Child Sexual Exploitation: Casey Report

Jim Allister Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

I can tell my hon. Friend that we are working with the Lord Chancellor on taking forward this recommendation now and not waiting for any further local inquiry. Baroness Casey is really clear that the adultification of children, treating them as consenting to something into which they were coerced and in which they were exploited, lies at the heart of a lot of the institutional failure to take this crime seriously. That is why we need to change the law, but we also need to change attitudes, because some of the cases that Baroness Casey refers to are recent, and that cannot go on.

[Jim Allister (North Antrim) (TUV)]

The Home Secretary refers to this inquiry as a national inquiry, but it is not, is it? The inquiry’s terms of reference and scope will exclude concern about grooming and organised sexual exploitation in Northern Ireland, whether by foreign nationals, paramilitary groups or others. Is that less important to this Government? Will the legislative change increasing the statutory rape age to 16 apply across the whole United Kingdom?

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. and learned Member will understand that Home Office responsibilities around policing and crime cover England and Wales. The Safeguarding Minister will be following up with the devolved Administrations, and it will be for them to decide how they want to take these issues forward, including in Northern Ireland. The Lord Chancellor will consult in the normal way with devolved Administrations on changes to the law.