The daughter of a murdered MP has called for “everybody else that Prevent failed” to get an inquiry into the death of their loved one.
Katie Amess, 39, is the daughter of Sir David Amess, the Conservative Southend West MP who was stabbed to death as he carried out a constituency surgery at a church in Leigh-on-Sea in October 2021.
It was later revealed that Sir David’s killer, Ali Harbi Ali, had been referred to the the Government’s counter-terrorism programme Prevent prior to the attack, but that his case had been closed.
Following the publication of a review into the handling of Southport child killer Axel Rudakubana under the same programme, security minister Dan Jarvis told the House of Commons on Wednesday that a Prevent learning review into the killing of Sir David will be released next week in a commitment to transparency over the programme.
“Transparency and enabling public scrutiny is also fundamental, and that is why we will take steps to publish the findings of other independent Prevent learning reviews where there has been an incident of national significance,” Mr Jarvis said.
Speaking to Iain Dale on LBC on Wednesday evening, Ms Amess said she welcomed the announcement – but added every victim failed by Prevent deserves an inquiry, not just the Southport victims.
She said: “I welcome the release of it so people can see the stupidity that I have been talking about.
“But it’s not an inquiry and I need an inquiry.
“The Southport case, rightly so, has an inquiry. Everybody else that Prevent failed also needs an inquiry.”
She added: “Dan Jarvis said today that a line in the sand has been drawn after Southport.
“Why was that line in the sand not drawn in 2021 when this happened to my dad?
“We potentially wouldn’t be in the same situation today with repeat failings of Prevent had somebody had just listened to me back when it happened and launched a full public enquiry.”
Sir David Amess was MP for Southend West (UK Parliament/PA)
Ms Amess told LBC Home Secretary Yvette Cooper had said she could not promise her an inquiry would be held because she was not in office when Sir David was killed.
She added: “That is absolutely irrelevant. Numerous inquiries have been launched by a subsequent government, and so I said: ‘I don’t accept that as an answer and you can’t pick and choose who you’re going to help’.”
Ms Amess said she believes that without the Southport knife attack, the learning review into how her father’s killer had been handled by Prevent would have never been released into the public domain.
She said: “So, I’ve got basically nowhere in three-and-a-half years. So I just despair.
“And I have got further with the Labour government than I did with the Conservatives, but I still haven’t had the answer to, yes or no: will I be getting an inquiry?
“That’s all I need to know from them.”
Rudakubana was given a life sentence with a minimum term of 52 years – one of the highest minimum terms on record – for murdering Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport on July 29 last year.
The 18-year-old also attempted to murder eight other children, who cannot be named for legal reasons, as well as class instructor Leanne Lucas and businessman John Hayes.
Three separate referrals were made to Prevent about Rudakubana’s behaviour in the years before the attack, as well as six separate calls to police, but the learning review concluded that too much focus was placed on the absence of a distinct ideology, to the detriment of considering his susceptibility, grievances and complex needs.