Rudd defends Prevent scheme on Leeds visit
HOME SECRETARY Amber Rudd yesterday issued an unequivocal defence of the Government’s counter-extremism programme, after a civil liberties charity called for the controversial policy to be scrapped.
Mrs Rudd was speaking during a visit to Leeds, where she took a tour of Karma Nirvana, a charity which supports victims of honour crime and forced marriage.
Earlier in the day, charity JUST Yorkshire had published its damning independent review into a strand of the Prevent programme, which concluded that it is “counter-productive”, and is “brewing a climate of self-censorship and fear”.
Co-author and senior lecturer at Leeds Beckett University, Dr. Waqas Tufail, said: “Our independent report has engaged with grassroots perspectives and has highlighted the many harms of Prevent, particularly those impacting on Muslim minorities.” However speaking to
Mrs Rudd said she had met a women’s group earlier in the day which was working through Prevent on anti-radicalisation measures.
“One of the women said ‘I could find you a hundred people tomorrow to tell you about the great work that Prevent does’,” Mrs Rudd said.
“I think Prevent does fantastic work safeguarding families and children from all backgrounds, and we are determined to protect them all.”
She stressed that work was ongoing to fight extremism of all kinds, from the far right and radicalised Muslims.
During yesterday’s visit, the Home Secretary heard from vic- tims of honour based crimes, who urged the Government to retrain police and public sector workers to be LESS culturally sensitive, in order to stop criminals using it as a weapon to escape justice.
The plea was made directly to the Minister during a round-thetable discussion with clients and staff of the charity - and echoed some of her own comments earlier this month.
The Minister heard from several survivors of honour abuse, including a woman who was forced into a marriage after being tricked into going on holiday to Pakistan and a man whose gay Asian partner committed suicide after being rejected by his family.
Mrs Rudd said: “There’s nothing more powerful than hearing those individual cases, and the way they told those stories will stay with me forever.”
She acknowledged that “making sure that the police are well trained” was important, as was making forces “more aware of the sort of circumstances that could lead to the consequences that we heard here today”.