Agenda item

The Committee considered a report of the Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services which provided members with information on The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse into Child Sexual Exploitation by Organised Networks and actions taken by Durham Constabulary, Durham County Council and Durham Children’s Safeguarding Partnership to address areas within the report (for copy of report, see file of minutes).

The Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services and Chief Superintendent Dave Ashton from Durham Constabulary were in attendance to present the report and deliver a presentation (for copy of presentation, see file of minutes).

Members were informed that IICSA was established in 2014 as a Public Inquiry to look into multiple child sexual abuse failures through a series of investigations.

In July 2019 ICSA launched an investigation into institutional responses to the sexual exploitation of children by organised networks. The Inquiry chose 6 geographical areas at random to participate. The geographical areas were chosen because they had not experienced previous issues and they provided a lens into practice.

The Inquiry chose eight themes to investigate that were disruption and profiling; empathy and concern of child victims; risk assessment, protection from harm and outcomes for children; missing children, return home interviews, looked after children; male victims; children with a disability; partnership working on child sexual exploitation and audit, review and performance improvement.

The investigation report was published on 1 February 2022, a copy of which had been circulated with the report. The Corporate Director clarified that the wording in the heading – ‘sexual exploitation of children by organised networks’ did not mean grooming gangs and the term network was used in its broadest sense of two or more people. 

Members were provided with details of the methodology and scale; IICSA headline recommendations; learning themes for Durham; improvement and investment since April 2019; new service developments and IICSA report next steps.

The Chair thanked the officers for their very informative presentation and asked members for their questions.

Councillor Walton thanked officers for their detailed response to the report that was a harrowing read but was reassured that the issues were being addressed. She commented on the high-risk groups and the number of gaps and gave examples. She then referred to the data and the introduction of a data analysist and asked how they could be sure that the data analysed was correct given the gaps. She asked what was being done to ensure that all information was being included. She then referred to the use of language and asked what steps were being taken to share this information.

In response to the question from Councillor Walton, Chief Superintendent indicated that they now had the ability to use male workers. During the work with IICSA going back two years they had appointed a dedicated male exploitation worker employed with the joint team from the Local Authority, since then an additional male worker had been employed. Previously, there was always an option to use a male worker from the police team if a child wanted to speak to a particular gender.

The Chief Superintendent went on to reassure members that where a perpetrator was unknown if any agencies had concerns, they should make a referral which would undergo joint screening that would show the risks and may also give intelligence on behaviour. He then referred to the use of language and that they needed to get better at this aspect, but it was hard to come up with a definitive dictionary of language and there were obvious words which they trained staff to avoid, it was changing, and it is not just language but having empathy and listening too.

The Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services referred to the toolkit that was developed by young people together with Investing in Children. At the public hearing this was seen as an example of good practice and a lot of the quotes in the report dated back to earlier documentation. There was still a lot of work to be done but there had been a significant amount of improvement. He then referred to male victims and that they had developed these resources in the team and one of the five cases that was looked at was a male victim who accessed specialist support which was seen as a positive intervention.

Councillor Walton asked that they ensure that the information the data analyst was analysing incorporates the responses to their questions.

In response, Chief Superintendent indicated that the data analyst helped them within the multi-agency forum, but each agency had their own systems with different systems for different purposes. When the information systems were pulled together and with joint working they had a good understanding of some of the key issues and good detailed work. Education colleagues provide screening that helps to put information into context for other professionals involved. It was a complex area that they needed to keep reviewing and how they used that data affectively. The multi tracker was used for children who were most at risk and indicated where they needed to put their resources. They were currently tracking around 60 children who had multi-agency plans and the risks had been reduced due to interventions been put into place.

Councillor L Mavin asked about children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and that one third of cases involved children with SEND and only one child with SEND received the appropriate support. She referred to the deep dive review and the additional specialist support to pupils in referral units and pupils who had been excluded. She asked for further details of the deep dive and what progress had been made and how children with severe learning disabilities were identified.

The Chief Superintendent referred to the work he had previously mentioned that they carried out with SEND specialists who were a key partner. He indicated that during COVID lockdown they had identified 33% of children on the vulnerability tracker had some form of learning disability or special education need that had increased coming out of lockdown. Each child that came through had the benefit of the special education needs expert who sat alongside the team to give advice to ensure they were given the most appropriate service. They did tack physical disability and had not seen a great number of children subject to sexual exploitation with physical disabilities. To ensure that they were covering this they had given multi-agency briefings to health visitors, midwives, safeguarding health professionals and general practitioners to ensure they had that understanding or what was meant by child exploitation and encourage those agencies to put a referral forward. All safeguarding leads within the school setting had the same briefing to heighten awareness to encourage people if they had a concern contact the social care team or the police or submit a referral.

Councillor Hunt suggested that in view of the number of questions, a separate meeting by arranged with all agencies including the Police Crime Commissioner (PCC) in person so that all questions and evidence of what had been happening be brought to that meeting for discussion and details of work that had been carried out.

The Chair responded that he agreed that a sperate meeting be arranged to discuss the report in more detail to give a greater understanding of the report, if agreeable with officers

Councillor Gunn commented that it was a big and complex area around all the issues, and they needed to focus on a good discussion and getting down to the complexity of the issues and agreed that they needed to look at a workshop going forward.

It was agreed that a separate workshop session be set up to discuss the issues and learn more about the detail.

