UK to unveil measures to tackle radicalisation in religious schools

The UK government is set to take a robust approach to tackling oppression, violence and radicalisation within religious groups.

In a review by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, which is due to be published shortly, a number of recommendations are expected to be made on unregulated faith schools and religious nationalism.

It comes as a number of faith schools have been caught in controversy.

Earlier this month the Charity Commission launched an inquiry into the Abu Bakr Trust, which runs three Islamic schools, after comments were allegedly made branding gay people as "evil".

In another case the government took action against the Rabia Girls’ and Boys’ School in Luton near London, which had segregated pupils.

Colin Bloom was appointed in 2019 to conduct an independent review into how the government engages with faith organisations as part of his role as faith engagement adviser.

It is expected to contain recommendations that unregistered and part-time schools should be monitored.

Previous attempts by the government to regulate such schools have been met with criticism and subsequently dropped.

These included allowing school inspectors to visit any institution where children under 19 are taught for more than six hours a week and introducing a register of children not in school.

The report is expected to look at the positive impact of religion and formal worship on society and could see more resources made available for religious education to be taught in schools and more provision for religious chaplains to be placed in prisons and schools.

Richy Thompson, the director of public affairs at Humanists UK, said the report will be welcomed.

“In the past the government has sometimes been nervous about tackling problems caused by religious groups, but those problems can extend to the most extreme forms of abuse," he told The Guardian.

On Wednesday, the Home Office announced more funding to protect faith schools.

It said synagogues and Jewish faith schools in the UK will receive an extra £1 million ($1.2m) from the government to help them guard against attacks, with a new dedicated police task force being created that will crack down on anti-Semitic crime.

The funding increase will see the Jewish Community Protective Security grant rise by £1 million on last year to £15 million, covering security measures such as CCTV and alarm systems to protect against what the Home Office described as persistent hate crime, antisocial behaviour, terrorism and state threats.