{"id":8122,"date":"2015-01-05T11:23:17","date_gmt":"2015-01-05T11:23:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tat.reddaisytrading.co.uk\/index.php\/2015\/01\/05\/terrorist-toddlers\/"},"modified":"2015-01-05T11:23:17","modified_gmt":"2015-01-05T11:23:17","slug":"terrorist-toddlers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/2015\/01\/05\/terrorist-toddlers\/","title":{"rendered":"Terrorist Toddlers?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Nursery Staff to Report Children at Risk of Becoming Terrorists<\/h3>\n

\"\"\/

\nIn keeping with their new anti-terrorism strategy the Home Office have instructed nursery staff to report toddlers harbouring terrorist views. However many have criticised the plans as unnecessarily extreme and turning nursery staff who must be looking after children, into spies.<\/p>\n


\nThe consultation document on the strategy titled the Prevent Strategy, reads, \u201cSenior management and governors are expected to assess the risk of pupils being drawn into terrorism, including support for the extremist ideas that are part of terrorist ideology.\u201d

\nStaff are expected to, \u201cidentify children at risk of being drawn into terrorism\u201d and \u201cchallenge extremist ideas which can be used to legitimise terrorism\u201d.<\/p>\n


\nThe department have pointed to situations such as Muslim children being taught that non Muslims are wicked or using anti-Semetic comments, which are cause for reporting.<\/p>\n


\nHowever the practicalities of the measures are being criticised, Conservative MP and former shadow home secretary David Davis said, \u201cIt is hard to see how this can be implemented. It is unworkable. I have to say I cannot understand what they [nursery staff] are expected to do. <\/p>\n


\n\u201cAre they supposed to report some toddler who comes in praising a preacher deemed to be extreme? I don\u2019t think so.

\n\u201cIt is heavy-handed.\u201d <\/p>\n


\nIsabella Sankey, the policy director at human rights body Liberty argues of the backfires of such plans, claiming teachers are turned into \u201cinvoluntary spies\u201d and feelings of mistrust and alienation will be felt across children at a young age.<\/p>\n


\nShe adds, \u201cThe Government should focus on projects to support vulnerable young people \u2013 instead they\u2019re playing straight into terrorists\u2019 hands by rushing through a Bill that undermines our democratic principles and turns us into a nation of suspects.\u201d <\/p>\n


\nGeneral Secretary of Headteachers\u2019 union NAHT, Russell Hobby, argues that nurseries hold a strong bond with parents as they are their first contact with the education system. Therefore questioning the ideology of families can create problems and focus should instead be laid on education and socialising children which he argues are \u201creal \u2018protections\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n


\nA government spokesperson stated, \u201cSchools, including nurseries, have a duty of care to their pupils and staff. The new duty in the Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill, to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism will be seen in a similar way to their existing safeguarding responsibilities.<\/p>\n


\n“We are not expecting teachers and nursery workers to carry out unnecessary intrusion into family life but we do expect them to take action when they observe behaviour of concern. It is important that children are taught fundamental British values in an age-appropriate way.\u201d \n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nursery Staff to Report Children at Risk of Becoming Terrorists In keeping with their new anti-terrorism strategy the Home Office have instructed nursery staff to report toddlers harbouring terrorist views. However many have criticised the plans as unnecessarily extreme and turning nursery staff who must be looking after children, into spies. The consultation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}