Grooming gang scandal: Report action 'still risks failing victims' - foster agency on what could truly help

• A ‘damning’ report into grooming gangs exploiting vulnerable children has been released
• It found many of the victims were children in care, some as young as 10
• The Government is taking urgent action, including launching a national inquiry
• But the managing director of a foster agency fears too much focus is being placed on the wrong things

A foster care agency wants the Government to shift the focus to victims and the vulnerable - amid concerns the grooming gangs debate has become more “headlines than healing”.

Earlier this year, the Government commissioned Baroness Louise Casey to carry out an audit of the nature, scale and characteristics of gang-based sexual exploitation, in the wake of high-profile incidents in Rotherham, Rochdale, and other parts of the country. Last week, her findings were released - and the Home Secretary has announced there will now be a formal statutory inquiry “to get accountability in local areas”.

The report found that vulnerable victims as young as 10 were singled out for grooming, and in some cases, the perpetrators were still walking free. It also found deep rooted institutional failures stretching back decades, where organisations which should have protected children and punished offenders looked the other way - with Casey saying “blindness, ignorance, prejudice, defensiveness and even good but misdirected intentions” all played a part.

The audit also found evidence of police forces avoiding the topic of perpetrators’ ethnicity altogether “for fear of appearing racist or raising community tensions”, an angle which has dominated media coverage. The Government has promised far-reaching action in response to the report, including new research and data on ethnicity.

But Chido Poe, managing director of London-based child fostering agency Banya, told us she believes action on the grooming scandal report still runs the risk of failing victims, especially children in care. She’s concerned that the current approach is “sensationalising the ethnicity” of perpetrators - which does little to either help victims heal or protect other vulnerable children.

Here is what she believes needs to be at the forefront of the Government’s response to the “damning” Casey report, as well as what the Government is actually planning to do so far:

Child victims labelled ‘troublesome or promiscuous’

Ms Poe said that the children abused by grooming gangs were failed once by their abusers, but many had also been repeatedly failed by the institutions meant to protect them. “The national audit confirms what many have known for years, that children in care are often viewed through a lens of suspicion and judgement, not protection and compassion.”

The report confirmed that many of the victims were in fact children in care, and instead of being safeguarded, they were frequently ignored, disbelieved, or even blamed by police and professionals, she continued. Some were labelled “troublesome” or “promiscuous”, while some were treated as willing participants rather than children in need of urgent intervention.

“There’s a deeply entrenched culture of adultification when it comes to looked-after children,” Ms Poe said. “Because they don’t fit the narrow idea of an ‘innocent victim’, they are dehumanised and dismissed. This is a national shame, and it’s still happening.”

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Calls for the Government to ‘challenge myths’

Ms Poe was concerned that the current race-based rhetoric was distorting the public conversation around child protection, and it warned that this “divisive” messaging may only serve to further isolate already marginalised groups of young people. “Instead of sensationalising the ethnicity of perpetrators to score political points, we need to be talking about safeguarding failures, professional accountability, and how to support survivors. The current debate is more concerned with headlines than healing.”

Banya is urging the Government to take further action than it has so far promised, including investing in specialist training for police and social workers on the vulnerabilities of children in care. The agency would also like to see a public awareness campaign to challenge myths around looked-after children and survivors of exploitation, as well as stronger oversight of local authorities to ensure proper safeguarding procedures are in place.

“The audit should have been a turning point. Instead, we risk making the same mistakes again, ignoring the victims while arguing over the details,” she said. “This cannot be allowed to continue.”

What actions is the Government taking?

As Baroness Casey’s findings were published last week, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper outlined some new measures being introduced into the Crime and Policing Bill. These included a “long overdue” mandatory reporting duty, as well as aggravated offences for grooming offenders “so their sentences match the severity of their crimes”.

Back in January, she had police forces identify cases involving grooming and child sexual exploitation allegations that had been closed with no further action. More than 800 had been found so far - and would be reviewed. She expected that number to rise to over 1,000 in the coming weeks

As well as launching a national inquiry into grooming gangs, Cooper also said that the Government would take action “immediately” on the 11 other recommendations in Casey’s report.

These do include new laws to protect children and support victims so they stop being blamed for crimes committed against them. They also include work across agencies to better identify children at risk; action to tackle new forms of exploitation and abuse, including online; and new ethnicity data and research “so we face up to the facts on exploitation and abuse”. The Casey report said that to date, ethnicity data had only been collected on about one-third (37%) of suspects.

The first steps would include changing the law to ensure that adults who engage in penetrative sex with a child under 16 face “the most serious charge of rape”. This aims to prevent grooming cases being dropped or downgraded to lesser charges because a 13 to 15-year-old was perceived to have been ‘in love’ or ‘had consented to’ sex.

“And we will change the law so that those convicted for child prostitution offences while their rapists got off scot-free will have their convictions disregarded and their criminal records expunged,” she continued. Finally, the police will also launch a new national criminal operation into grooming gangs, overseen by the National Crime Agency.

“Let me be clear. Perpetrators of these vile crimes should be off our streets, behind bars and paying the price for what they have done.”

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