Street gang web traps 27,000 children

VIOLENT street gangs have recruited at least 27,000 children in a scandal as big as sex abuse grooming, the children’s commissioner has warned.

Anne Longfield revealed that only 6,560 have been identified by child protection agencies as gang members, leaving more than 20,000 trapped without the help they needed to escape a cycle of drugs, violence and killings.

Ms Longfield said local authorities were neglecting the problem and repeating the mistakes that led to the sex grooming scandals a decade ago.

Calling for child criminal exploitation to be made a “national priority”, she said: “The gangs are complex and ruthless organisations, using sophisticated techniques to groom children, and chilling levels of violence to keep them compliant. At the moment it is too easy for them to succeed.

“I have been shocked to discover many of those responsible for the protection of children seem to have no idea where to start, despite hundreds of thousands of children being at risk.

“I find that all the mistakes that led to serious safeguarding failings in relation to child sexual exploitation in towns up and down the country are now being repeated.

“Local areas are not facing up to the scale of the problem, are not taking notice of risk factors in front of them, and are not listening to parents and communities who ask for help.”

Ms Longfield’s report came as the West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner David Jamieson described a spate of stabbings across Birmingham and London as a “national emergency.”

Three teenagers have died in knife attacks in two weeks in Birmingham. In London, five people were stabbed on Tuesday alone, one fatally.

The children’s commissioner’s analysis, based on the British Crime Survey, found 313,00 children aged 10 to 17 knew a street gang member.

But of most concern were the 34,000 who were either gang members, on the periphery of a gang, or victims of violent crime in the past year.

It is equivalent to 10 children in every state secondary school.

Despite that, most safeguarding boards responsible for child protection did not have plans to tackle the gang threat or an understanding of the scale of the problem.

Ms Longfield said: “Not one of them was able to give adequate answers to all of our questions, while several areas with the highest indicators of gang violence had no estimate at all of levels of gang violence in their area.”

Her report found younger children, particularly girls, were being recruited by gangs as they were less likely to be noticed by the authorities.

In one case, researchers found evidence of a “written manual” on how to entrap recruits through gifts, friendship, use of debt and threats. Parents said agencies dismissed their concerns.

Commission research found gang members were 95 per cent more likely to have mental health problems, and 37 per cent more likely to be absent from school. They were eight times as likely to be drug users.

“The Government needs to face up to the scale of this challenge and ensure both the priority and resources are given to helping these children,” said Ms Longfield.