Child Sexual Exploitation, Victimisation and Vulnerability

Abstract

Child Sexual Exploitation, Victimisation and VulnerabilityIssues concerning the sexual exploitation of children and young people remain the subject of considerable political, media, public and professional concern.As we go to press with this issue, child sexual exploitation (CSE) is again at the forefront of media attention with the publication of the Centre for Social Justice (2014) report Girls and Gangs, which has closely followed the nationwide Inquiry into Child Sexual Exploitation in Gangs and Groups conducted by the Office of the Children's Commissioner (Berelowitz et al., 2013), and in January the publication of the Health Working Group Report on Child Sexual Exploitation (Department of Health, 2014).This latter report has reiterated the important responsibilities that healthcare staff have as part of the wider multiagency response to CSE, and also highlighted a need for better evidence on the health consequences for young people of CSE.Three of the five papers in this issue directly consider aspects of CSE, and two further papers examine related issues of children and young people's victimisation and vulnerability.This issue begins with Jenny Pearce's (2014) paper which draws on data from a research study examining how national UK guidance on Safeguarding Children and Young People from Sexual Exploitation (DCSF, 2009) has been implemented by local safeguarding children boards (LSCBs).Data were collected through a questionnaire distributed in 2010 to all 144 LSCBs in England with a response rate of 100 (70%), followed by semi-structured interviews with 104 professionals in 24 of the LSCBs identified as 'the most proactive' (p.161), to look at how LSCBs were responding to the report's principles.A data monitoring and self-assessment checklist were also developed to record the nature and prevalence of CSE in each LSCB locality.A key finding of the research was that at the time of data collection, despite some excellent practice examples, 'approximately three-quarters of LSCBs [were] not proactive in implementing' the dual aim of the 2009 guidance of protecting children and young people and prosecuting abusers.While 59 per cent reported that they did not record data on CSE.Pearce (p.162) reports 'the reasons for this lack of activity were often put down to limited resources and a lack of awareness of the harm caused by CSE.' The research also highlighted issues of consent and blame.Pearce (p.163) reports that 'instead of being understood as victims of abuse, sexually exploited young people (particularly the 16 to 18 age group) were invariably perceived to be consenting active agents making choices, albeit constrained, about their relationships.As such, they were seen to carry responsibility for what happened to them, and consequently, the blame for the abuse that follows….

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 28 citations exist upstream.

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.