Speeches by Kohler.

“Happy new year, Mr Speaker. The Secretary of State was sitting alongside the Minister for the Armed Forces on Monday, when I asked him whether he was listening to the concerns of veterans regarding the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill. The Minister convinced me that he is listening, and we just heard the Secretary of Sta…”

“I am supportive of the Government’s desire to move beyond the Tories’ failed legacy Act, provided that the legitimate concerns of our veterans are met. However, I am not convinced that the Northern Ireland Office is even listening to, let alone acting upon, those concerns. Can the Minister tell the House what discussio…”

“I thank the right hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) for his question, and I thank the Secretary of State for his answer. I have three questions. First, do the Government accept the Operation Kenova report’s findings of “serious organisational failure” on the part of MI5, and if so, what concrete steps will …”

“I have some sympathy for the Minister. We all know that the Tories fiddled, leaving our criminal justice system to burn. As the Law Society president noted earlier this year, we are still not using our courts efficiently, despite what the Minister says. What steps have been taken to increase court sitting days and make…”

“So, they know how to do a referral, but not why, a lot of the times?”

“Given that there will always be the issues with time for training and teachers have a huge number of responsibilities, and being risk-averse of not making a mistake, is there something we can do with the referral system so that it does not stigmatise in the way you are telling me that it does?”

“Picking up on what Chris just said, events promote hypervigilance. Do they also, though, promote more people into extremism?”

“What can we do to stop that? Do educational professionals, teachers, have the skills to work out who they should be referring?”

“Is there an argument for not having counter-terrorism for that stage—one recognises a child that is vulnerable and not bringing in this Prevent approach at that point—or is that naive?”

“Dr Horton, do you want to add something?”

“What percentage of children who do go to the channelling point, engage with it? Do we have figures on that?”

“In broad terms, do most engage?”

“Four-fifths of referrals do not make it to a Channel discussion, and five-sixths do not get a Channel intervention. Is there a formal process as to what happens with that vast majority?”

“On that point, I have heard one defence of the Australian model: it is a nice binary, it is simple—as with do not talk to strangers—and teaching nuance at an early age is a fool’s errand and you need that simple rule that gives parents something to say, “You cannot do it”. Are you resistant to those ideas? I might be a…”

“In his review, Lord Anderson recommended that Prevent be connected to other safeguarding and violence prevention strategies. Dr Horton, you have already mentioned that that is happening in the informal pre-Prevent stage. Is there more to be done there?”

“Does it require a strategic approach where you work out which of these strategies are being used so they are not counterproductive?”

“So, the large percentage of false positives on referrals is a real danger, is it not?”

“This is the essence of a liberal democracy, of course.”

“Do you know what factors influence whether the child engages?”

“Excuse my ignorance but can you give me in broad terms what a social cohesion strategy would look like?”