We also remember the three young innocent victims of the savage attack in Southport: Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe, and Alice da Silva Aguiar. Their lives were cruelly cut short at a Taylor Swift dance class.
It is clear that these victims were failed by the system, because the killers were encountered by the Prevent system, but were not stopped by it.
Over recent years, there have been a number of failings in the way that Prevent has handled cases, which has on some occasions led to tragic outcomes.
While we should be vigilant to the evolving threats that we face, we cannot shy away from the facts.
Islamist extremism is the single biggest challenge that we face as a country. As Lord Anderson’s report said, the objective of Prevent is to stop people from becoming terrorist or supporting terrorism.
Islamists are responsible for 94% of all deaths caused by terrorism since 1999 and around 88% of injuries caused by terrorism over the same period. Last year, Islamists accounted for 80% of the police’s counter-terror caseload, 75% of MI5’s and 63% of terrorists in custody.
Despite this, only 13% of the Prevent caseload relates to Islamist extremism. The disparity is so stark, and the only conclusion can be that Prevent is under-engaging those with Islamist ideologies.
It is clear from this report that Prevent is not working in the way that it should.
The Conservatives want to see the recommendations of the Shawcross Review fully implemented. The Shawcross Review identified the fact that Prevent’s definition of extremist Islamist ideology is too narrow.
In our view the Government should not be losing focus on the ideological threats we face.
Of course, we must combat those who have a fascination with extreme violence, but this must not be done at the expense of our response to those with extreme Islamist ideologies which remain by far the largest threat.
We recently marked the 20th anniversary of the Islamist terrorist murder of 52 innocent people on July 7th 2005. We also all recall the terrible murders of 22 at the Manchester Arena by another Islamist killer. Prevent must not overlook the threat that Islamism poses.
We will be watching the Government’s response to the review into Prevent carried out by Lord Anderson very closely.