: we will combat the issue only when we fully recognise it for what it is The failure to define extremism properly also means that the guidance fails to live up to the promise that the Home Secretary made yesterday to distinguish clearly between Islam and Islamic extremism. The definition of Islamic extremism is limited: an Islamic extremist is described as someone who is angry with the west and resents western intervention in wars in Muslim countries. The guidance talks of a "them and us" rhetoric. That ignores the fact that the majority of the victims of Islamic extremists are Muslims, and the fact that those who are most likely to encounter it in the United Kingdom are Muslims. There is still nothing in the guidance about intra-Islam sectarianism, such as involving Wahhabis, Salafists and those with other views that have been specifically connected to ISIL, in particular Salafism. There is no discussion of that important matter in the document. The Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 was supposedly a response to that rising threat from ISIL-related terrorism. Does the Minister think more can be done in recognising that intra-Islamic sectarianism is not properly addressed in the guidance Those British people who have been leaving the UK to join ISIL are not generally joining a war against the west. They are joining a war against other Muslims, mainly Shi’as. This document should recognise the changing nature of this threat, and the need to recognise the degree of sectarian division related to groups such as ISIL within the UK In addition to this thematic problem within the guidance, I want to highlight some of the practical issues. The consultation highlighted confusion over what exactly was expected of non-Prevent-priority local authorities. Given that the Government seemed to be confused about exactly what a Prevent-priority area is, I am not terribly surprised that this is not addressed properly in the revised guidance. There is existing confusion about the role of central Government and the division of responsibilities within central Government. For example, how exactly is the burden of oversight shared between the body specifically charged with inspection of implementation—for example, Ofsted for schools—the Government Department with responsibility for that public body, for example the Department for Education, and the Home Office? What about the role of Departments, such as the Departments for Business, Innovation and Skills and for Communities and Local Government, in sharing good practice Several different bodies raised concerns about this in the consultation. It will be helpful if the Government publish a clear strategy as to how they will help promote best practice in relation to Prevent. Some of the obligations on certain bodies are unclear. Neither the guidance, nor the Minister in the other place yesterday, have been clear as to exactly what is expected of a nursery or childminder in terms of their responsibilities under Prevent. So I ask the Minister again today to set out exactly what this guidance means in practice for a childminder An issue raised in the consultation, which I also raised during the passage of the 2015 Act, was why the only NHS bodies to be included in the guidance are hospital trusts and foundation trusts. Under the Health and Social Care Act 2012 many more services are now going out to the private sector. Are those private companies going to be covered by the obligations under Prevent? Why are clinical commissioning groups and other commissioning bodies not included? General practitioners at the front line may come across people who are vulnerable and who may perhaps have mental health issues; should GPs also be under some of the Prevent duties set out in the guidance, and if not, why not? On the health and wellbeing boards that the Government established, I assume that because they are part of a local authority, they also have a Prevent duty On the provisions for universities, I am glad the guidance is less prescriptive than before. The new guidance has dropped the requirement that all academic presentations have to be submitted and vetted two weeks in advance, which was both absurd and unworkable. However, it is bizarre that the third paragraph of the guidance relating to universities states that further guidance will be issued to cover extremist speakers on campuses. As the Minister will be aware, that was one the most contentious issues. Yesterday the Minister in the other place did not seem to be able to explain why this was or how the issuing of updated guidance would work. I heard what the Minister said about the new guidance being a matter for the next Government, but I wonder whether he can answer the following questions. First, does he think the requirement for all speeches and presentations to be submitted two weeks in advance will be included in the new guidance Secondly, can the Minister explain how the external speakers guidance will be implemented? Will it require a separate statutory instrument and, therefore, approval by Parliament? Will the rest of the document have different implementation guidance from the external speakers guidance? Will there be a separate consultation?