Colleges in Greater Manchester entered a secretive agreement to tip off universities when an incoming student ad been referred to the government’s programme for stopping people from becoming terrorists, the Guardian can reveal. Further education and higher education institutions in the area drew up the data-sharing agreement in the last two years with the help of counter-terrorism police and the Department for Education (DfE) to share details of students referred to Prevent. The arrangement, revealed in documents uncovered by the researcher Dr Hilary Aked, includes University of Manchester, University of Salford, Manchester Metropolitan University, University of Chester and the Manchester College, the largest further education college in the UK. The plans were drawn up after the bombing of Manchester Arena in 2017, in which 23 people died, including the attacker Salman Abedi – a former student of Manchester College. The agreement says the purpose of data-sharing is not to inform a university’s decision to make or withdraw an offer to a student but to ensure “that those people who need support services can receive them”. A young person subject to a Prevent referral does not have to consent to the information being shared, though they are informed, the documents show. The stated aim of Prevent, a voluntary programme, is to divert people from terrorism before they offend and crucially deals with individuals who have yet to cross the criminality threshold. Critics say the data-sharing agreement in Greater Manchester raises the possibility that a referral – the majority of which do not progress to specialist support for radicalisation – could continue to blight a young person throughout their life. Aked said: “These agreements enable Prevent referral data to be shared whether the young person concerned gives their consent or not. Highly dubious in terms of necessity and proportionality, this also undermines the already paper-thin claim that Prevent is a consensual, supportive safeguarding programme. What kind of ‘support’ is forced on people in this way? “It means that a Prevent referral – which may have been made on completely spurious or racist grounds – could continue to blight a young person throughout their life, leading them to be treated like a potential terrorist and targeted for unwarranted suspicion and surveillance. “Although the universities involved claim this data is not being shared to inform admissions decisions, it is also concerning that there are no real guarantees a Prevent referral won’t also damage a young person’s chances of getting a place at university.” Under the agreement, referral forms should be sent from the further education college to the university with details of criminal convictions, ethnicity, religious belief, information concerning the individual’s health, wellbeing and mental health and any support provided by the college and other agencies including the police and social services. A paper trail of correspondence and draft documents dating back to 2018 suggests that Greater Manchester police and the Information Commissioner’s Office were initially sceptical about the lawful basis under data protection legislation for such an arrangement. A letter from a senior lecturer at Salford to the ICO seeking advice on how to formulate the agreement refers to “obstacles that the police perceived to proclude [sic] information sharing”. But ultimately, a final agreement appears to have been concluded in January last year and remains in place. In the year ending 31 March, 5,738 individuals were referred to Prevent, with the education sector being the biggest source of referrals, at 1,887 or 33%. Of those 5,738 only 561 – or one in 10 – went on to receive specialist support designed to steer an individual away from terrorism, known as the Channel process. The Manchester College told the Guardian the agreement had not yet been used by the college and that no students had been flagged to any other college or university. A spokesperson for the college said: “The Manchester College worked in close collaboration with other further and higher education providers across Greater Manchester on the protocol for sharing information in limited circumstances about vulnerable students, who may be progressing from further to higher education. As such, it falls under the umbrella of the safeguarding duty that we have to all of our students. “The protocol has strict privacy controls in place and was referred to the Information Commissioner’s Office before it was implemented. It has not been utilised by the Manchester College to date and we have not made any referrals to any other college or university under it. The Manchester College treats the personal data of all of our students with the greatest of care, utilising it in particular to help keep all our students safe and to achieve their full potential.” All the universities involved responded to the Guardian’s request for information, echoing the college’s remarks, stating that the agreement was in place as part of a duty towards the safeguarding of students and that strict privacy controls were in place. Greater Manchester police said Counter Terrorism Policing North West was part of the working group behind the agreement. “The data-sharing agreement ensures that consent is sought in every instance,” the force said. “Where there is a legal basis for doing so and it is necessary, justified and proportionate, information can be shared without consent.” A government spokesperson said: “Specific data-sharing arrangements are a matter for individual institutions but should be proportionate and adhere to data protection laws. Being referred under the Channel programme will have no bearing on a person’s education or career prospects.”