Prime Minister warns UK has ‘cohort of loners who are extreme and need to be factored in’ to security plans
Sir Keir Starmer has warned the UK has a “cohort of loners who are extreme and need to be factored in” as a leaked Home Office review said the UK should deal with extremism by focusing on concerning behaviours and activity rather than ideologies.
The prime minister said his government is “looking carefully where the key challenges” on extremism are, adding it is “very important” to focus on threats “so we can deploy our resource properly”.
“Obviously, that’s now informed with what I said last week in the aftermath of the Southport murders, where we’ve got the additional challenge, I think, of a cohort of loners who are extreme and they need to be factored in,” he said.
“So that’s the focus. In the end, what this comes down to is the safety and security of people across the United Kingdom, that’s my number one focus.”
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Sir Keir was speaking after a leaked Home Office extremism review suggested the UK should be focusing on behaviours and activities such as spreading conspiracy theories, misogyny, influencing racism and involvement in “an online subculture called the manosphere”.
The Home Office said Islamism and extreme right-wing ideologies are the “most prominent” issues they are tackling today.
In August, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said the Home Office was conducting a “rapid analytical spring on extremism” to map and monitor trends and inform the government’s approach to extremism.
Last week, Sir Keir Starmer said he would change the law if needed to recognise the new threat posed by extremists without specific ideologies ahead of the jailing of Axel Rudakubana for the stabbing to death of three young girls in Southport last summer.
The 18-year-old had been referred to the anti-terror Prevent programme three times but was not deemed as an extremist under the scheme’s criteria. And, although he pleaded guilty to murder, police were unable to identify Rudakubana’s motive, so his crimes fell outside the definition of terrorism.
Alice da Silva Aguiar, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Bebe King were murdered by Axel Rudakubana
Recommendations could be breach of freedom of speech
The leaked review, obtained ahead of its publication by the Policy Exchange thinktank, recommends reversing the guidance, introduced by then Home Secretary Suella Braverman, for police to reduce dealing with non-hate crime incidents.
It says a new crime, making “harmful communications” online illegal, should be introduced instead. The Conservative government rejected this on freedom of speech grounds.
Policy Exchange’s Paul Stott and Andrew Gilligan said recommendations to class claims of two-tier policing as a “right-wing extremist narrative” will also raise concerns over freedom of speech.
Dangerous individuals could be missed
They said including “behaviours” such as violence against women and girls, spreading misinformation and an interest in gore or extreme violence in the definition of extremism could “swamp already stretched counter-extremism staff and counter-terror police with thousands of new cases”.
This could increase the risk “that genuinely dangerous individuals are missed – it risks addressing symptoms, not causes”, Policy Exchange said.
The review itself admits many who display such behaviours are not extremists.
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Could the Southport killings have been prevented?
Review ‘downplays Islamism’
Following Rudakubana’s guilty plea last week, Sir Keir said the UK “faces a new threat” and the teenager represented a new kind of threat with “acts of extreme violence perpetrated by loners, misfits, young men in their bedroom, accessing all manner of material online, desperate for notoriety”.
He said he would change the law, if needed, “to recognise this new and dangerous threat” and said a review of “our entire counter-extremism system” would take place “to make sure we have what we need to defeat it”.
The review also “de-centres and downplays Islamism, by far the greatest threat to national security”, Policy Exchange said.
It said environmental extremism and Hindu extremism should be tackled, as well as “left-wing, anarchist and single issue extremism”.
And Policy Exchange said it has “ignored, even repudiated” recommendations by previous Prevent reviewer William Shawcross that the programme is the wrong place for dealing with the psychologically unstable.
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Government focused on Islamism and right-wing ideologies
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The counter-extremism sprint sought to comprehensively assess the challenge facing our country and lay the foundations for a new approach to tackling extremism – so we can stop people being drawn towards hateful ideologies.
“This includes tackling Islamism and extreme right-wing ideologies, which are the most prominent today.
“The findings from the sprint have not been formally agreed by ministers and we are considering a wide range of potential next steps arising from that work.”
Conservative shadow home secretary Chris Philp said: “By extending the definition of extremism so widely, the government risks losing focus on ideologically motivated terrorists who pose the most risk to life.
“In fact, the Shawcross Review of Prevent made clear that counter-extremism and the counterterrorism strategy should be more focused on terrorist ideology, not less.
“Prevent must be equipped to deal with the terrorist threats in our society, and we should not be dialling back efforts to confront this.
“What the government seems to be planning is a backwards step in the interests of the political correctness we know Keir Starmer loves.
“Starmer wants the thought police to stop anyone telling uncomfortable truths that he and his left-wing lawyer friends don’t like.”
The Bishop of Liverpool has announced his retirement days after facing allegations of misconduct from two women, including another bishop.
One woman said the Right Reverend Dr John Perumbalath kissed her without consent and groped her, while the second accused him of sexual harassment.
The bishop has vehemently denied the allegations – and in his retirement letter, published online on Thursday, he reiterated his denial.
The letter, shared by the Diocese of Liverpool, read: “Having sought the permission of His Majesty the King, I have today taken the decision to retire from active ministry in the Church of England.”
Addressing the accusations, he continued: “Since those allegations were made I have consistently maintained that I have not done anything wrong and continue to do so.
“I do not wish this story to become a distraction for this incredible diocese and its people whom it has been an honour and joy to serve,” the bishop says in his letter.
“This is not a resignation occasioned by fault or by any admission of liability.”
The exact date for when the bishop’s role will formally end is yet to be decided, but he is stepping back from ministering and leading the diocese as of Thursday.
The letter continued: “I have taken this decision for my own well-being, my family and the best interests of the Diocese.
“I have informed the Archbishop of York of my decision and I understand he will put in place the necessary arrangements for episcopal oversight of the diocese for the remainder of my time here and during the vacancy.”
Bishop Perumbalath has insisted his retirement is not an admission of guilt
The Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell – who has faced calls to resign over separate safeguarding failures – said: “I respect his decision and thank him for his ministry.”
“My thoughts and prayers continue to be with all those who have been affected by this situation,” he continued. “I am committed to ensuring stability during this time of transition and will be putting the necessary arrangements in place to provide episcopal oversight for the diocese.”
An acting bishop will be announced in the coming days.
The Archbishop of York (pictured) has welcomed the decision – which comes at a tumultuous time for the Church of England
The diocese – which on Wednesday pressured the bishop to step aside – said in a statement: “We acknowledge his decision in taking this step for the good of the Diocese of Liverpool.
“This is a deeply painful situation, and we hold all concerned in our prayers.”
The misconduct allegations were reported by Channel 4 earlier this week but the first dates back to 2023, the Church of England confirmed.
It said: “The complaint was looked into according to statutory safeguarding guidance… and an independent risk assessment undertaken.
“This process concluded that there were no ongoing safeguarding concerns, but a learning outcome was identified with which the bishop fully engaged.”
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A “further disclosure was made by another woman” shortly after, the Church said. This was “assessed not to be a safeguarding matter but a matter of alleged misconduct,” it added.
Bishop Perumbalath’s resignation comes at a tumultuous time for the Church of England, which has recently seen Justin Welby quit as Archbishop of Canterbury over the handling of another case.
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