Anti-terror strategy failed to stop a killer

Southport attacker’s lack of coherent ideology meant the Prevent scheme did not see him as a potential risk, exposing the need for reform

Lizzie Dearden

Seven years before Axel Rudakubana launched the Southport attack, a new category was quietly added into the UK’s Prevent counter-terrorism scheme. Labelled “mixed, unstable or unclear ideology”, it aimed to cover a growing number of cases where people had been flagged as a potential security threat but did not fit into existing boxes, such as Islamist or far-right extremism. “In cases such as these, the individual may not have a coherent or single ideology, but may still pose a terrorism risk,” said an official bulletin announcing the change in 2017, warning of a significant increase in these kinds of cases. By the time a 13-year-old Rudakubana was flagged to Prevent in November 2019, more than half of all referrals to the scheme were put in the “mixed, unstable or unclear…

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Guardian Weekly (Digital) - 1 Issue, 31 January 2025

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