Prevent Strategy

Baroness Fullbrook Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

It is our intention that there will be different responsibilities for those matters. We will allow the Department for Communities and Local Government to identify how it wishes to operate its integration strategy. I believe that hon. Members will hear more from my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government on the wider issues of community cohesion, participation in society and integration in due course. We will bring together a joint board to ensure that all activity takes place against the Government’s overall objectives in this area. I expect that that board will look at the interface between the Prevent strategy and the integration strategy of the Department for Communities and Local Government. We will not label the DCLG work as part of the Prevent strategy, and it will not be part of the counter-terrorism strategy run by the Home Office.

[Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend reassure my constituents in South Ribble that these reforms will ensure that the Prevent programme is properly focused and, above all, more effective than it has been?

[Mrs May]

I welcome my hon. Friend to the House following her recent illness. It is good to see her back in her seat. It is certainly our intention to monitor how money is spent on Prevent to ensure that it is spent effectively. In looking at the programmes that work, we will ensure that the decisions that are made are fully evidence-based.