In response to reports that the Green Party’s crime and justice working group has proposed scrapping Prevent, Rebecca Barnes, Racial Justice Campaigner at Amnesty International UK said:
“A discussion on scrapping the ineffective and discriminatory Prevent programme is long overdue. It is clear that Prevent stigmatises and disproportionality targets racialised and Muslim communities, as well as children or neurodiverse people, who often need support rather than being treated as potential terrorists. Meanwhile extremism and racism continue to rise and Prevent’s own data shows it to be ineffective to meet this challenge. Data released last year shows that despite record levels of referrals, 80% of cases were not deemed in need of intervention by Channel, the UK government’s deradicalisation programme. We hope the Greens will adopt this policy and other parties follow suit.”