‘Significant challenges’ remain for police response to grooming gangs – watchdog

There has been encouraging progress but “significant challenges” remain in how police tackle child sexual exploitation and grooming gangs, a watchdog has said.

His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services said in a new progress report that issues over data accuracy and co-ordination nationally risk weakening the policing response in efforts to crack down on group-based child sexual exploitation.

Inspectors said more than half of police forces still fail to include data from partners such as charities or social services in their assessments.

The watchdog said the Home Office and the Department for Education still need to fully adopt the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) definition in key guidance.

“These issues risk weakening the policing response and failing children,” inspector Michelle Skeer said.

“Group-based child sexual exploitation should be consistently identified, properly understood and addressed with urgency.”

Baroness Newlove, the victims’ commissioner for England and Wales, backed the call for a universal definition to avoid protection for victims being a “postcode lottery”.

Inspectors were commissioned by the home secretary in 2023 to look into policing of grooming gangs after the IICSA.

The seven-year investigation made 20 recommendations in 2022 after discovering tens of thousands of victims across England and Wales and revealing that institutions repeatedly failed them.

The watchdog said in its 2023 report that while some progress was being made by police and law enforcement agencies to tackle the threat of child sex abuse, “deep-rooted problems remained”.

These included inconsistent definitions of group-based child sexual exploitation, using victim-blaming language and a lack of national understanding of the true scale of the threat.

In the latest report published on Friday, the inspectorate found notable progress has been made in two years, including that nearly all police forces have adopted the IICSA definition of such crimes, and that it is more likely for specialist officers to investigate cases.

Many forces had also undertaken culture change programmes to stop victim-blaming language, it said.

Ms Skeer said: “Forces are increasingly responding decisively and swiftly to reports involving vulnerable children at risk of sexual exploitation. As a result, more children are being safeguarded and more suspects are being arrested.

“In this progress report, we describe the improvements that have been made and the critical gaps that remain.”

Among six new recommendations, the inspectorate called for the universal use of IICSA’s definition of an “organised network”, and for improvements to data collection.

The definition has been adopted by policing organisations including the National Police Chiefs’ Council, the National Crime Agency, the College of Policing and the Home Office’s Child Sexual Exploitation Police Taskforce.

Reacting to the findings, Baroness Newlove backed calls for the use of a universal definition.

“For victims, this lack of a common definition means the protection they receive can be a postcode lottery,” she said.

“Without an accurate picture of the threat, genuine cross-agency collaboration, and a grip on the unacceptable investigative delays mentioned in the report, we risk failing children in the most profound way.”

The report findings come amid fallout over the Government’s national inquiry into grooming gangs, after the loss of the two candidates to chair the probe and the resignations of five women from the victims liaison panel.

There has been mounting pressure on the Government to move forward with the inquiry, first announced by the Prime Minister in June, including by setting out terms of reference and appointing a chairperson.

A Home Office spokeswoman said: “The grooming gang scandal was one of the darkest moments in this country’s history, with survivors let down time and time again.

“This report shows important progress. Government investment, totalling almost £10 million this financial year alone, has given police the tools they need to tackle these vile crimes.

“And we are using the IICSA definition of organised networks in our policy work. But there is more to do, as recent days have shown.”

Ministers have also set up a new national police operation, Operation Beaconport, which is reviewing closed cases of child sexual exploitation, and data collection on suspect ethnicity is being improved.

Tory shadow home secretary Chris Philp said: “This report is devastating for Labour. It confirms that, despite repeated promises, the Home Office still hasn’t adopted the key definition of group-based child sexual exploitation.

“This definition was meant to help safeguarding professionals identify grooming gangs, collect reliable data and stop these crimes from being hidden in plain sight.

“By refusing to use it, the Government is keeping the system blind to patterns of abuse that destroyed thousands of lives.”

Published: 24/10/2025 by Radio NewsHub