If you own a venue that you hire out for events, it is important to ensure that you do not inadvertently provide a platform for extremists and that your venue is not able to be used to disseminate extremist views.
To prevent this from taking place, your organisation should take steps to ensure that you have a rigorous booking system in place for your venue, and that you carefully monitor how the building is being used.
Tips for building PREVENT considerations into venue hire
- Ensure that any staff or volunteers that are responsible for taking bookings for your premises having an understanding of PREVENT and extremism, so that they know what to look for. Therefore make sure that your staff are aware of the information in this toolkit.
- Ensure that you collect all relevant details from anyone hiring the venue to enable you to undertake appropriate suitability checks.
- Consider (and where necessary, research) the following:
- What is the topic/reason for the event?
- Has this topic had an regional or national criticism or hostility on previous occasions?
- Does the organiser or any of the speakers have a reputation for causing disruption, which may prompt certain individuals to attend?
- What are the conditions of the event, will it be an open or closed event?
- Are there any specific reasons why your venue has been chosen?
- Ensure that you have a clear internal process to enable staff to report any suspicions and refer these to the appropriate authorities.
More information on responsible event booking and venue hire can be found on the Cambridgeshire County Council website.