Agenda item

Consideration was given to a report, presented by the Police and Crime Commissioner, Shaun Wright, containing information about the report of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) into South Yorkshire Police’s Response to the investigation of Child Sexual Exploitation. The appendix to the submitted report contained the text of the response by the South Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner to the HMIC report.

The report stated that the protection of vulnerable children in South Yorkshire, especially those at risk of child sexual exploitation, is a priority of the Police and Crime Commissioner. During 2013/14, the Commissioner approved significant financial investment, as well as extra resources for the South Yorkshire Police, to help tackle the problem of child sexual exploitation.

In August 2013, the Commissioner invited the HMIC to provide:-

i) an independent assessment of the effectiveness and resilience of the current arrangements in place within South Yorkshire Police to protect children from sexual exploitation; and

ii) recommendations for improvement.

The HMIC report, resulting from this assessment, was published on 11th November, 2013 and can be obtained from both the Commissioner’s and HMIC’s website (www.southyorkshire-pcc.gov.uk and www.hmic.gov.uk) respectively.

The report concluded that South Yorkshire Police had made considerable efforts to improve its child sexual exploitation response.  However, HMIC considered that the force-led focus and commitment to this was not truly and consistently replicated in all districts. Although there were examples of good and effective practice (most notably in Sheffield), the approach taken to tackling this kind of offending varied significantly across the force’s four districts. The report had concluded that there should be a consistent high standard, across the County, for the protection of all children in South Yorkshire.

The recommendations for improvement, arising from the HMIC assessment, were summarised in the report submitted to this meeting.

The Commissioner stated that:-

: child sexual exploitation remains a serious and complex crime, affecting all areas of the country;

: tackling this crime will remain a priority of the Police and Crime Commissioner;

: additional resources will be allocated during the next two years, to the extent that the South Yorkshire Police will move into the top quartile of Police forces in terms of spending on this issue;

: specific resources are now being allocated to the problem, examples being :-

- assisting victims (children and young people) to give evidence in Court

- mapping hot spot areas in the County, to assist the Police response to this crime

- introduction of the use of polygraph testing for alleged sex offenders

- increased resources for the management of sex offenders

- centralised unit within the South Yorkshire Police, in addition to Police staff in the four districts, to tackle child sexual exploitation.

The Commissioner reported that all of the recommendations of the HMIC assessment report have now been implemented within the required timescale. There will be a re-inspection of the South Yorkshire Police, against the report’s findings, which is due to be completed before the end of June, 2014.  This assessment will be undertaken as part of the national HMIC inspection of Child Protection. 

Members of the Police and Crime Panel asked the following questions of the Police and Crime Commissioner:-

(a) arrangements for further reporting – the Commissioner will report further progress within his annual report, as well as providing details of the allocation of resources as part of the budget report;

(b) brief details were explained of the South Yorkshire Police Chief Constable’s ‘silver-gold-platinum’ model of standards for Public Protection Units - future reports will describe the progress of the Police response to the crime of child sexual exploitation, against these standards;

(c) use of best practice operating in other Police forces, as well as sharing South Yorkshire’s best practice with other forces – working arrangements are already in place with the West Yorkshire and the Greater Manchester Police forces; operations have also been assisted by the studies of the College of Police Officers; the Commissioner emphasised that, although the sharing of best practice is important, the investigation and solving of crime is the paramount duty of the Police.

Resolved:- (1) That the report be received and its contents noted.

(2) That the Police and Crime Commissioner continue to provide regular reports on the progress being made by the South Yorkshire Police to tackle the crime of child sexual exploitation and a full progress report be submitted to a meeting of this Police and Crime Panel in twelve months’ time.