Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 20 October 2025 to Question 79293 on Offences against Children: Criminal Investigation, what her timetable is for setting the terms of reference for Operation Beaconport.

A new national police operation into group-based child sexual exploitation and abuse, Operation BEACONPORT, is now underway and being overseen by the NCA in collaboration with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) and other policing partners, as recommended in Baroness Casey’s report. This will identify more perpetrators, give victims the justice they deserve, ensure best practice is shared, and equip the system to deal with complex cases more effectively.

This will be done through assistance to live investigations through support and guidance, a review of cases where they were closed with no further action, improving operating models to ensure child sexual exploitation and abuse is treated as serious and organised crime, and ensuring technology is harnessed to identify vulnerable children and safeguard them. It will also identify the prolific perpetrators carrying out these heinous offences.

Terms of Reference are being discussed and agreed with policing partners with future budgets subject to the department’s allocation process.

The closed case review element will have phases running concurrently. Each phase will build on the last.