Watchdog issues recommendations to Met over strip-searching children
Joe Lepper
Wednesday, August 3, 2022
The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) has been issued with a raft of recommendations from the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) amid concerns over the strip-searching of children.
The move follows a safeguarding scandal that emerged in March when a 15-year-old girl in Hackney, known as Child Q, was strip-searched by police at school while on her period, after being wrongly accused of possessing cannabis.
A total of 11 referrals around strip-searches have been made to the watchdog this year by the Met, and two will be independently investigated, the IOPC has announced.
These two cases both involve 16-year-old boys. The IOPC understands they were strip-searched in custody with no appropriate adult present. One was at Ilford police station in January 2020 and another at Bethnal Green police station in October of the same year.
In total the police watchdog is investigating five incidents, including those involving Child Q and another girl of the same age who was-strip searched in a police cell earlier this year.
Recommendations to the Met from the watchdog include ensuring that the best interests and safeguarding needs of the child “are a primary consideration” when deciding on whether to carry out a strip-search.
An appropriate adult must be present during the search, unless “a valid exception exists”.
Officers have also been told to ensure that any strip-search of a child “is conducted in such a way which, as far as possible, maintains their dignity and takes into account their health, hygiene and welfare needs”.
All referrals from the Met this year relating to strip-searching of children relate to young people aged 14-17. These incidents took place between December 2019 and May 2022.
In six cases the IOPC has asked for local investigations by the force and three are still being assessed.
“We have been concerned about what we have seen in the cases referred to us involving complaints about strip-searches of children, and we are acting now by making recommendations, stressing that existing best practice and policies should be followed by the MPS at all times,” said IOPC director general Michael Lockwood.
He is also concerned about “the apparent delay in some of these cases being referred to us” and has written to the National Police Chief’s Council to highlight his concerns around strip-searching children.
“By coming together in this way, I hope we can address increasing concerns about the use of strip-search powers in England and Wales, in order to provide assurance that they are only being used when absolutely essential,” added Lockwood.