The Prevent duty


Produced in partnership with Sam Rose of Penningtons Manches Cooper
Practice notes

The Prevent duty


Produced in partnership with Sam Rose of Penningtons Manches Cooper

Practice notes
imgtext

Since the introduction of the Counter-terrorism and security act which came into force in 2015 (CTSA 2015), certain ‘specified authorities’ have been under a statutory duty, in the exercise of their functions, to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism (known as the ‘Prevent duty’). This Practice Note considers the origins of this duty in the government’s overall counter-terrorism strategy (CONTEST) and in the particular context of the Prevent strategy. It covers the statutory basis of the duty and its scope and content, before considering its application to specific sectors, namely local authorities, schools and childcare, the health sector, prisons and probation and police.

Counter-terrorism strategy

CONTEST, the Government’s over arching counter-terrorism strategy, was first published in 2006 by the Labour government. The fourth version was published in June 2018 and acknowledges that the threat to the UK from terrorism is higher than when CONTEST was last published in 2011 evidenced by attacks in London and Manchester in 2017.

The aim of CONTEST is to:

‘…reduce the risk to the UK and

Sam Rose
Sam Rose

Solicitor, Penningtons Manches Cooper

Sam is a member of the education sector group at Penningtons Manches Cooper. She advises higher education institutions on governance; student disciplinary cases; fitness to study and fitness to practise; student disputes relating to teaching and assessment; freedom of expression; Prevent and Equality Act issues.
Ìý
She also advises on information law, including complex freedom of information requests and data subject access requests.
Ìý
Before joining the firm Sam worked as an education law specialist at the University of Oxford and as the Head of Strategic Litigation for the Consumers' Association (better known as Which?). As part of her role at Which?, Sam worked on projects considering consumer law compliance across the higher education sector, including looking at university advertising and student protection plans. She engaged with Government departments and regulators, including the Competition and Markets Authority and participated in the European Commission's REFIT exercise, reviewing the consumer law acquis.ÌýShe was also actively involved with BEUC (the European consumer organisation).

Read moreRead more
Powered by Lexis+®
Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom
Related legal acts:
Key definition:
Terrorism definition
What does Terrorism mean?

Terrorism in essence involves the use or threat of force for political, religious, ideological or racial causes.

Read more

Popular documents

Conduct of meetings—chairing, quorum and voting

Conduct of meetings—chairing, quorum and votingChairing meetingsIf the chairman of a local authority meeting (also referred to as the mayor or maer in a city or borough council where there is no directly elected mayor) is present at that meeting, they must preside.If the chairman is absent from a

Micklefield clauses

Micklefield clausesWhat is a Micklefield clause?It is common for employee share plans to provide that, on termination of employment (or when an employee is given or receives notice of termination of employment), subsisting share awards will be forfeited and subsisting share options will lapse.It is

Financial clean break orders in family proceedings

Financial clean break orders in family proceedingsDuty of the court to consider a clean breakAlthough there is no presumption in favour of there being a financial clean break between parties on divorce, the court is under a duty to consider whether it would be appropriate to exercise its powers so

Late payment penalties—inheritance tax

Late payment penalties—inheritance taxWhile interest often accrues on overdue tax, the late payment of certain taxes may also attract a penalty. For information on the interest accruing on overdue tax, see Practice Notes: IHT—payment deadlines on death—Interest on IHT and Interest on late paid