Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps the Government plans to take to (a) tackle sexual abuse and sexual crime involving 16 and 17 year olds and (b) better educate young people about sexual abuse.

Tackling child sexual abuse and exploitation is a top priority for this Government. In March 2015 we launched the “Tackling CSE” report and prioritised child sexual abuse as a national threat in the Strategic Policing Requirement, setting a clear expectation on police forces to collaborate across force boundaries, to safeguard children, to share intelligence and to share best practice.

Our “This is Abuse” campaign has sent clear messages to prevent young people becoming victims or perpetrators of sexual violence by helping teenagers to recognise and understand sexual abuse. It also signposts them to appropriate support including specialist services, counselling, Independent Sexual Violence Advisers, and helplines.

The College of Policing and the National Policing lead have set the requirement on all forces to train all new and existing police staff including police officers, detectives and specialist investigators to respond to child sexual abuse. In addition, all police forces and the NCA are now connected to the Child Abuse Image Database (CAID). CAID is a national UK policing system that supports law enforcement in the pursuit of offenders involved in the sexual exploitation of children and in safeguarding the victims of this crime.