The Power of Nightmares
I hope to run a story on Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú Radio Cornwall tomorrow morning about the local Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education (SACRE) and its plan to train school teachers how to spot potential suicide bombers in the playground.
It's not every day that the SACRE sits through a presentation from police, complete with slides from MI5 and contact details for Special Branch. The official "threat level" from some unspecified violent religious extremist is currently assessed as "severe."
So the SACRE has agreed to sponsor a special summer conference for 31 schools. Teachers will be helped to identify those traits which might turn some children into terrorists. The £3,500 cost, of course, is peanuts and this is one of those "damned if you do, damned if you don't" scenarios - imagine the outcry if the SACRE failed to follow up on government advice and that some years down the road, a Cornish lad (or lass) eventually does something outrageous.
But am I alone in wondering if another civil liberty (that of school children not to be spied upon by the State) hasn't just been lost; or if the tiny handful of Muslim children in Cornish schools might not be just a little bit concerned about what all this might lead to?
I'm Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú Radio Devon’s Graham Smith, blogging on news, views and some fresh insights into West Country life, particularly the way government works locally and nationally.
Comment number 1.
At 12th Jun 2010, blueskygreysky wrote:Isn't the idea simply to alert teachers to signs of possible radicalisation, which might (might) lead to violence. I fail to see how this could be considered spying on children. Teachers have received similar advice to spot signs of possible drug use, but I can't remember any journalist suggesting this to be a form of spying.
However, I would agree that it's of vital importance that teachers are given sufficient guidance to reduce the chance of a (moody, introverted or outspoken?) child being mis-identified as a radical or extremist Muslim, Christian or whatever (and aren't their laws against Special Branch of MI5 investigating minors?).
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