The Commission for Countering Extremism (CCE) is a British government agency created under Prime Minister Theresa May in response to the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing.
The Commission for Countering Extremism (CCE) is a British government agency created under Prime Minister Theresa May in response to the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing.
The idea was mentioned in the 2017 election platform of the Conservative Party, released four days before the Manchester bombing attack. [1] [2] May described the Commission as "a statutory body to help fight hatred and extremism in the same way as we have fought racism." [3]
Sara Khan was named head of the new commission in January 2018. The appointment was criticised by former Conservative Party chairwoman Sayeeda Warsi, Harun Khan, the secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, and Labour MP Naz Shah. [4]
On 24 February 2021 the Commission released a report "Operating with Impunity - Hateful extremism: The need for a legal framework". [5]
In March 2021, Priti Patel appointed Robin Simcox as CCE commissioner in an interim capacity. Before this, Simcox had worked as a research fellow at the neo-conservative Henry Jackson Society think tank, and as a Margaret Thatcher Fellow at The Heritage Foundation's Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, specialising in counterterrorism. [6] [7] In 2019, he had stated that the UK's official definition of a hate crime was "far too broad" in response to a CCE report. He had also founded the Counter Extremism Group organisation. [7] Patel officially appointed Simcox as commissioner in July 2022. [6]
In October 2021, The Independent reported that since 2019, ministers had not formally responded to any of the reports released by the commission. [8]
In December 2022, the commission held a conference involving speeches from Michael Gove and Munira Mirza. [9]
In its 2022-23 end of year report, it noted that it had commissioned research on "how blasphemy is viewed and presented by UK Islamists" and "how various fringe ideologies promote anti-government messaging online". [9]
In August 2023, a report by The Independent stated that the CCE had underspent £300,000 in 2021-22, and £680,000 (over a third of its budget) in 2022-23 which the commission stated was partially due to "delays in staff recruitment" and "setting up project work", returning both amounts to the Home Office. The paper also reported that since Simcox's 2021 appointment, the commission had "published no new research or scrutiny of government policy," but that it was mostly working on the implementation of the findings of a review of the government’s Prevent counterterrorism programme, a measure asked of Simcox by home secretary Suella Braverman. [9]
The Conservative and Unionist Party, commonly the Conservative Party and colloquially known as the Tories, is one of the two main political parties in the United Kingdom, along with the Labour Party. It has been the Official Opposition since being defeated in the 2024 general election. The party sits on the right-wing to centre-right of the political spectrum. It encompasses various ideological factions including one-nation conservatives, Thatcherites, and traditionalist conservatives. There have been twenty Conservative prime ministers.
Theresa Mary May, Baroness May of Maidenhead,, is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2016 to 2019. She previously served as Home Secretary from 2010 to 2016. She was Member of Parliament (MP) for Maidenhead from 1997 to 2024, and has been a member of the House of Lords since 2024. May is the second female UK prime minister, after Margaret Thatcher, and the first woman to have held two of the Great Offices of State. Ideologically, May is a one-nation conservative.
The Bureau of Counterterrorism and Countering Violent Extremism (CT) is a bureau of the United States Department of State. It coordinates all U.S. government efforts to improve counterterrorism cooperation with foreign governments and participates in the development, coordination, and implementation of American counterterrorism policy.
Dame Priti Sushil Patel is a British politician who served as Home Secretary from 2019 to 2022. A member of the Conservative Party, she was Secretary of State for International Development from 2016 to 2017. Patel has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Witham since 2010. She is ideologically on the right wing of the Conservative Party; she considers herself to be a Thatcherite and has attracted attention for her socially conservative stances.
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Dame Sara Khan is a British human rights activist and the chief executive officer of Inspire, an independent non-governmental organisation working to counter extremism and gender inequality. Khan is a contributor to The Guardian and The Independent newspapers, as well as The Huffington Post and has made appearances on British television and radio. She has been interviewed for the BBC's HARDtalk and Desert Island Discs.
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The Manchester Arena bombing, or Manchester Arena attack, was an Islamic terrorist suicide bombing of the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England, on 22 May 2017, following a concert by American pop singer Ariana Grande. Perpetrated by Islamic extremist Salman Abedi and aided by his brother, Hashem Abedi, the bombing occurred at 10:31 p.m. and killed 22 people, injured 1,017, and destroyed the arena's foyer. It was the deadliest act of terrorism and the first suicide bombing in the United Kingdom since the 7 July 2005 London bombings.
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On 15 September 2017, at around 08:20 BST, an explosion occurred on a District line train at Parsons Green Underground station, in London, England. Thirty people were treated in hospital or an urgent care centre, mostly for burn injuries, by a botched, crude "bucket bomb" with a timer containing the explosive chemical TATP. Police arrested the main suspect, 18-year-old Iraqi asylum seeker Ahmed Hassan, in a departure area of the Port of Dover the next day, and subsequently raided several addresses, including the foster home of an elderly couple in Sunbury-on-Thames where Hassan lived following his arrival in the United Kingdom two years earlier claiming to be an asylum seeker.
On 14 August 2018, three people were injured when a silver Ford Fiesta hit them near the Palace of Westminster, London, England. The car then went on to crash into the separation barrier of the pavement situated between St Margaret Street / Abingdon Street and Old Palace Yard. The Metropolitan Police responded within seconds and arrested the driver, Salih Khater, without further incident. An ambulance immediately behind the Ford stopped and gave assistance to the injured. Khater was subsequently found guilty of two counts of attempted murder and sentenced to life in prison.
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