CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: "It is impossible to imagine how frontline staff operating in this squalor could raise their game enough to manage the inevitable confrontation of denying extremist prisoners the material they need to spread their hateful ideologies. They can’t even keep the bins empty. Taylor observed that ‘there is no better sign of decline in a prison than a lack of cleanliness’. He’s right. It’s one thing to remove any ambiguity in the rules to avoid staff being bamboozled and intimidated by people using religion as an excuse to undermine security. It’s quite another to make sure staff enforce these rules and deal with the kickback."

"Ian Acheson of the Counter Extremism Project (CEP) carried out the independent review into Islamist extremism behind bars. His principal recommendation was about Friday Prayers, however it was rejected by the government. Speaking to The Epoch Times, the former prison governor welcomed the measures, but criticised the length of time it had taken the MoJ to put them in place."

CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: "We know a depressing amount of information about terrorists who have managed to evade detection and carry out atrocities in this country, mainly through public inquiries and inquests. But what about those who have failed in their crimes? What are we doing with them and why does it matter?"

CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: "But now, our high-security jails are filled with Islamist extremists who operate by markedly different standards. While the U.K. and Spain grappled with Irish and Basque separatists, these terrorists were not aiming for a worldwide caliphate that would subjugate all other faiths and make war on liberal democracy as such. Nor, despite their immense cruelty, did the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) or Basque Homeland and Liberty (ETA) operate under the pretext of divine permission to murder civilians."

CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: "Hall’s report critically examines the contemporary threat of violent extremism from within the prison walls – where at the last count reside some 230 offenders convicted of terrorist offences and a greater number who are at risk of radicalisation or already radicalised. The vast majority of these offenders are motivated by Islamist extremism which explains his report’s focus."

CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: "The headline findings of this latest report — which included the incredible fact that terrorists are setting up Sharia courts inside — did not surprise me though. 

Six years ago I led an independent review of the same problem and made 69 recommendations for change, many of which were either ignored or watered down."