Britain’s students have rejected government cash for a project to improve relations between different ethnic and religious groups on campuses, on the grounds that it is an attempt to impose the prime minister’s controversial counter-extremism agenda.
Last week, David Cameron unveiled his plan to tackle “entryism” in the public sector by rooting out people holding “extremist” views, a policy attacked by the Muslim Council of Britain for “McCarthyist undertones”.
Now it has emerged that the government’s crackdown on “non-violent extremism” has also led to division between the National Union of Students and ministers over a six-year project funded by the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS). The Campus Cohesion, Faith and Belief programme sought to bring different faith groups together and encouraged and funded the training of university staff on how to mitigate risks posed by external speakers.
However, the NUS was “alarmed” that the offer of funding was to come this year from a unit at BIS entitled Preventing Violent Extremism in Further and Higher Education. The union, which had voiced concern about the government’s attitude towards non-violent extremism on campuses and the dangers the more hardline approach posed to free speech, rejected the cash after it failed to receive assurances about ministers’ intentions.
Shelly Asquith, the NUS vice-president, said she believed other organisations should also be wary of taking grants from the government considering the increasingly wide definition given by ministers of the “Prevent duty”, which stipulates the need to show “due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism”. On the NUS website, Asquith wrote: “This government money would fund the continuation of work that the NUS had previously delivered called Campus Cohesion, Faith and Belief. It comprises various projects that have been incredibly important for students’ unions in understanding how to engage students of faith, building partnerships, and tackling issues such as hate crime and fascism. This is work we desperately wanted to continue, so long as we could ensure it was funded in line with policy you have passed.
“When the offer came through, I was alarmed that the department in question was named Preventing Violent Extremism in Further and Higher Education, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Why would this department fund such a project? What is it about students of faith that necessarily relates to ‘violent extremism’, unless we are following a common narrative that assumes all Muslim students are suspects before proving themselves otherwise?
“Our policy was to ‘investigate’, and so, as vice-president for welfare, I requested the department assure me that the funding channel for the grant is in no way associated with the Prevent strategy, and is an entirely separate mandate and budget ... Unfortunately, they refused to confirm this.”
Cameron and home secretary Theresa May have become increasingly convinced that to mitigate the risk of domestic terrorism, the state needs to challenge those who hold extreme views, not just those threatening violence.
However the Muslim Council of Britain has claimed that in conflating terrorism and “subjective notions of extremism and Islamic practices” the government would alienate the very people that they need to confront – those willing to undertake terrorist acts.
Shadow home secretary Andy Burnham said he was concerned both by the NUS’s reaction and that of leading Muslim organisations to the government’s approach. He said: “Only days after the prime minister’s speech, we are beginning to see signs that a heavy-handed approach will not work. This is the greatest challenge of our age and Labour will support reasonable government measures, but David Cameron must be careful not to fuel resentment and division.”
A BIS spokesman declined to comment on the NUS decision.