In response to a question from Mrs Evans, Chief Superintendent explained in broad terms that if there was insufficient evidence for the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute initiatives to disrupt would be used such as child abduction warning notices being issued. There was a good multi-agency group and could bring together other local authority colleagues to look at other ways and other legislation to disrupt the individual. They would look at both individual investigations and prosecution to consider what could be done and the police work closely with the local authority in this.

Councillor Varty indicated that she was pleased that Pupil Referral Units (PRUs) were receiving support from Durham University.

The Director of Children and Young People’s Services advised of targeted work carried out with PRUs was important as education is a protected factor and work was being done with both safeguarding and SEND leads.

Councillor Gunn referred to the issues raised in the inquiry covering Durham and commented that improvements were implemented during the independent inquiry or being implemented now. She then commented that most of the high-profile recommendations were for Department for Education (DfE) and government to implement in terms of regulation and asked what the main challenges were and even one child being sexual exploited was too many.

The Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services indicated that this was a complex area and a cultural shift was needed. Whilst there had been a number of investigations over the last ten or twelve years there was still a lot the service did not know and often the perpetrators or criminal gangs were one step ahead. There was a significant challenge in terms of how they moved to address multiple difficulties and different ways of working and quite often structures had not been set up in this way and was the reasons why a number of the recommendations were national.

He then referred to the Children Act 1989 and that within the Act there was no reference to child exploitation or child criminal exploitation when it was published it was aimed to protect children at risk in their own home and they still had this system operating with some statutory guidance. There had been a massive cultural shift to look at the different complexities and challenges to support young people where there were groups, individuals, organisations and networks who were looking to exploit in a range of different ways. The service were working closely with national experts, but it was changing and shifting significantly and to keep ahead of it was difficult. Safeguarding mitigates the risk it does not remove the risk and the aim is to protect every child.

The Chief Superintendent indicated that child sexual exploitation was just one form of exploitation and sadly children that come to their attention were more likely to be abused by people they know. They were challenges in terms of how children had access to pornography and the internet and some of the behaviours that manifest in their everyday lives. Work had been done with Professor Simon Hackett and Professor Carlene Firmin, both from Durham University that has helped to understand child behaviour and a wider understanding of a child it is not just CSE these children had vulnerabilities and may have suffered neglect or domestic abuse and it was important that the service and police get to grips with other risk factors too.

The Head of Children’s Social Care commented that from a safeguarding child perspective the biggest challenge was that CSE was underpinned by a culture of secrecy. Children were threatened with harm to themselves or their families and were made to feel guilty for what had happened or alternatively were made to feel loved by their perpetrators so that they did not recognise what was happening was abuse. Everything was reinforced by a culture and power differential that exits within the perpetrator that was designed to stop children understanding what was happening to them and enabled to do what they do. The Head of Children’s Social Care agreed a detailed workshop session could look at how perpetrators operate as this underpins a lot of the complexities discussed today.

Councillor Martin referred to the deep dive and the work being done and asked officers if they foresee an increase in prosecutions or attempted prosecutions due to child exploitation and if they believed that due to this work as a result of the deep dive if young people in County Durham were going to be safer.

The Chief Superintendent confirmed that they were making children safer, but sadly the prosecution was too late, and they wanted to intervene at an earlier stage to prevent the child from being abused in the first place. This was not just a police issue and they needed to work with education colleagues, parents and children’s services to identify some of those factors to reduce the risks. Significant sentences were given to those who had abused children, in terms of child sexual exploitation it was proactiveness to try and identify the networks. Currently there were 1400 registered sex offenders across County Durham and Darlington who had been prosecuted and quite a proportion of those were against children. Under legislation they had strict monitoring processes around those individuals. He stated that this was not enough and did not hit every offender and was why they needed to be open to the signs of a child being exploited or abused to make sure they were acting on it. Durham Police have a high harm agenda with a priority to prosecute for offences of child abuse and domestic abuse.

Councillor Hunt indicated that she struggled to understand the definition of CSE and that having sex with a minor was breaking the law and prosecutions should be brought against anyone who harms a child. Prosecutions showed that they do take child abuse seriously and working together collectively any kind of sexual abuse was illegal regardless and would be prosecuted.

The Chief Superintendent indicated that there was clear legislation with the sexual offences act and a lot of provision came in 2003 specifically around grooming of a child and any sexual activity in the presence of a child. There was lots of different offences and they were not lacking legislation some of the difficulties were in terms of the grooming process. Perpetrators would groom and gain power or authority over that child and knew how to manipulate them into thinking the abuse was consensual and part of a loving relationship. This caused traumatic impact in child thinking and was not always clear and was difficult for that child to come forward. The Police Force did provide training on trauma informed impact and how the brain worked and misguided thinking. It was difficult to prosecute without any evidence and referred to the Medomsley Detention Centre investigation that took six years where they had over 2000 victims the perpetrators were now of an old age and a significant number were not well enough to stand trial or had died. The victims were living with the abuse every day some had gone on to be successful, but others had suffered alcohol and drug addictions, it was not just about what is happening today but historical cases too.

Resolved: ( i) That the IICSA Child Exploitation by Organised Networks report be noted.

(ii) That a separate workshop session be set up to discuss the issues in more detail.

(iii) That Members be provided with an update to a future meeting in relation to the agreed next steps and actions taken by the service and partners to address the issues highlighted in the report.