The Counter Terrorism and Security Act 2015 placed Prevent on a statutory footing and requires all specified authorities to have “due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism”. Local Authorities and their partners therefore have a core role to play in countering terrorism at a local level and helping to safeguard individuals at risk of radicalisation. The Counter Terrorism Strategy (CONTEST) 2018 confirms that the threat to the UK comes from Islamist terrorists while extreme right-wing terrorism is described as a growing threat.
The government’s Counter Terrorism Strategy is called Contest. It has four objectives:
- Pursue – To stop terrorist attacks (the remit of the police and security services)
- Prevent – To stop people becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism
- Prepare – Where we cannot stop an attack, to mitigate its impact
- Protect – To strengthen our overall protection against terrorist attacks
Factsheet: Prevent Fact Sheet (PDF; 190Kb)
Key messages (National)
Evidence Base:
- The UK threat level for International Terrorism changed to Substantial which means an Attack is Likely from Severe (an Attack is Highly Likely) in February 2021
- The threat level reached Critical – the highest level, where an Attack is Expected Imminently on two occasions during 2017, a year during which there were five terrorist attacks resulting in 36 deaths and hundreds of injuries.
Statistics:
- There were 185 arrests for terrorism-related activity in the year ending 31 December 2020, 97 fewer than in the previous 12-month period (a fall of 34%). This was mainly due to a reduction in arrests under non-terrorism legislation.
Of the 185 arrests:
- 56 (30%) resulted in a charge, of which 48 were for terrorism-related offences
- 73 (39%) persons were released pending further investigation
- 40 people (22%) were released without charge
- 13 (7%) faced alternative action, for example receiving a caution or recalled to prison
- 3 (2%) cases were awaiting an outcome to be assigned.
Links to data
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