Child Sexual Offender Data
Debate between Esther McVey and Sarah Champion(1 week, 4 days ago)
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Esther McVey
That is shameful. I am delighted that my right hon. Friend brought that up; that is why it is essential that today’s debate rectifies that situation.
Missing from Baroness Casey’s recommendations was the vital need for data collection on religion and immigration status—factors that surely need to be understood so that if they are found to be related to higher offending rates, strategies for protecting children can be that much more targeted and effective. As Baroness Casey acknowledges in her audit, for too long the authorities have shied away from the ethnicity of people involved, and “blindness”, “ignorance” and “prejudice” led to repeated failures, over decades, to properly investigate cases.
If we had complete and consistent data, we would be able to answer more questions with greater accuracy. Are certain types of exploitation increasing? How are offenders operating? Are those from certain ethnic backgrounds more likely than others to commit certain sorts of crimes? If we understand what patterns exist, we can improve policing, bring more survivors the justice they deserve and stop these horrendous crimes happening again.
Other questions need to be answered, too. Why are institutions so adverse to collecting and reporting such data? The Jay report, published in 2014, documented a reluctance to discuss offender ethnicity openly. We know that the Labour-run councils of Rotherham—
Sarah Champion
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for referring to the Jay report on Rotherham. She will be aware that the frontline staff were gathering that data; management and the upper echelons were blocking it. She is absolutely right to ask why that happened, and what the consequences were—I put it to her that there were not many.
Esther McVey
I thank the hon. Member for all her work on this matter over many years. I know the abuse that she went through for standing up for those girls.