New report telling us something we already knew. The Met Police are singled out for being particularly bad:
Most investigations into child exploitation were rated as inadequate by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC). Of the 244 cases it examined, 43 were graded as good, more than half (121) as inadequate and 80 as needing improvement.
HMIC decided the situation was so dire that it told the Met to improve in three areas, helping to keep the force in special measures, and it said it would reinspect to check that promised improvements had happened.
And
Among the failings was victim-blaming language among officers and staff, with 55 examples found from files recently examined, including a 14-year-old girl described as “seeking out sex with older men”, a 15-year-old girl referred to as “engaged in sex work” and a 12-year-old girl who had been raped described as “sexually active with older men”.
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In other cases children were described as “making poor choices” or “placing herself at risk”. HMIC said: “This fails to recognise an imbalance of power with the person exploiting them or coercion that may be used to keep them away from home.”
And
In another instance, a 14-year-old girl believed to be involved in class A drug supply had been missing for 20 days before the force decided she was at high risk.
Inspectors found concerned parents begging for help after their children had been missing for days were often fobbed off by officers.
One mother who reported the sexual exploitation of her 15-year-old daughter was told to take her child to the GP and ask for a referral to children's social care services.
Another mother who offered police evidence that her 14-year-old daughter was being groomed by a man offering her money for sex was told that the victim would have to report the matter herself.
When the mother persisted, the report was passed between six officers in a month but nothing was done before the child went missing again.
Officers and staff were found to use 'victim-blaming language' in 12 per cent of exploitation cases, with one detective speaking of 'children being promiscuous'.
In other cases, a 14-year-old girl was described as 'seeking out sex with older men' and a 12-year-old girl who had been raped was described as 'sexually active with older men'.
Women and girls are not listened to by the police. The idea that the police can not grasp basic safeguarding and the law when it comes to children is appalling but not remotely surprising. No wonder coercive control isn't on the police radar at all
^^