A lack of resources is preventing the Ministry of Justice and other government organisations from improving their management of terrorism offenders, according to a progress report.
A joint inspection by three regulators in July 2023 found significant progress had been made in managing terrorists and those at high risk of committing terrorist offences.
The inspection – by HM Inspectorate of Probation, HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services and HM Inspectorate of Prisons Counter Terrorism Joint Inspection – looked into the work of the Probation Service’s National Security Division (NSD) and multi-agency arrangements for the management of terrorist offenders in the wake of terrorist attacks in 2019 and 2020.
The regulators' report found prison, police and probation services “were working together well” and said they had laid “impressive” foundations. But it added that the risk of further terrorist attacks had not abated and that there were still concerns over areas such as “disjointed” recording and storing of information, inadequate training and IT systems not being joined up.
Following the report’s publication, HMPPS set out the government’s plan to respond to the report. An update on its progress, published on Friday, shows several target dates for making the recommended improvements have been pushed back due to reasons including a lack of resourcing and insufficient expertise.
One of the recommendations was for MoJ to commission storage systems capable of storing “up to secret” classified information to ensure that the NSD is able to safely record organisational decision-making and agreed actions following the disclosure of secret information. HMPPS’s initial action plan said that this would be completed by March 2024. This has now been delayed to November due to “internal resourcing challenges”.
The progress report states that HMPPS has, as a short-term measure, granted some directorate of security and National Security Division staff access to high-side systems – computers that allow access to top secret information – in partner agencies and have issued secure mobile telephones to these users. "In the long term, HMPPS are looking to develop a case of investment in the agency's own high-side infrastructure. There is currently no available expertise in the agency to do this. Originally deprioritised due to internal resourcing challenges, a procurement exercise is now being planned for external professional services to deliver this," the report adds.
The government set up the NSD and made other changes to its multi-agency approach in response to terror attacks committed by known terrorist offenders in the community, on release from custody, in the UK in 2019 and 2020.
One of the events that triggered this was the Reading stabbings in 2020 by a man who convicted six times between 2015 and 2019, had been investigated by security services over jihadist concerns, and who had been released from prison 17 days before the attack, after being sentenced for assault and possessing a bladed article.
Elsewhere in their report, the regulators asked the Home Office and MoJ to commission the development of an efficient and effective Counter Terrorism Nominal Management case management system. The HMPPS action plan said this would be introduced in July 2025 but this target date is now at risk.
The progress report warns that the planned new system, the Multi Agency Public Protection System, has not secured the full funding required. “If further funding has not been secured by September, the programme will have to ramp down and delivery timescales will be delayed,” it warns.
The regulators also recommended that the Joint Extremism Unit, a joint unit between the Home Office and HMPPS, strengthen leadership and practice by publishing an updated operational framework for managing terrorist and terrorist risk cases for probation and prison practitioners.
The government had committed to do this by June 2024 but the progress report says this is now expected by January 2025 “due to internal resourcing pressures”.
The Joint Extremism Unit was also asked to ensure that training given to prison-offender managers and keyworkers “equips them to confidently manage terrorists and those who present a terrorist risk”.
HMMPS committed to provide an improved training package by the end of 2023 and said it would “equip prison and probation staff with the skills they need to confidently spot and report the signs of radicalisation and changes in behaviours, and to manage terrorist and terrorist risk offenders more effectively”
The implementation of the new training offer has now been delayed until December 2024 due to “significant internal resourcing pressures”.
The regulators also asked the Prison Service to make training improvements. It said the service should “prioritise basic extremism training for all frontline staff, including refresher training, where required”. The Prison Service also initially targeted delivering this by the end of 2023 and has also delayed this by one year.
It also blamed the delay on “significant resourcing pressures”.