Recommendation 10

HM Government · verbatim extract Accepted in Part

In February, the Home Office published clear guidance on Prevent thresholds, titled Key Principles of Prevent, to help ensure there is a shared understanding of the purpose of Prevent and the circumstances in which it should be used. These messages were reinforced and replicated in the Prevent Duty training packages (explained in more detail below). This guidance clearly sets out that, while ideology is an important consideration, it is not mandatory for a Prevent referral. Prevent is an early intervention programme, that must consider when someone is at risk of being radicalised to terrorism, rather than limiting Prevent to cases where a terrorist ideology has already taken hold. Prevent is a Counter-Terrorism capability, so where there is not a concern that someone may be drawn into terrorism, alternative local support services should be considered. The Government is considering the findings from Phase 1 of Sir Adrian Fulford’s inquiry alongside the recommendations made in Lord Anderson’s ‘Lessons for Prevent’ report. As Sir Adrian Fulford concluded, Prevent and Channel are not the answer for all such cases, however the Government has made improvements since the Southport attack in 2024 to strengthen the Prevent programme. To strengthen Prevent, we have launched a new Prevent risk assessment tool, changed the approach to repeat referrals so that cumulative risk is considered, introduced new guidance and training on a range of ideologies and threats, and have expanded the range of interventions available to people being supported by Channel. We have also introduced the role of Independent Prevent Commissioner. The Government has also strengthened the approach to knife crime, introducing stricter laws in the Crime and Policing Bill for online sellers of knives including strengthening age verification controls and checks at sale and delivery. We are also ensuring every child caught carrying a knife will now be given a mandatory, targeted plan to tackle the root causes of their offending. To address harms online, the Online Safety Act is a significant step forward and one of the most robust systems globally. Platforms now have duties to identify and remove illegal content and to protect children from harmful content, with Ofcom robustly enforcing these duties. Whilst Government has already begun to make improvements to help keep the public safe, there is much more to do. The Government will bring forward legislation to help tackle violence-fixated individuals in this parliamentary session. Proposed measures are a new offence for preparing a mass casualty attack, and measures to prevent the spread of extreme violence content online. On 20 April, the Government announced its commitment to set up a Home Office-led taskforce to develop a new approach to tackling the risk from such individuals. The taskforce will develop an approach to tackling the risk posed by violence fixated individuals and will run alongside Phase 2 of the Southport Inquiry. Prevent training The Home Office provides training for frontline professionals, those applying the duty in their day-to-day roles, to give them a solid understanding of Prevent, how to identify behaviours of concern, and how to make a Prevent referral (when appropriate). We currently provide two core training products: • Our e-learning provision, the Prevent duty training, which launched in 2022 is a free to access service for all sectors and the general public hosted on GOV.UK. This is composed of four modules which cover raising awareness of what Prevent is, how to identify behaviours of concern, how to make a referral and what the Channel process is. • Our Face-to-Face provision, which launched in 2024, is accessed by Prevent Trainers via a restricted training platform. It includes two courses: the Prevent Awareness course, which provides frontline staff with a more comprehensive and localised understanding of the Prevent process, ‘Notice, Check, Share’ and radicalisation risks; and the Extreme Ideology course, which is a specialised, supplementary resource that provides learners with an enhanced understanding of the ideological nature of terrorism, the importance of ideology, common narratives, and a summary of the current threat picture. To ensure that our training provision remains effective and reflects the latest policy position and threat from terrorism, we have embarked upon a full review of our current provision, with a view to refreshing its content over the course of the next year. The refresh will also include creating new video case studies, to support referrers in establishing whether their concern means a Prevent referral is appropriate. This content features antisemitism concerns. Organisations applying the duty can also choose to develop their own Prevent training or supplement it with additional training applicable to their sector and/or organisation.