Over a hundred young children, including babies, have been directed to the Government’s Prevent program, which aims to counteract extremism.
Recent statistics reveal that in the span of eight years leading up to 2024, the initiative received referrals for 45 babies under one year old.
Among these, 29 were flagged due to fears of exposure to Islamist extremism.
For toddlers aged one and two, 91 referrals were made during the same timeframe, with 67 relating to Islamist concerns.
Furthermore, the program was notified about 75 three-year-olds, with 54 of these cases linked to Islamist issues.
Experts believe these referrals are part of protective efforts for young children, stemming from radicalization concerns involving a parent or older sibling.
In all there were 388 referrals for children below school age over the eight year period, showed the Home Office data, which was obtained by the website Hyphen.
In 2021 it emerged that a four-year-old boy had been referred to Prevent after talking about the Fortnite video game at his after-school club.
The Government’s Prevent anti-extremism scheme has been accused of a number of failings, including its handling of Southport killer Axel Rudakubana, pictured
The scheme was notified about the Muslim boy from the West Midlands two years earlier after he said his father had ‘guns and bombs in his shed’.
However, transcripts of a conversation with a club worker later revealed that he was talking about weaponry used in the video game.
In 2016, nursery workers suggested a four-year-old boy who mispronounced the word ‘cucumber’ as ‘cooker bomb’ should be referred to the counter-terrorism project.
The Asian family said concerns were raised with them after the child drew a picture of a man cutting the vegetable with a large knife.
Nursery staff in Luton, Bedfordshire, told the child’s mother they believed he was saying ‘cooker bomb’ when he was asked about the drawing, and discussed referring the case to the Home Office programme.
Nursery staff discussed referring a four-year-old to the Prevent scheme after believing he had said ‘cooker bomb’, when he had actually mispronounced the word ‘cucumber’
However, the case was eventually referred to police and social services panel instead, who decided not to take further action.
In the same year it was claimed a ten-year-old Muslim boy was visited by police after he wrote ‘terrorist house’ instead of ‘terraced house’ during a school lesson.
His father, from Accrington, Lancashire, branded it a ‘joke’ and said police had been ‘very rude’ when they came round to seize the family laptop.
Alexander Gent, chairman of the National Association of Muslim Police, said of the new figures: ‘I struggle to understand how this applies to someone so young, especially for children who are babies and can’t even speak or even comprehend what an extremist ideology is.’
Home Office data published last week showed referrals to Prevent spiked by more than a third in the wake of the Southport attack.
There were 6,350 cases referred to the Government’s flagship programme between the day of the murders, July 29 last year, and the end of March.
It marked a 34 per cent jump on the same period in 2023-24.
But the scheme still appears to be underplaying the jihadist threat and focusing on Right-wing extremism, despite warnings raised about the imbalance in an official report published nearly three years ago.
Nearly 1,800 cases of suspected far-Right extremism were referred to Prevent in the year to March, compared with just 870 cases of suspected Islamist extremism.
A major report published in 2023, commissioned by the Home Office, warned Prevent had become ‘politicised’ because officials feared being labelled Islamophobic or racist.
The review by Sir William Shawcross, former head of the Charity Commission, said: ‘At present, 80 per cent of the Counter Terrorism Police network’s live investigations are Islamist while 10 per cent are extreme Right-wing.
‘The fact that only 22 per cent of Prevent referrals for the year 2020-21 concerned Islamism suggests a loss of focus and failure to identify warning signs.’
However, the latest data shows the proportion of Islamist referrals has slipped to just 10 per cent of the total.
Overall there were a record number of referrals with 8,778 individuals flagged to the scheme in the year, up 27 per cent, according to Home Office data.
If someone is believed to pose a threat they can be put on the Government’s ‘Channel’ scheme which aims to address their behaviour.
However, Prevent has made a series of high-profile errors.
Southport attacker Axel Rudakubana, who fatally stabbed three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class, was referred to Prevent three times but his case was closed.
The scheme was also criticised for failing to address the activities of the murderer of MP Sir David Amess in 2021 and the 2017 Parsons Green Tube bomber, among others.
A Home Office spokesman said that in the ‘rare instances where a young child has been exposed to harmful terrorist narratives’, intervening early ‘can provide vital safeguarding measures’.
‘All referrals to Prevent are carefully assessed based on the specific details of the case,’ they added.
‘If a child is found to not be at risk of radicalisation, the case is immediately closed to Prevent.
‘They may be referred to other appropriate services, or no further action may be taken.’
