The Department for Education has replaced its practical Prevent guidance for designated safeguarding leads and, days later, amended it again. Protect & Teach examines what has actually changed, what has not, and where the new guidance still leaves difficult questions for schools, parents and DSLs.
On 24 September 2026, the Department for Education replaced its previous suite of practical Prevent material with three new documents: practical guidance for designated safeguarding leads, guidance on Channel meetings and a set of next-step checklists.
Eight days later, on 2 October, it amended the DSL guidance again.
That second update added material on fixation with weapons or explosives and antisemitism.
But an important distinction has been lost in some discussion of the changes.
Several of the potentially more consequential provisions; including referral without parental consent, references to grievance and “us and them” language, and the statement that a person does not need to demonstrate a clear ideology before a Prevent referral can be appropriate, were already in the 24 September version.
Protect & Teach compared the current document with an archived copy from 27 September. The sequence matters if schools and parents are to understand what DfE has actually changed.
What is the new guidance?
The guidance is aimed at designated safeguarding leads and others with responsibility for safeguarding learners in schools, colleges and further-education independent training providers.
DfE describes it as practical guidance rather than statutory guidance and says:
“The use of the guidance is not mandatory, but it does refer to the statutory requirements of the Prevent duty and Keeping children safe in education.”
That distinction matters. The practical guide itself is non-mandatory; the underlying Prevent duty is not.
Specified authorities remain under the statutory duty to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism. DfE describes Prevent in the new guidance as a safeguarding approach focused on identifying and supporting people who may be susceptible to radicalisation.
What are DSLs being told to look for?
The document states clearly that:
“No single behaviour demonstrates radicalisation.”
It nevertheless provides 13 potential indicators.
Some are closely connected to terrorism or extremist violence: accessing terrorist material, supporting violence for ideological purposes, or displaying a fascination with terrorism.
Others are considerably broader, including:
- sudden or significant changes in behaviour, presentation or attitude;
- increasing use of divisive, intolerant, dehumanising or “us and them” language;
- expressions of grievance towards groups, communities or perceived injustices.
The 2 October amendment added another:
“demonstrating a fixation with weaponry or explosives … without an otherwise reasonable explanation”.
The breadth of some of those descriptions needs to be read alongside the safeguards that DfE puts elsewhere in the same document.
DSLs are told that susceptibility factors are not themselves evidence of radicalisation, that not all concerning behaviours or views indicate susceptibility, and that context, patterns and changes over time matter. SEND and neurodivergence are specifically said not to be indicators of radicalisation.
The guidance also says conversations with learners should seek to understand the context rather than “challenge or debate beliefs”.
That context is important. A pupil expressing a grievance is not, simply by doing so, demonstrating radicalisation.
A Prevent referral no longer requires a clearly identifiable ideology
Perhaps the most significant sentence for DSLs is:
“While ideology is an important consideration, an individual does not need to demonstrate a clear or identifiable ideology for a Prevent referral to be appropriate.”
This does not mean ideology has become irrelevant. DfE expressly calls it “an important consideration”.
But it does mean that lack of an identifiable ideological commitment does not, by itself, prevent referral.
The case studies help explain the intended threshold.
One learner, TJ, had no clear ideological belief but had developed a strong interest in the Columbine attackers and similar mass-casualty events. The wider picture included repeatedly showing other pupils videos of people being killed, talking about owning and carrying knives and frequently discussing Hitler and other violent historical figures. A Prevent referral was made.
Another learner, JH, had threatened family members. But because the risk was directed towards particular people rather than being connected with an extremist ideology, terrorist cause or grievance, the case was dealt with through other safeguarding, social-care and mental-health routes.
And JF, aged ten, had refused to work with immigrant classmates while making prejudiced comments. With no wider indicators of radicalisation, DfE’s case study says a Prevent referral was not required.
That is an important restraint in the guidance:
“Not all concerning behaviour, prejudice, fixation on violence or safeguarding concerns will meet the Prevent threshold.”
The examples make the intended distinction considerably clearer than the indicator list alone.
Can a school refer a child without telling the parents?
Yes: parental consent is not required to make a Prevent referral.
