Sexual Exploitation: Protection of 16 and 17-year-olds
Kit Malthouse Excerpts(8 years, 4 months ago)
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Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House notes the findings of The Children’s Society’s report entitled Old enough to know better? which looked at the sexual exploitation of 16 and 17 year olds; further notes the particular vulnerability of that age group as they transition from childhood to adulthood and the role that aggravated offences and harsher sentences have in deterring crimes against 16 and 17 year olds; calls on the Government to clarify for prosecution and sentencing purposes the role drugs and alcohol, mental health problems, being in care and learning disabilities have in adding to the vulnerability of that age group; and further calls on the Government to give police the same tools to intervene when a 16 or 17 year old is being targeted and groomed for exploitation as they have for younger children.
Over the past few weeks it has been said a number of times in this House that our success as parliamentarians is measured by how we defend the vulnerable. In recent years we have seen all too clearly that children fall into that category. On the subject of this debate, the horrendous crime of child sexual exploitation, our first instinct is to recoil, and our next is to hide our children away, wrapped up so that no harm could ever come to them. But hiding from the problem because it is too grisly or, even more impossibly, stopping our children growing up would be markers of neither a brave society and brave lawmakers nor good parents.
As well as recognising that children are especially vulnerable, our approach must reflect the fact that they are also fully fledged adults in waiting, steadily gaining the experience, knowledge and mental development they need to take up all their rights and responsibilities. The protection of children and the maintenance of the environment in which they can grow therefore go hand in hand. On the whole, we do that well for most children, even if we need to think hard about how new technologic developments, such as the internet and social media, and cultural issues, such as body image problems and academic pressures, will impact on them.
However, our efforts to protect children and maintain that healthy environment run into the greatest difficulty at the very end of childhood—the transition to adulthood between 16 and 18—and on the issue of sex. It is a time of life that requires nuance, a nuance that does not come easily in laws that must deal in precision and definites. The age of consent for sexual activity is set at 16, and we are not suggesting that should be changed. But we start this debate in the light of the Children’s Society report “Old enough to know better?”, which shows that we still do not get the balance right in the case of the sexual exploitation of 16 and 17-year-olds. The report highlights the particular vulnerability of that age group and the awkwardness that exists between the fact they are children, their position over the age of consent and the expectations that society has of them.
Our motion therefore looks at what we can do in law to better protect 16 and 17-year-olds from being sexually exploited without changing the age of consent. In particular, we look at the role that aggravated offences could have in better deterring sexual exploitation of those children and clarifying in the mind of the public their special vulnerability as they stand on the threshold of adulthood. If we can clarify, for prosecution and sentencing purposes, the guidance for judges and juries on the role that drugs, alcohol, mental health problems, learning disabilities and being in care have in adding to the vulnerability of that already vulnerable age group, I believe we can achieve some progress. The motion also suggests that the powers that the police possess to enable them to intervene when a child under 16 is in danger should be extended to situations in which a child over 16 is under threat. I cannot stress enough how necessary all this is. I suspect that I do not need to do so for those present in the Chamber today.
At that age, abuse and exploitation can cause profound damage that can last a lifetime. It will irrevocably shape how a child grows to see both the world and themselves. They will see the world as forever hostile and threatening. They will cling to any security or affection, no matter how bad it is for them or how malevolent the source—a vulnerability that many predators exploit in the first place. It risks their forever seeing themselves as a victim or as someone who cannot take the risk of trusting anyone. It can stop them ever becoming a healthy, independent adult.
We also know from research conducted by the Children’s Society that those young people can end up feeling that they deserve the abuse, and that on occasion juries have not taken the fact of their vulnerability seriously enough: they have refused to recognise that the fact that the child was over the legal age of consent did not mean that their attacker was not guilty of sexual exploitation. When they did that, they failed and betrayed those young people.
