Inquiry identifies thousands of young victims of sexual exploitation
Joe Lepper
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
More than 2,400 children have been identified as victims of sexual exploitation, while a further 16,500 are at risk of abuse, a report by the Children's Commissioner for England has found.
The report presents interim findings from the commissioner’s two-year inquiry into child sexual exploitation in gangs and groups.
It identified 2,409 children as victims of such abuse during a 14-month period from August 2010 to October 2011, using data from police, councils, charities, central government, health services and interviews with children and young people.
Young people quoted in the report describe experiences of rape and violence, often lasting years.
Despite the recent spate of high-profile cases of Asian men grooming white girls for sex, the report found that perpetrators of child sexual exploitation came from a range of ethnic backgrounds.
The inquiry collected information on a total of 1,514 perpetrators, 545 who were classified as “white”, 415 “Asian” and 244 “black”. The ethnicity of the remainder was unknown.
The children's commissioner Maggie Atkinson described the report as “a wake-up call”. She urged professionals working with children to act on the warning signs of child sexual exploitation such as self-harm, drug or alcohol abuse, truancy, running away from home or care and repeatedly contracting sexually transmitted infections.
“Each and every one of us owes it to all victims to be vigilant, to listen and to act to stop the sexual exploitation of children,” she said. “Identifying the warning signs listed in the report is the first step to identifying and protecting children.”
Sue Berelowitz, the deputy children’s commissioner, called for better information sharing among police, education, health and wider children’s services.
She said: “The reality is that each year thousands of children in England are raped and abused by people seeking to humiliate, violate and control them. The impact on their lives is devastating. These children have been abducted, trafficked, beaten and threatened after being drawn into a web of sexual violence sometimes by promises of love and sometimes simply because they know there is no alternative.”
The University of Bedfordshire is supporting the inquiry. Professor Jenny Pearce, director of the University of Bedfordshire’s International Centre for the Study of Sexually Exploited and Trafficked Young People, said girls in gangs were routinely victims of serious sexual assault.
“Our findings show there are few clear boundaries between child victims and child perpetrators: children often both being abused, and abusing others themselves,” she said.
Debbie Jones, president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, said the report highlights the “shocking prevalence of sexual exploitation” across the country.
“It is clear that we cannot make assumptions about victims or perpetrators based on their age, ethnicity or whether they are in care,” she said. “Making such assumptions will risk some children not being identified as being sexually exploited and not receiving the protection that they so desperately need.”
She added that professionals must recognise that many young people identified as offenders are in fact victims of crime.
“Young people who are involved in criminal behaviour may have suffered almost unimaginably horrific experiences that shape the way that they behave,” she said.
“These young people need therapy, not punishment and to know that they will be treated as victims first and foremost, rather than as criminals. Removing references to prostitution and replacing them with references to exploitation will serve as a useful signal that these children are victims.”
The final report from the inquiry is due to be published in autumn 2013. The second year of research will focus on tackling child sexual exploitation and finding examples of good practice.
