Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make an assessment of the implications for her policies of the report by Big Brother Watch entitled Ministry of Truth: The Secretive Government Units Spying On Your Speech, published in January 2023.

The Research, Information and Communications Unit (RICU) was established in 2007 under the Prevent strand of HMG’s CONTEST strategy. RICU aims to understand and counter terrorist and extremist ideologies to reduce the risk to the UK, its citizens, and its interests overseas.

RICU provides analysis on terrorist use of propaganda and exploitation of the internet to inform the UK’s counter-terrorism system. To support this crucial objective RICU undertakes open-source monitoring to better understand the media, online and communications environment as it relates to terrorism and extremism. All RICU data collection and analysis complies with relevant legislation.

RICU’s spend by financial year from the 2011/12 (when our records begin) is provided below. Spend increased from financial year 2012/2013 to support RICU’s response to the threat posed by Daesh and from 2017 in response to terrorist attacks in 2017 at Westminster, Manchester Arena, London Bridge, Finsbury Park and Parsons Green. 2022/23 figures are based on spend to date.

We do not recognise this characterisation of RICU's work in this Big Brother Watch report. RICU has supported organisations working to confront the warped ideology of groups like Daesh to protect communities in the UK. This work has helped to position the UK at the forefront of the battle against terrorist propaganda, including the online terrorist content produced by Daesh. Prevent remains a vital tool to divert people from dangerous and poisonous ideologies. We are now implementing all recommendations from the recent Independent Review of Prevent, paving the way for a more transparent, efficient and sustainable programme.