Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Justice on the length of prison sentences for people convicted of offences in connection with paedophile rings.

Home Office Ministers have regular discussions with their counterparts across Government, including the Ministry of Justice, on measures to tackle the heinous crime of child sexual abuse and exploitation and ensure perpetrators face the full force of the law.

Through the Crime and Policing Bill, the Government is legislating to make grooming a statutory aggravating factor in the sentencing of child sexual offences. This will include (but is not limited to) offences committed by individuals involved in grooming gangs.

Where a sentencing court concludes that a child sex offence was involved or was facilitated by grooming behaviour, it will be obliged to treat this as an aggravating factor, for which a more substantial penalty is accessible.