Young people and communities hold the key to ending FGM

It seems the number of young women and girls at risk of having this barbaric procedure done to them is growing with each year, yet there is a feeling of powerlessness among public bodies. I want to argue that we can do something about it, but that the tools to bring about change are not the ones we are used to using.

FGM involves cutting off parts of the female genitalia. It can be administered at any age - very young babies may be cut or it may happen at puberty. It is said to increase the sexual pleasure of men and reduce the pleasure of women. There can be severe health risks - many children die from trauma or from infection, and very many women face later health complications. There have never been any positive health justifications offered for cutting; its justifications are all to do with culture. In countries in north-east Africa, the procedure is almost universal - 90 per cent of women in Somalia, Sudan and Egypt have been cut.

It is currently estimated that 100,000 women living in the UK have been cut (an increase over the last decade as the population of women from the Horn Of Africa has increased). The risk for the future is that about 60,000 girls have been born to these women over the past 15 years, and it is known that many children are taken abroad to be cut in countries where it is legal and, indeed, expected. So tens of thousands of girls may be at risk of being cut. What can authorities do about it? What should we do if we know that a girl is going to, say, Eritrea for a summer holiday and we think she may be cut there?

This is a truly complex issue. Our instinct is to see this as a safeguarding issue - and of course it is. But while the infliction of FGM on a young girl seems unspeakably cruel, it is seen as an act of love by most of the adults who carry it out. Many of the girls will be otherwise well cared for - do we want to contemplate procedures for removing a child from her family if we suspect they are planning to cut her? Some girls inflict it upon themselves - they see it as a crucial step towards adulthood within their community.

Some see FGM as a Muslim issue - but it is not. While most of the countries where FGM is carried out are Muslim, there is no reference to FGM or anything similar in The Koran, and most of the Muslim world does not practice it. It is, though, an issue entrenched in gender politics; it exemplifies the domination of women by men.

Complex issues need complex remedies. So here are my four pointers for progress.

First, this is an issue that will be led by young women themselves. A group of inspirational women from Bristol formed "Integrate Bristol" some years ago to fight FGM. They produced teaching materials, spoke out, met government ministers, spoke to the media, and ended up speaking at the UN and talking with Michelle Obama. Last week, I met a group of girls from Hornsey School in London who are on the same track. By educating their peers and challenging orthodoxies within their own communities, they are not only fighting FGM, they are establishing a precedent of powerful young women taking control of their lives.

Second, it is an issue that has to grow from within cultural communities themselves. If most men understood the pain and suffering involved in FGM, they would not argue for the practice to continue to boost their own pleasures. It will take men, and the older women who normally carry out the cutting, to decide that the time has come to change the practices.

Third, while legislation has a role, it should only be a supportive role. When seat belt legislation was introduced, hardly anyone was prosecuted, but the knowledge that wearing seat belts had become compulsory helped to change the behaviours of many people. I don't want to see children taken into care or parents sent to prison, but I do want someone somewhere to have a suspended prison sentence, so that the message gets out about the law. Laws where nobody is affected have no power.

Fourth, while FGM is a safeguarding issue, I'm not sure it is normally an issue for social workers. If families think their child may be taken away, the practice goes further underground and the community feels even more detached from public services. Most authorities now have some form of first response services, bringing together health, social care and police, often commissioning services from local community organisations. The locus for responding to risk of FGM, and seeking to harness community support for change, perhaps lies here. Robust risk assessments, followed by robust community-led responses, carry more chance of success.

There is a noble drive for us to end FGM across the world in a generation. It will only truly end when the communities who practice it want it to end.

Sir Paul Ennals is chair of Haringey's local safeguarding children board