All sexual crimes are extremely serious, but I think we can all agree that those committed against children are doubly cruel. That is why we must achieve some changes in the law. Although the proposed changes would protect all 16 and 17-year-olds, this is particularly pressing in the case of children in care. I expect that all Members of the House will agree that we could and should do better for them. The Prime Minister said as much recently. He noted that children in care today are almost guaranteed to live in poverty, and that 84 % of them leave school without five good GCSEs. He noted in a speech this year that 70% of prostitutes were once in care and that, tragically, care leavers are four times more likely to commit suicide than anyone else. We cannot go on setting those children up for a life on the streets, on welfare because they are unable to find work, or an early grave. Please God, the Prime Minister will make some progress on the issue. I understand that he will make a statement about children in care after the Christmas recess.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The hon. Gentleman’s remarks so far have been music to my ears. When I chaired the Children, Schools and Families Committee we looked at children in care. He is absolutely right about vulnerability. Does he agree that access to therapeutic care for those children at that crucial age is often just not there?
Kit Malthouse
I agree with the hon. Gentleman. Indeed, progress needs to be made in all manner of policy areas to deal with this issue.
Their vulnerability to child sexual exploitation is one area where we can stop failing those young people now. Their characteristics mean that this particular group of young people are in desperate need of the changes we are proposing today. While most children’s vulnerability is shielded by family, friends and the support networks that come through good communities and good schools, those children are not so fortunate. Their backgrounds are chaotic, frightening or cruel, putting them in a nearly hopeless situation. Combine that fragility with the fact that there is no one actively looking out for them, and it quickly becomes clear that they are easy prey for evil people. We have seen from case notes that that kind of background is so often part of the trajectory of an abused child—a trajectory that sees an abused and vulnerable child become a troubled adult. The Children’s Society report shows that these predators target children systematically and lie in wait near where they live, study or socialise. They stalk them on social media. They offer the child everything they have missed, win their trust, isolate them from the adults who would intervene, ply them with drink and drugs, and then strike. Every time they are successful, they leave a life in tatters; every time they fail, they just move on to the next target.
In the past few years we have seen several sickening cases of hundreds of children targeted by gangs and by predatory individuals. These cases of exploitation sometimes occurred in collusion with, or at least with the knowledge of, those who should have been protecting and caring for them. In some cases, the police or those responsible for the children wanted to intervene but lacked the authority or confidence to do so. Right now, the police, children’s services and the courts look on without the legal teeth or power to stop it.
Some will immediately think of high-profile cases like those in Rotherham or Oxford, but let us be clear: this is not a problem with one demographic, even if divisive and unhelpful groups want to pretend that it is in order to further their own agendas. Child sexual exploitation affects, and is perpetrated by, all races, colours and creeds. The papers focus on the big cases, but there are thousands of individuals whose lives have been turned upside down by these crimes. As I have said, these children do not have parents who can look after them or family to care for them, so it is our collective duty as a society to be those parents and that family. We, us, you and me have to be the arms that catch them if they fall and the voices calling them back when they wander and stray. Now, too often, we fail them just when they need us most.
More broadly, these issues point to a wider problem in the way we protect children. To reflect the importance of ending this national scandal, it is time that we tilted the law and the criminal justice system decisively in favour of children and those who wish to protect them, not just in this instance but across the board. In thinking about protected groups, it seems strange to me that children are not among them. Gay people, minority racial groups and religious groups are all protected specifically in law, and rightly so, but children are not, and they should be. We have to add them as a category for special protection, at least to send a signal to society and the justice system that more effort is required. The upcoming policing and criminal justice Bill that was announced in the Queen’s Speech offers just such an opportunity.
On the distinct matter of child sexual exploitation, the crux is that 16 and 17-year-olds are not protected in the same way because they are over the age of consent. Children under 16 are already protected by the fact that they cannot consent to sex, and the rightly harsher sentencing that exists because of this is a strong deterrent. Sexual crimes against children under 16 are further prevented by the extra powers and tools that the police possess to intervene when someone is targeting and grooming them for exploitation. These include child abduction warning notices, which are used to disrupt an adult’s association with a child under 16. We should take note of this deterrent effect and extend the power to 18. There is already backing for this.
