Category Archives: International Safeguarding

Interpol shows up UK child abuse record

 The UK’s Child Exploitation and Online Protection  Agency is calling for a database that will store images of abuse appearing on the web.  BBC Newsnight highlights the impact not having such a national paedophile database. Britain has a poor ability to identify and rescue child abuse victims compared to most other countries. 

Mick Moran, head of child protection at the international police agency Interpol told Newsnight that simply prosecuting those who download images of child sex abuse is not enough.  He said that the images need to be sent to a central point where they can be analysed to look for clues to identify the children, but that is not happening in the UK. Mr Moran said some police officers are “forgetting the fact that each of these images, each of these movies, contains a victim”.

In the UK different police forces currently have various systems and different databases. Some have their own victim identification units.  However it could be another 18 months before a national system is introduced.  Although millions of images of child sex abuse have been collected only 47 cases were passed on to Ceop by the UK’s 52 police forces in 2010 – less than one per force.   In the cases which were passed to them Ceop helped rescue 22 victims.

Mick Moran and Mark Williams Thomas have been invited to National Conference on Safeguarding on the Internet , 16th November, Reading.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/9532058.stm

Doctor suspended pending child abuse hearing

A former doctor at Great Ormond Street Hospital has been temporarily suspended from the medical register while being investigated over child abuse claims. Philipp Bonhoeffer, who stopped seeing patients at the London-based hospital in 2009, faces a General Medical Council (GMC) disciplinary hearing, he strongly denies any impropriety or misconduct.   Continue reading Doctor suspended pending child abuse hearing

PQ on EU Criminal Record exchange

In a Parliamentary Question Anas Sarwar  asked what steps the Home Office is taking to increase sharing of criminal records files with other EU member states.  Lynne Featherstone  replied in a written statement as follows:

Criminal record exchange within the European Union takes place within the framework of Council Decision 2005/876/JHA on the exchange of information extracted from the criminal record. Between 2007-08 and 2009-10 the amount of criminal convictions exchanged has increased:

  • Notifications received of UK nationals convicted in the EU increased from 3,120 to 6,298.
  • The number of notifications from the UK to other member states about the convictions of one of their nationals here has increased from 12,736 in 2007-08 (when only the first conviction of an EU national was sent) to 33,583 in 2009-10 (when all convictions were sent).
  • The number of requests received for the criminal record of UK citizens subject to criminal proceedings in other member states has increased from 190 to 341 in the same time period.
  • The number of requests made by the UK police and law enforcement agencies in relation to EU nationals subject to criminal proceedings here increased from 2,372 to 6,513.

Continue reading PQ on EU Criminal Record exchange

New guidance to tackle child trafficking

The London Safeguarding Children Board has launched a new set of guidance and tools to help social workers, teachers, police, health workers and other agencies identify and support children who have been trafficked.  These children can be subjected to sexual exploitation, enforced labour or drug dealing, sold or forced to commit crime by the organised gangs or individuals who have brought them into the country or trafficked them between cities within the UK. Continue reading New guidance to tackle child trafficking