18 people every week referred for extremism
EIGHTEEN people a week in the North West are being referred to the Government’s anti-extremism programme – and nearly a third are aged under 15.
Counter-terrorism figures show there were 948 referrals to the Prevent programme in the region in the 12 months to the end of March 2016.
Of those, 284 were for children aged under 15 – more than for any other age group.
A further 281 were aged 15-20, 153 were aged 21-30, and 72 were aged 31-40. A total of 75 were aged 41 or more, while in 83 cases the age was not specified.
That means some of those might have been young children, too.
The data, released by the Home Office, shows than in 623 cases – roughly two thirds – the concern flagged up to authorities was of Islamist extremism.
In 94 cases it was right-wing extremism, while 148 cases listed ‘other’ concerns and in 83 cases the concern was not specified.
More than a third of the total referrals in the North West – 357 in all – were made by teachers or other people working in education.
A total of 180 were made by police, 102 by council staff, 76 by health workers, 49 by members of the community and six by the Prison Service.
Only 27 were made by friends and family.
Not everyone who is referred through Prevent ends up receiving support or proving cause for concern. ●
Nationally there were 7,631 referrals in 2015-16 and 36% left the process requiring no further action.
Men and boys made up 78% of nationwide referrals.
London had the most referrals, with 1,915.
The Prevent strategy, published in 2011, forms part of the Government’s wider counter-terrorism programme.
It aims to stop people from becoming terrorists, or supporting terrorism.
Anyone concern that someone is at risk can flag this up with council or police teams for assessment.
Police perform initial screening and only a relatively small number of people end up receiving in-depth support packages via a multi-agency programme called Channel.
In 2015-16, for example, only 381 people received Channel support.
The new figures are for the first year in which a new Prevent ‘duty’ has come into force, with a large number of agencies receiving training in terms of their role and responsibilities in terms of flagging up potential concerns.