An inspection report has warned that the criminal justice system in Northern Ireland needs to do much more to protect children from sexual exploitation, with police resourcing levels said to be creating a risk.
The most recent statistics from the PSNI, for the year 2023-24, show that over half of all recorded sexual offences in Northern Ireland were perpetrated against children aged under 18.
A report, published today by Criminal Justice Inspection Northern Ireland, says more needs to be done to protect children and to disrupt and prosecute offenders.
Five years after the organisation published a report on the same issue, a review of progress found that just one of nine accepted recommendations has been fully achieved.
Six of the recommendations have been partially achieved while two have not been achieved.
"Child exploitation is not a lifestyle choice for children who go missing," said Chief Inspector Jacqui Durkin.
"It is not a fictitious storyline in a popular television drama; it is child abuse. It is real and it is happening here in our towns, cities, and rural communities.
"It can involve children who live with their parents just as much as those who are in care or have been in care before and it has a devastating impact on victims."
The report says inspectors were concerned that the PSNI's response to children who were reported missing was not adequate, especially for children living in care.
The Chief Inspector said she was concerned by staffing and deployment pressures affecting the PSNI’s Public Protection Branch, noting that during the period of the review the Child Exploitation Team had just three detective constables out of a compliment of 12.
"This placed additional pressure on these officers and their supervisors and was impacting on the PSNI’s response to, an investigation of, child sexual exploitation, creating a risk for children and the organisation," Ms Durkin added.
"If a victim focus doesn’t apply to child abuse victims, it is hard to see where it does."
The report welcomes ongoing work to develop the multi-agency approach to the issue but says there were "significant gaps between the partially and achieved recommendations and the level of progress organisations believed they had made against the inspection recommendations compared to inspectors’ assessments".
She added: "It is disappointing that positive progress noted in 2020 had not been sustained and inspectors found very real and worrying signs that resource pressures were influencing policy and practice, rather than a more timely and proactive response in the best interests of the child."
The PSNI said it "welcomes the latest follow-up review of Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) by the Criminal Justice Inspection in Northern Ireland. We are fully committed to improving how we identify, safeguard and protect vulnerable children, especially those who go missing and are at risk of exploitation."
Detective Chief Superintendent Zoe McKee, Head of Public Protection Branch said: "CJINI has acknowledged the significant progress made by the PSNI in strengthening our response to child sexual exploitation, including better strategic coordination, improved risk-flagging processes and the professionalism of our officers and staff. We welcome this recognition and are determined to build on it.
"The review also highlights important areas where our response has not always been sufficiently consistent or child-centred. We take these concerns extremely seriously. Any instance where a child does not receive the service they deserve is unacceptable and we are accelerating work to deliver a more trauma-informed and risk-led approach."
