School Prevent referrals rise – but fewer get support
More from this theme Recent articles Schools are increasingly referring children to the government’s anti-terrorism programme, but fewer than one in ten youngsters got support through the Prevent scheme, data seen by Schools Week reveals. Earlier this week it was revealed that Axel Rudakubana, the teenager who murdered three little girls in Southport last summer, was referred three times to Prevent. He was this week jailed for a minimum of 52 years after pleading guilty to the killings. Although his violent behaviour was concerning, Rudakubana was judged on each occasion not to pose a terrorism risk. Government data seen by Schools Week shows his is not an isolated case. In the year to April 2024, two in five school referrals were found to involve a vulnerable child, but one deemed not to be driven by a terrorist ideology. That meant more than 1,000 cases from schools were classed as “vulnerability present but no ideology or CT [counter-terrorism] risk” – an increase of 140 per cent since before Covid. It was the highest of any Prevent …