Agenda item

To receive an update on the delivery of the Prevent initiative within Haringey.

Christina Andrew, Prevent Policy Officer, provided an update to the Panel on progress with the Prevent initiative. 

She stated that she was unable to share data regarding referrals with the Panel as this had been deemed sensitive.  Haringey had become a Prevent local authority in 2012 and the scheme was currently funding the post of Prevent Co-ordinator, which she was covering at the moment.  The Home Office had also recently announced funding for a schools officer who would assist in providing support for training in schools. 

Prevent was funded by the Office of Security and Counter, Terrorism (OSCT) which had an oversight of annual delivery plans, funding, monitoring and evaluation of projects.  Prevent work was led locally by the Haringey Prevent Delivery Group (HPDG) which was a partnership group and reported to the Community Safety Partnership (CSP).

Haringey had been selected to take part in the Dovetail Pilot.  This provided the Council with greater responsibility for the functioning of the Channel Panel, which brought together a range of partners, including the Police, health and schools.  It also now included a psychiatric nurse as many people referred had mental health issues.  However, few referrals came directly from mental health services.  The Channel Panel was considered to be working well.

Ms Andrew reported that there had been an increase in hate crime in the last quarter.  There were a number of factors that were felt could have contributed to this, including Brexit, and these were being investigated.  Training on third party reporting had been delivered to several faith institutions, Registered Social Landlords and voluntary and community sector organisations in Haringey. More sessions were being planned to ensure that there was a range of organisations able to support people and to provide additional options for people not comfortable with reporting directly to the Police.

She stated that Haringey was receiving funding from the Home Office to deliver two community based projects in 2016/17:

·         Web Guardians was a scheme delivered by the Jan Trust that aimed to build knowledge amongst mothers of internet usage and online safety of their children; and

·         The Young Leaders Project was being delivered in CoNEL and Haringey Sixth Form College and aimed to build young people’s leadership skills whilst educating them on the Prevent strategy and related issues such as community cohesion and engagement.

Training has been delivered to schools and governors across the borough as well as refresher sessions were being delivered to school senior leadership teams and designated safeguarding officers. In addition,  all schools and council services were required to have a Prevent specific section in their policies.

Although she was not at liberty to disclose the number of referrals, Ms Andrew reported that they had been lower in recent months than those of other Prevent boroughs.  Most referrals came via schools.  In addition, significant numbers were received from the Police and Homes for Haringey. 

In answer to a question, she reported that project with the Jan Trust was aimed at reducing the risk of children and young people being groomed on line through providing mothers with basic IT skills.  She stated that clusters of intolerance could be followed up on as well as situations where people had expressed sentiments that could be interpreted as inflammatory. 

AGREED:

That the report be noted.