Violent Extremism

Thursday 16th September 2010, Guoman Charing Cross Hotel - London, 09:00 - 16:00

Preventing Violent Extremism and Building Cohesive Societies

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Overview

The overwhelming majority of people in Britain feel positive about living side by side with people from different ethnic backgrounds. However, there are still new and complex challenges that require national and local action to ensure that society is inclusive and any extremism and potential community tensions are tackled.

In 2007, the former government launched its counter terrorism strategy CONTEST. The strategy has four main priorities; pursue, prevent, protect, prepare. Prevent is a leading part of this strategy; its aim, to stop people from becoming terrorists or supporting violent extremism.

On 30th March 2010 the Communities and Local Government Select Committee published their ‘Preventing Violent Extremism’ report. It recommended that a different approach needed to be taken to tackle violent extremism. This new approach calls for improved information sharing between local partners and recommends that the government does not get involved in theological matters.

The new government has stated it will conduct a review of the Prevent strategy, and offer English classes for immigrants to strengthen inclusion and support local community groups to foster community cohesion.

Building community cohesion is important in tackling violent extremism. To help build cohesive communities the former government highlighted the need to integrate the UK’s diverse and excluded communities. New laws introduced in the Equalities Act (2010), to tackle racial and religious hatred, have been implemented to protect religious beliefs and the freedom to express these beliefs.

Agenda

09:00	Coffee and Registration
09:30	Chairs Welcome and Address Hanif Qadir, Projects and Programme Director, Active Change Foundation (CONFIRMED)
09:40	Preventing Violent Extremism – A Different Approach Preventing Violent Extremism – Where do we stand? The Preventing Violent Extremism Report – Recommendations Dr Phylis Starkey, Former Chair, Communities and Local Government Select Committee (CONFIRMED)
10:00	What Works in Preventing Violent Extremism: Effective & Hard Edge Interventions Understanding violent extremism/terrorism Indentifying individuals Highlighting abuse Applying interventions S.A.N.C.T.I.O.N.S Successes Hanif Qadir, Projects and Programme Director, Active Change Foundation (CONFIRMED)
10:20	Questions and Answers Session
10:35	Coffee and Networking
11:00	Reducing the Threats Posed by Violent Extremism Lord Carlile of Berriew QC, Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Liberal Democrats (CONFIRMED)
11:20	The value of creativity in Prevent interventions How can creative media and arts contribute to PVE objectives? Case study: My View - film-making mentoring project What are the challenges of a creative intervention, and how can they be overcome? How can you evaluate the soft outcomes of creative interventions in PVE? Ewan King, Director, OPM and Rehana Mughal, Cultural Programmes Manager, CCE (CONFIRMED)
11:40	Questions and Answers Session
11:55	Building Capacity, Leadership and Skills in Young Muslims – Waltham Forest The Young Muslim Leaders Programme – Building the capacity, leadership and skills of young Muslims in the borough. Develop young Muslims as peer mentors The use of pathfinder funding and third sector organisations in delivering the programme Young people designed their own curriculum Working and Liaising closely with the police to resolve any issues that concern young Muslims The Outcomes –Raising faith awareness, building community cohesion and delivering an Islam Awareness Week Future work – Encourage continuation of leadership to become more active citizens; engage with young women and girls to tackle extremism Nazia Mirza, Head, Cohesion and Partnerships, London Borough of Waltham Forest (CONFIRMED)
12:15	Working Together to Tackle Violent Extremism The role of ‘prevent’ in the wider context of CONTEST Ensuring there is effective support for those at risk of advocating violence and those that have been radicalised Challenging the ideologies behind violent extremism How can we Increase the resilience of communities to violent extremism? How to effectively work with local partners to deliver the prevent strategy? The new public reporting mechanism Tackling new/reemerging threats – Far right extremism Debbie Gupta, Director, Prevent, Home Office (CONFIRMED)
12:35	Questions and Answers Session
12:50	Lunch and Networking
13:50	Preventing Violent Extremism at a Local Level The importance of community level interventions that the needs of that individual community Findings and recommendations from the Rapid Evidence Assessment report - How can these recommendations be taken forward to effectively deliver ‘prevent’ at a local level? Capacity building and empowerment Launching the National Citizen Service to integrate diverse communities Offering English classes to all migrants to strengthen inclusion Outreach/peripatetic work – Engagement, Integration and Trust The role of pathfinders Jane Everton, Deputy Director, Preventing Violent Extremism Unit, Department for Communities and Local Government (CONFIRMED)
14:10	Building Cohesion, Tackling Extremism Building cohesion to prevent extremism in the long term The importance of cohesion in the workplace How to augment cohesion in communities – Practical solutions The role of communications in promoting cohesion Professor Ted Cantle CBE, Executive Chair, iCOCO (CONFIRMED)
14:30	Coffee and Networking
14:55	Peterborough City Council: Taking a Partnership Approach to Preventing Violent Extremism Preventing Violent Extremism in Peterborough – Reducing inequalities through effective partnership working Establishing the Senior Citizens Association – Bringing people together from different denominations The formation of the Imam Council Embedding the programme in the day-to-day delivery of services The Peterborough Muslim Youth Forum – Engaging young people through various projects Results so far Next steps Jawaid Khan, Cohesion Manager, Great Peterborough Partnership (CONFIRMED)
15:15	Questions and Answers Session
16:30	Chairs Summary and Close

*programme subject to change without notice

Audience

The audience will be representative of the diversity of the issue and the stakeholders present will include, community safety teams, police & fire authorities, LSP's, housing organisations, CDRP's, jobcentre plus, drug and alcohol action teams, youth offending teams, town centre managers, transport authorities, neighbourhood wardens, victims support, children’s trusts, ALOs, education authorities, licensing teams, environmental professionals, planning authorities, social inclusion officers, community cohesion officers, schools, local criminal justice boards, prison/probation service, PCT's, central government departments & bodies, unions, academia, the private, legal & voluntary sectors and all those involved in tackling violent extremism.