Child-on-child sexual abuse in schools - figures from Guardian investigation

[GingerBeverage]

What is happening to our children and their childhoods?

Burnham urged to ‘end cycle of harm’ after scale of child-on-child sexual abuse revealed

A coalition of nearly 90 organisations has written to the prime minister calling for “decisive action” on violence against women and girls after a Guardian investigation revealed the scale of child-on-child sexual abuse in schools in England and Wales.
The groups urged Labour to redouble efforts to deliver on its manifesto promise to halve violence against women and girls (VAWG) and “end this cycle of harm once and for all”.
Guardian analysis of police data for 2021-25 found that an average of close to five sexual crimes against children aged 12 and younger were recorded by police every day in primary and secondary schools in England and Wales.
The figures include reports of almost 2,000 rapes and attempted rapes, which equates to police receiving an average of one allegation of rape at a school every day. More than a third of the rape victims were children under 13.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/oct/05/burnham-urged-to-end-cycle-of-harm-after-scale-of-child-on-child-sexual-abuse-revealed

I read this at the time and was somewhat doubtful as to the basis on which the Guardian was drawing its conclusions.

I would also like to know who put this "coalition" of "nearly 90 organisations" together?

I have been a reader for many years but I am sorry the Guardian is increasingly becoming a "progressive's Daily Mail".

[edited for typo]

They take their own sweet time in that article getting to the fact that it's in the main male on female rape, sexual violence, abuse and harassment. Using headlines like 'child on child' is a neutral masking trick they adopt to underplay, for some bizarre reason, the reality that it's actually male VAWG that's a key problem here. A bit like the 'students' in Paris who are mostly male, but packaged up in sexless terms like 'pupils', 'students' and 'schoolchildren'.

If you can't describe it, you can't even begin to fix it.