Prevent Duty Toolkit

Wednesday 5th September 2018 Written Statements

[The Minister for Security and Economic Crime (Mr Ben Wallace)]

The aim of the Prevent duty, commenced as part of the Counter Terrorism and Security Act 2015, is to reduce the threat to the UK from terrorism by stopping people being drawn into terrorism or supporting terrorism.

The statutory guidance which accompanied the Prevent duty was the starting point for the implementation of Prevent across sectors and places a duty on specified authorities to have “due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism”. A range of sector-specific advice to supplement the statutory guidance and further support duty implementation across sectors has since been issued.

The Prevent duty has made a significant positive impact in preventing people being drawn into terrorism. To further support the local government sector, the Office for Security and Counter-Terrorism has worked across government and with local partners to publish practical advice in the form of a toolkit. The toolkit supplements information provided in statutory guidance to ensure local authorities are effectively supported in implementing the Prevent duty. This toolkit does not replace the statutory guidance.

The publication of the Prevent toolkit is based on three years of productive engagement with the local government sector since the introduction of the duty, and illustrates examples of good practice to promote continuous improvement. It will support the practical delivery of Prevent by local authorities by providing information, implementation guidance, a self-assessment framework and case study examples to support local authorities and their partners in delivering the Prevent duty locally.

The toolkit has been published today and I will place a copy of it in the Library of the House. It has also been made available on Gov.uk at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prevent-duty-toolkit-for-local-authorities-and-partner-agencies

[HCWS934]