Prevent - there are more children like Rudakubana

[noblegiraffe]

I just read this interesting and worrying article about the increase in children being referred to Prevent but not getting support from them due to lack of terrorist ideology.

https://schoolsweek.co.uk/school-prevent-referrals-rise-but-fewer-get-support/

I can see that if Prevent resources are geared to children who are being groomed into jihadist ideology or white supremacy then they wouldn't necessarily be able to tackle someone who just wants to go on a killing spree. However it is clear that if violent tendencies and posing an obvious risk do not meet the threshold for Prevent support, then we either need a different agency to deal with these troubled children, or Prevent needs to widen its remit.

If Rudakubana phoned Childline aged around 12 to say he wanted to kill people, if social services were involved, if CAMHS was involved, if there were enough concerns that he was repeatedly referred to Prevent, then clearly there was need for a type of support that wasn't on offer.

The article says "In the year to April 2024, two in five school referrals were found to involve a vulnerable child, but one deemed not to be driven by a terrorist ideology.
That meant more than 1,000 cases from schools were classed as “vulnerability present but no ideology or CT [counter-terrorism] risk” – an increase of 140 per cent since before Covid."

"Just 8 per cent of all school referrals in the year to April 2024 resulted in a decision to give the child specialised support through Prevent"

Then what on earth is happening with the other 92%?

Totally agree, there is no ideal as I said just now, but my preference is to act preventatively (no pun intended), police need more powers, we need to widen the concept of 'mental illness/ill health/disorders)

Interestingly the MHA has only just changed to not include ASD as a mental health disorder, making the point (AGAIN, for those at the back) that you can only be detained if you have a psychiatric condition.

@soupyspoon
Our whole society struggles with this - what are the defining limits of mental illness? and how do we describe, let alone cope with or create policy for, people who are violent criminals but not strictly mentally ill?
Many people don't agree with the idea of 'evil' as it is a religious term, and/or can't cope with the idea of 'violent but not mentally ill'. We often want it to be illness and trauma, as then something can possibly be done.

We have labels, like 'evil' or 'personality disorder' or 'trauma', which can be debated, but at the end of the day, there needs to be law and policy - what do we do about cases like this, where there is no mental illness treatment path, before a crime is committed?

Yep, exactly

The pendulum will no doubt continue to swing around over decades and hundreds of years to come

Perhaps we'll be more willing to let people live in institutions but very good quality ones
Perhaps we'll be more willing to use forced medication to sedate people so they are safer around others
Perhaps we'll be even less willing to provide services to protect society and have to continue to accept risk to us all but more liberty for those that we're scared of

Not an easy dilemma

@batshitaboutcatshit the most scary young child I witnessed from 3 up to 10 had the most loving parents and grandparents who all supported the parents. Both parents gentle educated people. I witnessed repeated acts of violence from the boy and extremely devious behaviour.

So it looks like the best thing would have been a tag, because he was deemed a risk but wouldn't engage with services and no one at prevent actually looked at his developing case because he had been "signed off". We can't section him or detain him so the very least that could have happened was a tag to at least see where he was and keep him close to home.

I would suggest the bleeding obvious here that this case has highlighted the massive risk to us all of this falling between the cracks of services. The services where there but each one completely ineffective.

Our systems can't cope and yet we have 1000s of undocumented young men coming into the UK every week from all sorts of places some of them extremely violent. In an ideal world they would be assessed and processed humanly and seen by psychological profilers.

The reality is there are no resources to help them even the ones there.
. It's beyond worrying.

@Rewindpresse I will send you a link to the thread.

What would he be tagged for and how would that have prevented this?

What has immigration got to do with any of this?

@batshitaboutcatshit

I'm absolutely not advocating forcing. Also I realise that the vast majority of these children are of no danger to anyone.

I just think there is trend towards children retreating inwards. And no service is really helping with this. In some extremely rare cases they are retreating into a violent online world and losing touch with reality. But they all do need some intervention to support them and their parents.

I think unless you are an actual family member living in the house though, you never know the whole story.

I also knew a child from age about 4-10 who had the loveliest parents but she had extreme behaviour issues, zero empathy etc. I didn't find out until later down the line that she had witnessed horrific things in the first few years of her life.

One of my best friends is a mental health nurse and she has explained to me that even trauma that happens to a parent can be passed down to the child without them ever being a part of it, even if the parents are perfectly loving.

This would certainly seem to fit in the case of AR considering what his parents went through before moving to the UK.

My son is one of these children that "retreated inwards" and it was 100% the best decision for him.

