Boris Johnson

Boris: Extremist parents are child abusers

Boris: Extremist parents are child abusers

By politics.co.uk staff

Children taught extremist views by their parents should be placed in social services, Boris Johnson has claimed.

The London mayor said hundreds of children across London were being taught "crazy stuff" by radicalised parents – and that the law should "obviously" treat this as a form of child abuse.

He used his weekly newspaper column to echo "the strong view of many of those involved in counter-terrorism" that the law should be strengthened to prevent children being turned into extremists.

"At present, there is a reluctance by the social services to intervene, even when they and the police have clear evidence of what is going on, because it is not clear that the 'safeguarding law' would support such action," he wrote for the Telegraph newspaper.

"A child may be taken into care if he or she is being exposed to pornography, or is being abused – but not if the child is being habituated to this utterly bleak and nihilistic view of the world that could lead them to become murderers.

"I have been told of at least one case where the younger siblings of a convicted terrorist are well on the road to radicalisation – and it is simply not clear that the law would support intervention."

Johnson said children receiving the teachings of the banned extremist group Al-Muhajiroun from their parents were especially in need of protection.

He linked the radicalisation issue to female genital mutilation and the National Council for Civil Liberties' involvement with paedophiles as examples of "political correctness" being imposed at the expense of children.

"We need to be less phobic of intrusion into the ways of minority groups and less nervous of passing judgment on other cultures," Johnson added.

"We can have a great, glorious, polychromatic society, but we must be firm to the point of ruthlessness in opposing behaviour that undermines our values."