Sefton Council is failing in multiple areas related to the Government’s counter-terrorism Prevent programme, a new report has revealed.
The Prevent strategy is a nationwide multi-agency programme published in 2011, as part of the overall counter-terrorism strategy, CONTEST. The aim of the Prevent strategy is to reduce the threat to the UK from terrorism by stopping people from becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism.
Sefton Council has legal responsibilities under Prevent, overseen by the Council’s Safer Sefton Together (SST) committee.
Sefton’s compliance was recently assessed by a Prevent regional advisor in ten criteria, in which six showed that “statutory responsibilities are not being met” according to an SST report.
Areas requiring improvement included training, risk assessments, and communications.
Upon receiving the report in June, the committee agreed to form a sub-group to work on the necessary improvements; however, as the report details: “No volunteers have been forthcoming to form this important sub-group that will deliver the statutory responsibility on behalf of SST”
Sefton Council refused to comment officially on the disclosure but confirmed that they were working closely with the Home Office on those areas that require improvement.
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