The guidance says:
“Parental or carer consent is not required to make a Prevent referral. Where appropriate and safe to do so, you should be open and transparent about concerns and the actions being taken.”
It also recognises circumstances in which involving parents initially may be inappropriate, for example where doing so could place the learner at greater risk, compromise safeguarding activity or prevent concerns from being explored properly.
So the guidance does not establish a general policy of secret referrals.
Its stated expectation is openness where appropriate and safe, with safeguarding circumstances determining when parents should be involved.
There is another distinction parents should understand.
Prevent referral is not the same thing as Channel
A Prevent referral may lead to several outcomes. Counter Terrorism Policing may decide that no further Prevent action is required, signpost to another service, continue information-sharing, consider Channel or, where necessary, take law-enforcement action.
Channel is a separate stage.
DfE’s Channel guidance describes it as a voluntary multi-agency programme, and informed consent is required before Channel support can be provided. For children and young people, the guidance says consent will usually be sought from a parent or carer.
That distinction is crucial:
- A Prevent referral can be made without parental consent.
- Channel support requires informed consent before support begins.
What changed on 2 October? Weapons and antisemitism
The official DfE change note is quite narrow. On 2 October it added guidance on:
1. fixation with weaponry or explosives; and
2. antisemitism.
It did not introduce the referral-without-consent rule, the grievance wording or the no-clear-ideology provision. Those were already present in the 24 September rewrite.
The new antisemitism passage is also more nuanced than a headline might suggest.
DfE states:
“Antisemitism, in and of itself, is not a Prevent concern.”
The reason is that Prevent is concerned with terrorism and susceptibility to radicalisation rather than prejudice or discrimination in isolation.
But DfE immediately adds that antisemitism features within a range of extremist and terrorist ideologies and says a Prevent referral may be appropriate where antisemitic beliefs or behaviour form part of a wider extremist worldview connected with radicalisation or support for terrorism.
That does not mean antisemitic behaviour is acceptable when it falls below the Prevent threshold. Schools retain their wider safeguarding, behaviour and equality responsibilities.
It simply defines what belongs within Prevent.
P&T analysis: the difficult question is how the broad indicators will be applied
The following is Protect & Teach analysis rather than wording contained in DfE guidance.
The new document contains important safeguards. But there is an operational tension within it. On one side are broad expressions such as:
“grievance”
“us and them”
“divisive”
“intolerant”
and the statement that no clearly identifiable ideology is necessary.
On the other are repeated instructions to examine context, avoid assumptions, recognise that views alone may not indicate susceptibility, and not use conversations to challenge or debate beliefs.
The question is therefore not simply what those phrases say on paper.
It is how consistently DSLs will apply the caveats surrounding them.
A strongly held view on politics, religion, sex, gender, immigration, war or another contested issue could potentially sound “divisive” or involve a perceived “grievance”. That does not make it an extremist or terrorist concern.
The guidance itself recognises that distinction.
Our concern is therefore about loose application, not an assertion that DfE has instructed schools to refer pupils for expressing particular lawful political or philosophical beliefs.
The guidance does not expressly target sex or gender-critical views, nor any other particular contested position.
One safeguard is conspicuously absent from the DSL page
There is no reference in this particular practical DSL document to:
- political impartiality,
- freedom of speech, or
- contested political beliefs.
That does not mean those protections disappear.
The statutory Prevent duty guidance tells schools that they must be mindful of their existing duties concerning political impartiality and balanced presentation of political issues. But those safeguards are not cross-referenced on the practical page a DSL may actually have open while deciding what to do about a pupil.
That is a missed opportunity.
A simple cross-reference could remind practitioners that safeguarding against radicalisation and maintaining political impartiality are simultaneous duties, rather than competing alternatives.
There is also a wider change in the safeguarding landscape
This should not be confused with the Prevent rewrite, because the DfE Prevent page does not itself make the connection.
But the timing is worth understanding.
From 30 September 2026, section 16LA of the Children Act 2004 came into force. It creates a duty for specified persons to disclose relevant safeguarding information where the statutory test is met, subject to an exception where disclosure would be more detrimental to the child than non-disclosure.
The Prevent guidance does not cite section 16LA and we should not imply that the September Prevent rewrite implements it.
They are parallel developments.