In 2012, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner asked the Government to extend the use of these notices and allow them to be served without parental consent where necessary. There is solid statistical backing for this change too. In 2012-13, 306,118 incidents of missing persons were reported to the police in England, Scotland and Wales. During that year, children accounted for 64% of all missing person incidents, and 15 to 17-year-olds were the most common missing persons, accounting for 36% of all such incidents. This means that in over a third of cases, the police did not have the right powers to intervene to protect a child. That must change.
The fact that 16 and 17-year-olds are still children, and that children are vulnerable and more likely to be targeted, is enough to warrant extending these protections to them.
Mr Sheerman
Does the hon. Gentleman share my misgivings—I make myself very unpopular on the Labour Benches in this regard—about introducing the vote at 16, which would be a move towards adulthood at 16 and therefore reinforce the problem of the shrinking of childhood? We must be very careful about that as the length of time that someone is child, as a percentage of their now very long life, becomes shorter and shorter.
Kit Malthouse
I realise that the House is divided over the issue of votes at 16. My personal view is that we should stay at 18. I am trying to illustrate the fact that the two years between sexual consent and legal majority is a particular zone of childhood which, as I hope the hon. Gentleman agrees, requires particular attention from a legal and a parliamentary point of view.
We also have to consider the psychological impact that the lack of protection has on society. It makes people think that these children should not have this protection, that they are not really vulnerable, and that they are, in the words very deliberately chosen by the Children’s Society, “old enough to know better”. Furthermore, in many cases, because they lack these protections and are above the age of consent, they are all the more likely to be denied justice, and that is why predators are drawn to them. The fact that they are above the legal age of consent has had a big psychological impact on how crimes committed against them have been interpreted. There is evidence that juries have lacked sympathy with their cases when these crimes have come to court. Their vulnerability and the cruel effectiveness of grooming are not well understood across the population, and attackers are aware of the public’s complacency.
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)
On the topic of public attitudes and misperception, is the hon. Gentleman aware of the case of Maria Cahill, who bravely came forward to the authorities, and eventually to the media, with her story of abuse within the republican movement, as a member of that movement, and how her story was suppressed? Ever since the BBC revealed it, she has been subjected to punishment tweeting by Sinn Féin supporters and, indeed, by Sinn Féin politicians, who have cast slurs on what age she was to imply that she did “know better” and was somehow complicit in her own victimhood.
Kit Malthouse
I am sad to say that I do not know of that particular case, but the hon. Gentleman makes a powerful point.
This point is so obvious that it should not need stating, but I will do so anyway, because even when it is intellectually understood, people still do not “get it”: not fighting someone off, not objecting vociferously, or not attempting to take oneself away from a situation does not equal consent. That is even more obvious when we think of common factors in the cases that have come before the courts. We are talking about victims with mental health problems and learning disabilities. We are talking about children recovering from traumas and encouraged to take drugs or drink alcohol so that they would submit. Complacency about this matter is the biggest encouragement that the attackers look for. It needs to be clear in law that these children are to be considered vulnerable and that the targeting of vulnerable people will never be accepted in the United Kingdom.
All this points to the fact that the sudden removal of protections at 16 is not working, and that we can protect children better with our actions in this House. Let me reiterate what we are asking for: the Government must clarify, and put the clarification in statute, that when a victim of sexual assault is aged 16 or 17, it is an aggravated offence. They must make it clear that drugs and alcohol can never be viewed as consent for a sexual act. They must recognise that vulnerable people are deliberately targeted, and that this should be further considered as an aggravating condition. Passing this motion will move us towards doing a better job of helping parents, police and child protective services to look after children, and we must do so.
I do not advocate these reforms as a Conservative but as a father and as a Member of Parliament. I believe that it is in that spirit that other hon. Members joining us today also back this motion. As we do so, we lay claim to the best traditions of social reform that Britons have offered from within and without these walls through the ages. Every party in this House can lay claim to this, the most honourable of political traditions—the tradition that looks the vulnerable in the eye and says to them, “I will use the good fortune and power that society has given me to protect you.” When it comes to this kind of reform, I do not believe that any Member is sitting on a particular side of the House.
