My little children were detained because of a toy gun. Prevent has gone too far

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/01/children-detained-toy-gun-prevent-strategy

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On the penultimate day of spring term 2016, my children – aged five and seven – were detained in isolation after school for nearly two hours and questioned by police officers (without the consent or presence of a parent) because of a toy gun.

This was the day our family’s perception of its place in the community was turned upside down. Our lives are divided into before and after.

Before that day, my children were just children. They trusted their teachers and friends – school was a safe place. Before that day, I was just another mum: chatting at the playground gates, reading with other children in school, helping out at the PTA, planning my dream life in a country village.

Since that day, my children are scared and I’m scared – both for them and for myself. Every small interaction with anybody outside our home results in hours of self-doubt and musings as to how we are seen.

Walking to school is an exercise in avoiding eye contact. Every conversation with a teacher is a minefield of anxiety; my heart is in my mouth at every school pick-up in case my children have said or done something that could be misinterpreted. Village life now feels like a nightmare and I long for the anonymity of a city where my children were not the only BAME kids in class.

All this because of a toy gun my husband and I bought for them at a supermarket – a toy almost every child their age owns.

The school’s concerns, and ultimately the staff’s call to the police, arose out of training they had received about the Prevent duty – which requires all schools (among other places such as healthcare facilities and universities) to “have regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism”.

The government claims the Prevent duty is about “safeguarding” children. But it places every child under suspicion.

My husband and I are British, and of no faith. In our case, the school’s suspicions were based on the colour of our children’s skin, rather than any suggestion of terrorist activities. Its own investigation report shared my concern about whether the school would have treated a white child in the same way.

The school’s actions would still have been wrong if we were foreign or Muslim, but our case shows Prevent to be an instrument for prejudice and racism. It alienates people of colour, making us feel unwelcome in our own country.

And the Prevent duty (and the guidance for schools in England and Wales) fails to provide sufficient checks and balances to stop this scenario happening again. The duty and national guidance are vague and open to interpretation – using undefined language such as “drawn into terrorism” and “British values”. Such woolliness will inevitably result in absurdities like my children being considered “at risk” simply for having toy guns and brown skin.

The local education authority (LEA) guidance in my area doesn’t advise teachers to balance the Prevent duty with other responsibilities, such as not to discriminate and to uphold human rights. Too often, Prevent is prioritised.

The training available on the Prevent duty is primarily via e-learning. Some LEAs roll out further training, but this is very much a postcode lottery that leaves schools to fend for themselves – which inevitably leads to mistakes.

If a school fails to follow the duty it is threatened with consequences by Ofsted – yet there are no consequences, unless parents take legal action, for making incorrect reports. This fosters a culture in which teachers over-report for fear of the consequences, forgetting the impact false reports could have.

Ideally, I’d like to see the Prevent duty removed altogether. The legislation is rushed and based on false premises. It overburdens teachers (who themselves say they don’t want it), and there is no evidence that it’s actually keeping us safe.

Prevent has arisen because the government has played on our fears – of terrorist attacks, of difference, of immigrants, of losing our “Britishness”. Instead of uniting us, ministers have made suspects of us all – especially those of us who aren’t white. Prevent makes teachers watch and suspect their students, rather than educate and nurture them.

Of course we must protect children from being drawn into terrorism. But marking them out as “other” and making them afraid to speak openly won’t keep them safe. Instead, it will only increase resentment and division.

We cannot alienate children who look different because we are afraid. We cannot police their thoughts and speech because we are afraid.

Our children must not fear their teachers and see the state as their enemy. They cannot be scared to discuss world politics, ask questions and seek guidance on difficult issues.

We must teach them knowledge not ignorance, acceptance not intolerance, justice not bigotry.