But both sit within a safeguarding environment in which parental consent is not necessarily the gatekeeper for professional information-sharing or referral.
That makes clarity about transparency, proportionality and recording professional judgement increasingly important.
And what about misogyny?
Again, a distinction is necessary.
The word “misogyny” does not appear in the new DSL practical guidance or its indicator list.
It does appear elsewhere in the statutory Prevent guidance, where established terrorist narratives are described as exhibiting themes including antisemitism, misogyny, anti-establishment grievances, anti-LGBT grievances and ideas of religious or ethnic superiority.
That is not the same thing as saying misogynistic comments automatically trigger Prevent. Nor is there, in the new DSL document, a textual connection to the Government’s wider work on misogyny or healthy relationships in schools.
Any such relationship should therefore be discussed as wider policy context, not presented as something the new document says.
What should schools do now?
For schools and DSLs, the message is not simply “refer more”.
It is to apply the whole document.
That means recognising possible warning signs while also applying its safeguards:
- look for context;
- look for patterns;
- do not mistake vulnerability for radicalisation;
- do not assume SEND or neurodivergence indicates extremism;
- distinguish prejudice from terrorist susceptibility;
- distinguish general safeguarding concerns from Prevent concerns;
- record the reasoning behind decisions;
- and involve parents openly wherever it is appropriate and safe to do so.
For parents, the key point is equally important:
a Prevent referral can occur without parental consent, but referral is not a finding of radicalisation, and it is not the same as entering Channel.
The 24 September rewrite gives DSLs a much clearer operational rulebook.
Precisely because some of its language is broad, its accompanying caveats now matter just as much as its list of indicators.
And if those safeguards are to work in practice, schools need practitioners who can distinguish a safeguarding concern, a controversial belief, prejudice, political disagreement and genuine susceptibility to terrorism.
Those categories are not interchangeable.
Protect & Teach position
Protect & Teach will keep the implementation of the revised guidance under review, particularly:
- how the new indicators are reflected in DSL training;
- whether clearer cross-referencing to political impartiality is provided;
- how parental transparency is handled in practice; and
- whether future referral data show any change following the September rewrite.
This article is for general information and does not constitute legal advice.
References
Channel meetings (DSL) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation/channel-meetings-practical-guidance-for-designated-safeguarding-leads Updated 2 Oct 2026; Channel consent language
Children Act 2004, s.16LA (duty to share information). https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2004/31/section/16LA
The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 (Commencement No. 2) (England) Regulations 2026, reg. 6. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2026/803/regulation/6
Collection / change notes https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation Change notes for 2 Oct 2026 and 24 Sep 2026 verified
DfE,The Prevent duty: safeguarding learners susceptible to radicalisation (collection and change notes, last updated 2 Oct 2026). https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation
DfE, The Prevent duty: practical guidance for designated safeguarding leads (updated 2 Oct 2026).https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation/the-prevent-duty-practical-guidance-for-designated-safeguarding-leads
DfE, Keeping children safe in education 2026 KCSIE 2026 full PDF https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6aba40e0fceb6fb3a650127d/Keeping_children_safe_in_education_2026.pdf
DfE, Keeping children safe in education 2026 KCSIE 2026 Part one PDF https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a9088e19a177a1decf97b01/Keeping_children_safe_in_education_2026_Part_one.pdf
DSL practical guidance (live) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation/the-prevent-duty-practical-guidance-for-designated-safeguarding-leads Updated 2 October 2026; Applies to England
Home Office, Prevent duty guidance: for England and Wales (accessible version; para. 184 on political impartiality). Prevent duty statutory guidance (accessible) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prevent-duty-guidance/prevent-duty-guidance-for-england-and-wales-accessible Updated 6 March 2024; in force from 31 Dec 2023
Making a referral to Prevent https://www.gov.uk/guidance/making-a-referral-to-prevent
Next-step checklists https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation/safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation-next-step-checklists
Archives used for change verification: Wayback DSL page 20260927114221 https://web.archive.org/web/20260927114221/https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-prevent-duty-safeguarding-learners-susceptible-to-radicalisation/the-prevent-duty-practical-guidance-for-designated-safeguarding-leads