Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many child informants have been used by the police in county lines operations in each of the last five years.

The statutory framework for the deployment of juveniles as covert human intelligence sources is designed to ensure that they are deployed with great care and only in very limited and carefully managed circumstances.

The Home Office does not collect information on covert human intelligence sources in county line crimes as this is an operational matter.