Kit Malthouse
With the leave of the House, I thank all Members who have taken part in this thoughtful and important debate, and I thank the Children’s Society for the support it has offered to a number of us in compiling our contributions. I also thank the Minister for her offer of an open door, which I took to mean a meeting to talk about perhaps putting together some clauses in the criminal justice Bill which might close some of these loopholes. More than that, I hope that this can be the start of an examination, before that Bill appears, of what more we can do to protect children, because it is obvious that the evidence is available to us.
As my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) said, the 2012 report of the Children’s Commissioner pointed to things that needed to be done. We now have the Children’s Society report with similar evidence. We also have the appalling cases that we see in the newspapers. Obviously, something needs to change. Much of the legislation around the protection of children is quite old, and has not been looked at since the 1980s, when there was a period of rapid change. I know from my own experience that children have just been through another period of enormously rapid change, and that the legislation has lagged behind. I would welcome working with Members, the Minister, and, hopefully, the Home Secretary and the Secretary of State for Justice to see what more we can do in the upcoming criminal justice Bill to protect young people.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House notes the findings of The Children’s Society’s report entitled Old enough to know better? which looked at the sexual exploitation of 16 and 17 year olds; further notes the particular vulnerability of that age group as they transition from childhood to adulthood and the role that aggravated offences and harsher sentences have in deterring crimes against 16 and 17 year olds; calls on the Government to clarify for prosecution and sentencing purposes the role drugs and alcohol, mental health problems, being in care and learning disabilities have in adding to the vulnerability of that age group; and further calls on the Government to give police the same tools to intervene when a 16 or 17 year old is being targeted and groomed for exploitation as they have for younger children.
Mr Graham Allen
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. The brilliant way in which you managed the debate meant that every single person who wanted to speak did speak, and they all kept to within 10 minutes. Can you work that magic again?
Draft Investigatory Powers Bill
Kit Malthouse Excerpts(8 years, 6 months ago)
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Mrs May
I thank my hon. Friend, particularly for her reference to her own experience. Sometimes people have a vision of judges taking a very long time to do all this, but as she says, there are many occasions on which they have to react very quickly to requests, and they have to be available to do so. I expect that they will do that in these circumstances as well. I believe that this Bill will strike the right balance between public accountability and the independence of the judiciary, which will give the public that extra confidence.
Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)
The House has generally welcomed the Home Secretary’s balanced approach, as do I, but may I urge her to be much more aggressive in one regard? In her statement, she referred to equipment interference powers. May I encourage her to frame those powers in such a way that they could be used to disrupt or even destroy servers distributing child abuse images or other criminal material?
Policing
Kit Malthouse Excerpts(8 years, 6 months ago)
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Julie Cooper (Burnley) (Lab)
I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate and to support the motion. My constituency of Burnley is policed by Lancashire constabulary, which is renowned as a top-performing police force. It has already been mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Kate Hollern).
Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary has rated Lancashire constabulary as outstanding. Yet, since 2010, Lancashire has lost 20% of its officers and 23% of its community support officers. In 2010, Lancashire had six police divisions; it now has three.
Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)
Given what the hon. Lady has told us—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Natascha Engel)
Order. The hon. Lady must resume her seat while the hon. Gentleman is standing.
Kit Malthouse
Given that the hon. Lady has said that Lancashire has seen a reduction in the number of police officers but is still rated as excellent, will she accept that there is no connection between performance and bare police numbers?
Julie Cooper
As my speech progresses, the hon. Gentleman will see that I do not accept what he says.
There is no doubt that these reductions are impacting on crime levels and on the public perception of crime. Now, worryingly, crime is on the increase in some areas of Lancashire. Sexual offences, burglary and violent crime are all showing significant increases. In addition to that, and very importantly, the nature of crime is changing, and we ignore that at our peril. Cybercrime is growing at a phenomenal rate. A person is now more likely to be mugged online than in the street. Added to that, an ever-increasing amount of police time is spent countering terrorism and tackling child exploitation. Such crimes are more complex to investigate and place a massive demand on police resources. Bearing that in mind, I am hugely concerned by the further proposed cut to Lancashire’s policing budget. Under the new funding formula, the cut to Lancashire would be an additional £24.5 million.
