UK ‘failing’ to stop radicalisation

Hazel Blears, who as Communities Secretary helped lead the Prevent strategy, warned too much focus had been on policing and security measures rather than supporting integration.

She backed Prime Minister David Cameron’s creation of a task force to crack down on extremism but added there was “much more to be done”.

Ms Blears, a member of the Intelligence and Security Committee, said the Government was right to review the Prevent strategy in 2011.

But she added: “What I am concerned about now is that the Prevent programme work that was being done in local communities with local authorities appears to have been abandoned and the Prevent programme now is purely run by the Home Office, who are doing everything they can through the police but there’s a whole range of other work that needs to be done, particularly with young people, with women, getting that sense of British values and working very much at a local level where these problems are.”

She said it was “far too simplistic a view to say that integration and trying to prevent extremism are two entirely separate things”.

“I actually think it’s really important for young people in communities to feel that this is their community and that way you stop the next generation being groomed into extremism,” she said. “I think the two things do have a connection.”

She said that simply banning extremist preachers from television screens or blocking their websites would not be enough. “I don’t think this is simply a matter of banning things, you have to take on this ideology and that way you have to empower young people, people right across communities, to say ‘this is not our religion, this is not our belief’ and to tackle the extremists themselves.”

“This is a long term, generational, strategy and my concern now is we have to get back on this agenda. I’m delighted that the Prime Minister is launching a task force on extremism, I think that this is an acknowledgement that there’s much more to be done.

“I think we have to, all of us, pull together on this, it’s so important for the country.”

Home Secretary Theresa May has questioned the BBC’s decision to give airtime to Anjem Choudary, former leader of banned Islamic group Al Muhajiroun, and also hinted at a stronger role for regulator Ofcom.

But Tory MP Mark Reckless said that any move towards a blanket broadcast ban on extremists, similar to that imposed on Sinn Fein during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, should be a “last resort rather than the first response”.

Mr Reckless, a member of the Home Affairs Select Committee, did, however, say it was a mistake to give a platform to Mr Choudary following the Woolwich attack.

“I think to give that particular individual the sort of platform you gave was a mistake. Whether we go further and there’s a role for government, as with Sinn Fein in the 1980s, I think that is harder but it is certainly something the Home Office is considering.

“I think that’s sensible to at least look at the arguments but I do think in the meantime it’s very important for broadcasters to exercise proper editorial judgment.”

Liberty director Shami Chakrabarti said: “You criminalise speech when it crosses the line into inciting violence and murder. When it’s just bad taste and extremist views I think the future is about taking it on in heated debate.

“If people are making editorial mistakes then we have a debate about that. But we don’t want politicians censoring the media.”

Comment: Page 10.