Croydon Council has received £50,000 from the Government to tackle Muslim extremists.

The council is to use the money to join forces with the borough's faith and community groups to find ways to stop the growth of extremism among small minorities within the borough's Muslim community.

The money from the new Preventing Violent Extremism Pathfinder Fund is expected to pay for a series of events, exhibitions and projects to tackle extremism, in partnership with the mosque and other local groups but the council says it is still working on the details.

Croydon is one of 24 local authorities in London to win money from the £5million fund from the Department of Communities and Local Government.

Deputy council leader Steve O'Connell said the fund aims to tackle terrorism by improving communication with the peaceful Muslim majority and isolating extremists.

"Much is already being done at a national level to deal with these issues but the importance of a local, grassroots approach cannot be over-estimated," Coun O'Connell said.

"The Government clearly recognises that it is local communities who understand their own areas best.

"We all know that it is just a small minority of individuals who are out to cause trouble.

"The aim of this project is to find new ways of working with our local Muslim communities to engage with them in a bid to prevent opportunities for vulnerable individuals to be drawn into extremism.

"This funding will help feed into the work already going on in this area and will boost our efforts to protect our law-abiding communities from such extremist ideologies."