Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent steps the Government has taken to tackle extremism in schools.

All children must be safe wherever they are educated, and the Department is committed to ensuring that children are safe from extremism and radicalisation.

The Department is actively working with the education sector, national and local partners to safeguard children and young people from these risks. This includes supporting schools to effectively implement their obligations under the Prevent duty; to protect young people from radicalising influences; ensuring that schools are equipped to build children’s resilience against extremist ideologies; and taking firm action where extremism concerns arise.

The Department has carried out its own regulatory action and supported the Teaching Regulation Agency to prohibit individuals from being involved in education, including where there are substantiated concerns about their extremist views or activities. The Department has also developed a new online form to allow for concerns regarding extremism within the education sector to be reported directly to the Department, to complement our existing counter-extremism helpline.

The Department also continues to update the Educate Against Hate website, which brings together the best advice, support and resources available for parents, teachers and school leaders, to help them protect young people from extremism and radicalisation.

The Department continues to fund, with the Home Office, a network of Prevent Education Officers, who provide expertise and support directly to schools and teachers on Prevent implementation.

The Department has also worked with Ofsted to further strengthen their inspection framework to ensure that all schools are helping to prepare children for life in modern Britain, including through their requirement to promote our shared values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and respect and tolerance of those with other faiths and beliefs.