Issue - meetings

The paper seeks to assure the Panel that relevant policies, procedures and strategies recognise and address exploitation and furthermore sets out examples of the services and programmes commissioned to support children, young people and adults with care and support needs.   

Rob Fortune, Avon & Somerset Police introduced this report to the Panel and summarised some key points from within it.

Child sexual exploitation involves situations, contexts or relationships in which a person under 18 is given something, such as food, accommodation, drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, affection, gifts or money in return for performing sexual activities or having sexual activities performed on them. It can also involve violence, coercion and intimidation, with threats of physical harm or humiliation

Avon and Somerset Constabulary response to Child sexual exploitation is Operation Topaz. Topaz is a perpetrator disruption team enabling the Force to proactively protect the highest risk child sexual exploitation victims by developing opportunities to disrupt suspects. Topaz recognises that disrupting suspects is often the most effective way of safeguarding victims of child sexual exploitation.

The Topaz Victim Contact / Engagement Officer works alongside victims to build relationships and gather information to enable well-informed safeguarding and disruption. The focus is on supporting victims to enable the capture of an evidential account, intelligence gathering and safeguarding; working alongside the Topaz Disruption Officer to disrupt perpetrators and locations.

Across Bristol, B&NES and South Gloucestershire about 150 perpetrators are flagged to Topaz and potentially posing a risk of CSE and about 200 children are flagged as being at risk.

The current figures for children and young people that are at risk of or are being criminally exploited in B&NES is 69 and children and young people at risk of or are being sexually exploited is 57; there is some overlap with these figures as some children will appear in both groups.

As a result of some of the findings from Operation Button it was agreed that Requests for Service pertaining to CSE would be referred to our MASH (Multi- Agency Safeguarding Hub) this enables a more integrated approach and a greater understanding of the risks. 13 young people have been progressed through our MASH processes to ensure that their needs are being adequately met.

B&NES has developed a frontline response for young people who are at risk and victims of CSE. Through the development of the Willow Project CSE victims are offered support dependent on their level of need. The Willow Project is a multi-agency/multi-disciplinary virtual made up of professionals who have been trained to work with young people at risk of or involved in lower level CSE.

The professionals within the team remain employed within their substantive post and then commit half a day per week to working within the Willow Project. The aim of the project is to support, advocate and provide time to potential victims of CSE.

The Modern Slavery Act 2015 define the criminal offence of slavery servitude and forced or compulsory labour (section 1) and the separate criminal offence of human trafficking. This might include labour exploitation, sexual exploitation, criminal exploitation, organ trafficking and forced marriage. Modern Slavery is not the same as illegal immigration or people smuggling. It is characterised by elements of violence, intimidation, deception, coercion, abduction and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 53