No-one can have failed to have been
shocked by the revelations about the extent of child sexual abuse over the last
few months.
I chair the all-party Communities and
Local Government Committee in the House of Commons. Our job is to scrutinise and report on the Department for Communities
and Local Government (DCLG), its agencies and local government.
We have a particular interest
in reviewing policy – formulation and implementation – taking and analysing the
evidence on what works and what doesn’t, and then drawing conclusions and
making recommendations for improvement.
It is in that context that we
have been taking evidence on
the local government aspects of the failure to protect so many children. We
have just published our first report[1]. We heard alarming evidence that the
organised child sexual exploitation at Rotherham is prevalent across England.
Rotherham is not an outlier.
In leadership, governance and
accountability terms, what most concerned us was that it was the press which
stimulated action in Rotherham, not the Council’s own system of challenge or
scrutiny, nor external inspections. Therefore, we were clear that it is
essential that councils across the country are busily reviewing whether their
own scrutiny, governance, and leadership is fit and ready to identify and
combat child sexual exploitation in their communities.
Serious questions also need to be asked of Ofsted. Repeated Ofsted
inspections in Rotherham failed to lift the lid on the Council’s shameful
inability to tackle child sexual exploitation. As a Committee, we will want to
question Ofsted about their inspection regime and ask why their inspections
were so ineffective in Rotherham.
As I write,
Ofsted has just reported that children’s services remain inadequate in
Rotherham[2]. I have little doubt that,
over the coming months, Ofsted will find that services in other councils that
it had previously rated as good will be found wanting.
And, Ofsted has just published a
wider-ranging report[3] which states that child sexual exploitation has not been
treated as the priority that events in Rotherham and elsewhere suggested it
should have been.
We all have to come to terms with the
fact that vulnerable children in every community are at risk of sexual
exploitation and abuse.
We all have a role to play in preventing
it and taking action to bring to account those who abuse children or fail to
keep them safe.
[1]
http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/communities-and-local-government-committee/news/child-sexual-exploitation-in-rotherham-report/
[3]
http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/sexual-exploitation-of-children-it-couldnt-happen-here-could-it