He had a severe lack of support at school. He is autistic and the school environment was hugely overwhelming. He had public meltdowns daily, migraines due to the stress, was crying all the time, self harming, couldn't sleep, developed tics, would cling to the doorframes and beg me not to make him go to school. As soon as I took the pressure off and said ok, let's try not forcing you to go there - there was a very steady improvement to the point that now (touch wood) most of these behaviours aren't present.

SEN parents have been battling and campaigning for many years for help for their children at school and it is not forthcoming so there is no option other for them to be at home.

Absolutely agree with this . Or sometimes the abuse or trauma is happening outside the home. For example sometimes it's bullying from their peers. Or a sexual attack from any other person. Parents are often unaware or they may minimise it "it's just teasing, hit them back" or " it was only a bit of fondling/flashing etc"

@batshitaboutcatshit interestingly the school that Jonty Bravery attended in Kent is now being closed as kcc owe Wandsworth council (who own it) over two million pounds in care fees. This leaves lots of very vulnerable children who require residential care with no please from September.

There is a campaign on Instagram 'bradstow school'

There is no money. No specialised places unless you fight. No beds in psychiatric units. A lack of funding. No understanding. And a public enquiry will no doubt echo 'lessons will be learnt'

No they won't.

In Australia last year we had a terrible mass stabbing in a shopping centre by a man with a troubled mental health history. His victims were mostly women - easy pickings I suspect, he avoided the men shoppers. I suspect when the inquiry happens a lot will be said about underfunded mental health systems.
In his case, his parents also tried hard to get help.

@batshitaboutcatshit

I think we are in agreement with each other. I'm not saying anyone should be forced to go to school. I think parents and kids are crying out for appropriate help on this and it's just not available.

Not quite as straight forward as that

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgly827995o

I would have thought once agencies identified a strong proclivity for violence, the child would be sent for psychiatric evaluation and therapy. Wouldn’t that have been the case before Prevent existed?

@soupyspoon it's on prime real estate land and has been there donkeys years. They do have trouble getting staff due to the high need of service users (at one point they were being bused in from London) but I urge you to think outside the narrative being presented.

@soupyspoon

Because that seems the only possibility for someone who have expressed and acted out a desire to hurt people with weapons but for some reason can't be detained for varied reasons.

Or asbo and tag.

He can't be arrested and charged, he can't be sectioned he can't be forced to engage with prevent, he can't be forced to engage with cahms he can't be forced to do anything but he's still a massive risk.
So tag him

Re immigration, I think it's very clear that this man's background has had a massive effect on his psyche whether it's learning about his violent history too soon and in the wrong way or whether it's gene memory or inter generational trauma it's clear that when we have 1000s of undocumented men coming here from war torn traumatic backgrounds it's an issue.
. Ideally each one would be vetted and helped where possible but we know that's not possible because all those agencies couldn't treat, help, support, rehabilitate and ultimately prevent one man/boy from committing a horrific murder.

@Lurkingandlearning unfortunately it seems not because he was apparently not assessed to be having any condition other than autism.

Of course whoever came to that conclusion could be wrong but he was seen by multiple agencies and the last part where he was accessing terror stuff his prevent case had been closed.
However even if it hadn't I think it's unlikely they could have rehabilitate him because he has autism and had hyper focus on this subject.
The last agency to engage with him tried to make him think of the victims of the violent dictators he revered to no avail.
Why he wasn't arrested for the school attack, we see on here a parent saying their child has been attacked at school and absolutely nothing has happened... Sometimes schools manage the parents so police don't get involved?
Why he wasn't arrested after taking the knife on the bus?
His parents called the police on him many times..

I'm talking about much earlier in terms of preventing social isolation that plays a part in young people going on to find information about violence and join online groups that regard violence as acceptable. If they feel accepted by society and have a route into achievement etc. Back in the early 00s, a Connexions worker would literally meet a young person at home and walk them to college if they were struggling.

Lisa Nandy will be launching a new youth strategy which I think includes a commitment that every young person 18-21 will be earning or learning, and investing in the youth hubs which bring together specialists under one roof from different teams.

The police also need more resource and ability to intervene and support where there is risk of violence.

@podthedog the new scheme sounds hopeful. Now we just need to make sure the college /education facility treats them appropriately and supports them when there.

17 year old killed on Wednesday with a knife didn't even make the news, little Leo only 12 stabbed the other day it's becoming a daily occurrence, perhaps throw away the key if you are caught with a knife

You think we should have children locked away for life? They'd need to be educated, fed and housed. Do you think money would be better spent on relevant organisations and policing?

Aren't relevant organisations and policing and education being carried out now with zilch effect

Are they? I thought they'd been cut to the bone and were hardly functioning.