I understand that savings must be made, but a reduction of that magnitude is particularly hard to stomach when the same formula proposes significant increases in funding for several other police authorities.
Julie Cooper
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising that matter. The reserve is a result of prudent policing and developing new tactics to adapt to changing crime. It is about responsible policing.
There is no doubt that less delivers less, and Lancashire’s police constable has put his concerns on record. He talked about what would happen if the cuts went ahead. He said:
“Lancashire Constabulary will no longer be able to keep the public safe.”
Surely, when the police constable believes that cuts at the proposed level will mean that he cannot guarantee to keep the public safe, it is time to take notice. This is about not politics, but the safety of the people of Lancashire.
Last year, Lancashire police responded to more than 90,000 crimes.
Julie Cooper
No, I will not give way.
Lancashire police has been praised as an outstanding force, and yet it is to have cuts that go way beyond those of most other forces. There is no rhyme or reason to it, and, yet again from this Government, no fairness. What will the cuts mean operationally? The chief constable and the police and crime commissioner tell me that if these cuts go ahead at this level, the consequences will be this: no mounted police; no police dog units; the loss of the vast majority of our dedicated roads policing officers; the closure of every single public inquiry desk in the county; and dramatic cuts to our serious organised crime unit and the teams that deal with serious and complex crime—these officers deal with those criminals who pose the greatest harm to our communities. Added to that, police community support officers will become a thing of the past.
I know how much the people of Burnley and Padiham value their PCSOs. I have seen at first hand the positive impact that our PCSOs have on antisocial behaviour, but it goes further than that. PCSOs are key to delivering dedicated, accessible and visible neighbourhood policing. It has long been acknowledged that the mobilisation of local knowledge is fundamental in effective policing, and there is no doubt that PCSOs play a massive role in the prevention of minor crime and that the on-street intelligence that they access by virtue of their trusted role in the community often provides enormous assistance to major crime investigations. In addition, the presence of these uniformed officers on the street is a source of reassurance to the public. They make the public feel safe.
In all policing, safety is paramount. In Lancashire, we fully accept our need to take a share of the cuts, but I believe that we should never gamble with public safety. I urge the Government to listen to the professionals, including Lancashire’s chief constable, and to revisit the funding formula to ensure that cuts are shared fairly and that public safety is not compromised.
Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)
As possibly the only person in the Chamber who has actually handled a police budget, I must say that over the past few hours I have had an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. In my first week as deputy Mayor for policing in London I was told by various senior police officers that if I even thought about touching the budget, it would be the end of life as we know it. The first thing they would wave in front of me was safer neighbourhood teams. In every one of the four budgets I handled during my period at the Met, safer neighbourhood teams were the first saving to be rolled out. Of course, that was designed to frighten me and put me off making the much-needed savings and efficiencies in the force. Despite the fact that during my time I took something like 12% out of the overall Met budget, crime fell very significantly.
I also got used to armchair chief constables giving their views. Opposition Front Benchers have today made much of Peter Clarke. Lovely man though he is, Peter Clarke retired over 10 years ago, so he has not seen a budget for over a decade. Opposition Members would do much better to rely on more up-to-date expertise.
Jack Dromey
The concerns expressed by Peter Clarke about the impact on counter-terrorism of the hollowing out of neighbourhood policing have been echoed publicly in the past three months by the current head of counter-terrorism, Mark Rowley. Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that good neighbourhood policing—forming relationships, gathering intelligence and being the eyes and ears—is key to counter-terrorism?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. We need interventions to be short, because I am worried that the hon. Gentleman will not have enough time to respond to the debate in his own speech.
Kit Malthouse
I do accept the “golden thread” argument, but what I am trying to illustrate is that in February and March of every single year of my tenure that argument was waved in front of me, and it never came true.
