J.Just over a decade ago, with the publication of an independent inquiry, Britain was confronted with the horror of child sexual abuse committed over 16 years in Rotherham by organized gangs of men, for most of Pakistani origin. The 2014 report conservatively estimated that 1,400 children – some as young as 11, many in state care – were raped, kidnapped and sexually abused in Rotherham by groups of men . Since then, there have been numerous other inquests and investigations in other towns where children were subjected to similar abuse at the hands of organized groups of men, including in Rochdale, Oxford, Telford and Bristol.
Together, these studies paint a horrific picture of how child victims of sexual abuse were not only systematically ignored by those whose job it was to protect them – including social workers and police – but also how Young girls were considered by child protection authorities to be complicit in this violence. their own rape and abuse, as if it were something they could consent to. Another 2015 study of Rotherham, led by Louise Casey, also made clear that these abusers could hide behind their race to carry out their abuse: it discovered what it called an “archaic culture of sexism, bullying and discomfort around race,” with counselors and staff fearing they would be labeled racist if they mentioned the perpetrators’ ethnicity. By suppressing an issue that should have been addressed openly and properly, it allowed the abuse to continue.
Last week, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch called on the Labor government to launch a new statutory inquiry into child sexual abuse by groups of men. There remain gaps in our knowledge about the extent to which this has and is still happening across Britain, but questions arise as to whether another statutory inquiry could fill them. While in government, the Conservatives did not hold such an inquiry, instead citing the Independent Statutory Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), whose remit was to examine the extent to which state and non-state institutions States had failed to protect children. victims of sexual abuse in England and Wales.
The IICSA has carried out 15 investigations as part of its work, including one into the sexual exploitation of children by organized networks of men, and published a report in 2022. Rather than bringing together what was known from existing studies , she investigated the phenomenon through six areas of case studies that had not been independently investigated. Its conclusions are very worrying: although this form of child sexual abuse became a strategic priority for the police in 2015 – alongside terrorism and serious organized crime – we know and understand less than before 2015 the prevalence sexual abuse of children committed by groups of men. He highlighted the failure to collect data on the ethnicity of perpetrators and victims, and expressed concern that this lack of data could prevent police from taking preventative measures. It concluded that “the government… cannot know the current extent of the sexual exploitation of children by the networks, nor know who is involved in these groups.”
Since the publication of this report, efforts have been made to establish what we know about the scale of child sexual abuse by groups of men. Last November, the Child Sexual Exploitation Task Force released the first in a series of reports on the subject. It highlights that data from 44 police forces in 2023 shows that 3.7% – or 4,228 – of child sexual abuse crimes reported to police were group crimes and that 83% of suspects for whom the ethnicity was recorded were white, but only a third of the suspects had an ethnicity recorded, and this data only relates to crimes reported to the police. We need to know how many children have been and continue to be affected by this type of sexual abuse – but a more in-depth legal investigation is unlikely to be best placed to do so.
The findings of numerous studies on the rape of children by groups of men, on sexual abuse committed in institutional settings and on the most common form of sexual abuse of children – within the family setting – all have a common point. As a society, we have a disastrous record in combatting child sexual abuse, wherever it occurs and by whomever it occurs. It is estimated that half a million children are victims each year and that one in ten will be victims of abuse before the age of 16. But only 2,300 children benefit from a child protection plan following child sexual abuse.
Professionals working with children still receive inadequate training on child sexual abuse, and societal stigma and fear of making a mistake often make them reluctant to intervene and support children. Every day, children suffer terrible suffering. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse has produced several key recommendations to improve detection, prevention and support for victims which have not yet been implemented.
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Inquiries into what happened in towns like Rotherham, Rochdale and Telford, as well as the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse, have yielded countless lessons that have yet to be implemented. The most urgent policy priority must be to develop a comprehensive societal strategy to combat rape and child abuse, including by improving the way these crimes are detected, prevented and prosecuted. This is where Labor ministers must focus their efforts, and opposition politicians must support them and hold them to account.
theguardian