Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to improve child safety, in the light of the levels of sexual coercion reported by teenage girls in England compared to other European countries.

The findings on the levels of sexual coercion reported by teenage girls in England published by the University of Central Lancashire are part of a collaborative research project involving five European countries – Norway, Italy, Bulgaria, Cyprus and England. Protection from abuse is a fundamental right for all children and the Government continues to work to improve child safety.

Our recent key actions include:

• Commissioning the PSHE Association to produce guidance for teachers on teaching about consent, which will be published shortly. The statutory sex and relationships education (SRE) guidance also makes clear that young people should be taught about how the law applies to sexual relationships and be taught positive values and a moral framework to guide their decisions, judgements and behaviour.

• Revising statutory safeguarding guidance, Working Together to Safeguard Children, 2013 and Keeping Children Safe in Education (April 2014), to provide clear frameworks for professionals and for schools to take action to protect children from abuse. These updated versions will be published shortly.

• To help children stay safe online, we have also put online safety on the curriculum, published advice for parents on keeping young people safe from cyberbullying, and announced £500,000 extra funding in December 2014 to the UK Safer Internet Centre to provide guidance and training for schools. The Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) Command of the National Crime Agency has developed a specific educational resource to tackle ‘sexting’, which is designed for use by teachers.

• We are committed to improving the child protection system and are working with local leaders and professionals on a radical programme of reform, including improving social worker training and children’s services. The overall aim of this work is to bring about long-term change to help vulnerable children.