I have some observations to offer on some of the arguments we have heard today. First, on the connection between police numbers and crime, I can say from experience that there is absolutely no direct connection between the two. The best illustration of that I can give is the apprehension of Delroy Grant, a night stalker in south-east London. That man terrorised and raped elderly people over a period of 17 years. The operation to catch him was the largest and most complex the Met had ever mounted and it cost millions and millions of pounds. They did not catch him for 17 years because they were trying to catch a rapist. They appointed a new investigating officer who realised that they were trying to catch a burglar, and then they caught him within two weeks. Millions of pounds was spent on the wrong investigative method. If they had adopted the right method earlier, they might have prevented a lot more crime. Homicide in London fell from 211 in 2005 to 101 in 2012—happily at the end of my tenure. Is anyone saying that we should have the same number of police officers investigating murder as we had back in 2005? Of course not. There is no direct connection between the two.
Those Members who are complaining about a rise in crime types in their constituencies would do better to ask serious questions of their police forces about performance, technology, targeting and skill. Let us look at two similar police forces, Warwickshire and Cleveland. Cleveland currently attracts a lot more funding than Warwickshire, despite the fact that they have similar populations. Warwickshire’s performance, however, is excellent. Cleveland has just been criticised for not handling antisocial behaviour correctly. Performance—skill, leadership and focus—has much more of an impact on crime types in any particular area than money does. I recommend that Members go and ask some of those testing questions. Most of the time, police officers know where, when and by whom crimes will be committed, and using intelligence better will be much more effective.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making his point in a typically powerful way. Does he agree—this might be a cynical point—that there are some who will say that we should not be playing ball as we have been doing in trying to reduce our budgets, in order to make political capital? That might make good political press releases; it does not make good policing.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. When I say I want short interventions, I do not mean, “Then carry on and make long interventions.” [Interruption.] No, I decide whether it is short. I am sure, Mr Hoare, you can find something else to do rather than challenging the Chair. I am sure that is not your intention. I want to get everybody else in, and the only way I am going to do that is to have fewer interventions. I want to allow the right amount of time for the closing speeches.
Kit Malthouse
My hon. Friend is right. I sat in the chamber at City Hall for year after year while Labour members waved the shroud for the public and tried to engender a sense of alarm, and of course crime dropped year after year, particularly very serious crime.
There is more to come out of police budgets—cars, buildings, reoffending rates, possibly a merger with the probation service. There is a huge amount that can be done. Many police forces still have not got a handle on procurement in the way that local authorities have, and many of them are saddled with scalping PFI deals that were brought in under the Labour Government. All of us bear the scars of that.
Much has been made of the supposed rise in crime as a result of online crime and cybercrime, but the truth is that no single force can tackle this. The idea that giving Lancashire more to deal with cybercrime will do anything for us is ridiculous. Often the perpetrator is not within the force area and may well be overseas. We would be much better off having a focused, efficient, combined central force to deal with cybercrime, which is exactly what is proposed.
Finally, I want to say something about the police formula. For many years it has been an unspoken secret—something that senior police officers sniggered about behind their hands—that the formula that was put in place 10 years ago was so manifestly unfair, but nevertheless politically sensitive, that politicians would never have the courage to meddle with it. During the four years that I was deputy Mayor for policing, there were constant complaints about the police formula and nobody really had the cojones, if that is parliamentary language, to get a grip on it. So I congratulate the Minister on finally dealing with it.
As my hon. Friend and neighbour the Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Jayawardena) mentioned, the biggest injustice in the formula has been damping. Most of the Opposition Members who have been complaining about cuts have forces that were beneficiaries of damping. Merseyside and Sussex did well out of damping. Hampshire has been significantly penalised over the past 10 years by damping, and its removal will be welcomed not only by those forces that have been penalised thus far and which will therefore benefit, but by anybody who is interested in fair play in police finance.
Some of the forces that have benefited from damping thus far, such as Lancashire, were wise and knew that they were living on borrowed time, so they took action and built up their reserves. Lancashire, as we have heard already in the debate, has £65 million in reserve. Much of that is money that has been accumulated by taking money away from Hampshire. Now that we are getting to a fairer formula and a level playing field for all counties, it is time for Lancashire to use Hampshire’s money to plug the gap that it may now experience.