Government to establish new Child Protection Authority in response to CSA

Jess Phillips (pictured) says the Government plans to set up a new Child Protection Authority to improve national oversight and consistency of child protection practice in response to failings in tackling group-based child sexual exploitation.

The Minister for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) said the new authority would build on the national Child Safeguarding Review Panel by addressing one of IICSA’s central recommendations by providing national leadership and learning on child protection and safeguarding.

The Birmingham Yardley MP said work to expand the role of the Panel will begin immediately, with the Government consulting on developing the new Authority this year.

“IICSA revealed the terrible suffering caused by child sexual abuse and the shameful failure of institutions to put the protection of children before the protection of their own reputations,” Ms Phillips said in a speech in Parliament yesterday.

“Its findings, culminating in the final report published in October 2022, were designed to better protect children from sexual abuse and address the shortcomings which left them exposed to harm.

“The publication of that final report two and a half years ago should have been a landmark moment. But instead, the victims and survivors were failed again.”

The Minister also confirmed the Government would be taking forward the new mandatory duty to report child sexual abuse in its Crime and Policing Bill.

“Mandatory reporting will create a culture of openness and honesty rather than cover-ups and secrecy. It will empower professionals and volunteers to take prompt, decisive action to report sexual abuse.

“It will demonstrate to children and young people that if they come forward, they will be heard. And anyone who seeks deliberately to prevent someone fulfilling their mandatory duty to report child sexual abuse will face the full force of the law.”

Phillips also announced a new best practice framework to support local authorities which want to undertake victim-centred local inquiries.

She said the Government would support local authorities to run the local inquiries with a £5m fund so they could draw on the lessons from independent inquiries like Telford, Rotherham and Greater Manchester.

She said the Government will publish the details next month about the best practice framework and the process through which local authorities can access the £5 million national fund to support locally-led work on grooming gangs.

“Following feedback from local authorities, the fund will adopt a flexible approach to support both full independent local inquiries and more bespoke work, including local victims’ panels or locally led audits into the handling of historic cases,” Ms Phillips said in Parliament.

The VAWG Minister confirmed that Baroness Casey’s three-month National Audit on Group-based Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse is ongoing, but said it is building a comprehensive national picture of what is known about child sexual exploitation, identifying local and national trends, assessing the quality of the data, looking at the ethnicity issues faced for example by cases involving Pakistani heritage gangs, and reviewing police and wider agency understanding.

The Chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, Gavin Stephens, has – at the Home Secretary’s request – urged the chief constables of all 43 police forces in England and Wales, to reexamine their investigations into group-based child sexual exploitation which resulted in no further action decisions.

Ms Phillips also announced that the Government intends to expand the Independent Child Trafficking guardians’ scheme across England and Wales – a scheme which provides direct support to child victims of sexual exploitation and grooming, which to date has only been available in selected areas.