Mandatory reporting: government not expecting hike in child sexual abuse referrals

The government is not expecting a significant rise in social care referrals from introducing a duty on professionals to report child sexual abuse.

Its assessment came as it issued a consultative proposals to introduce mandatory reporting of CSA, which fall short of those put forward by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), in its final report, published last year.

The Home Office’s proposed duty would require those carrying out regulated activities with children to report CSA to the police or children’s social care, where they have personally witnessed it or it has been disclosed to them by the perpetrator or victim. Regulated activities include all unsupervised work or volunteering with children or work for specific establishments that gives the person the opportunity to have contact with children.

Failure to report would result in referral to the Disclosure and Barring Service, which could result in the person being barred from carrying out regulated activities. Professionally regulated staff, such as social workers, would also be subject to sanctions from their regulator body.

IICSA proposed the introduction of mandatory reporting to combat what it saw as systemic under-identification of CSA.

No requirement to report recognised indicators of CSA

The Home Office accepted the recommendation in April this year, subsequently carried out a “call for evidence” on the topic and last week followed this up with consultative proposals.

However, these differ in significant respects from those put forward by IICSA.

Firstly, while IICSA proposed that mandatory reporting should also apply in cases where the practitioner or volunteer observes “recognised indicators” of CSA, as well as when they witness it or it is disclosed to them, the Home Office has rejected this.

It said that this would have involved “subjective assessment of indicators”, and that it had received “strong feedback” that “recognising child sexual abuse is likely to be difficult for those without formal training or who see children infrequently”.

Criminal offence for failure to report rejected

Secondly, while IICSA said that a failure to report cases of witnessed or disclosed CSA should be a criminal offence, the Home Office has also rejected this, saying respondents to the call for evidence were split on the idea.

The government department said it was “not our intention for the duty to inappropriately criminalise those working with children, often in challenging circumstances”.

It added that “non-criminal sanctions might provide more proportionate penalties which take account of the different levels of responsibility and experience applicable to the wide range of people who undertake regulated activities in relation to children, including volunteers”.

However, it has proposed introducing an offence for anyone who deliberately obstructs an individual from carrying out the mandatory reporting duty, for example, through destroying or concealing evidence or coercion.

“More must be done to address the identification and underreporting of child sexual abuse, and we see the introduction of this duty as an important step in improving awareness and reporting cultures,” the Home Office said.

Mandatory reporting ‘will lead to significant rises in abuse cases’

In its final report, the inquiry said that evidence from other countries showed that the introduction of mandatory reporting led to a significant increase in the number of children identified as in need of protection, and that this figure was higher in jurisdictions with mandatory reporting than those without it.

While CSA referral rates to local authorities are not recorded in England and Wales, the inquiry said the evidence suggested they were small. In 2022-23, CSA perpetrated by an adult was identified as a risk factor following 18,810 children in need assessments (3.7% of the total), with CSA perpetrated by children found in 13,100 cases (2.6%) and child sexual exploitation in 15,020 (3%), latest Department for Education figures show.

IICSA accepted that the Working Together to Safeguard Children statutory guidance states that anyone with concerns about a child’s welfare “should make a referral to local authority children’s social care”, doing so immediately in cases of suspected significant harm, such as child sexual abuse.

But the inquiry stressed that this did “not impose a legislative requirement on those working with children to report child sexual abuse”, only setting an expectation that could be departed from in “exceptional circumstances”.

Government not expecting large referral rise

However, in an impact assessment on its proposals, the Home Office said that, while it expected there would be an increase in referrals to children’s social care due to the introduction of mandatory reporting, it did not expect this to be large, because of the existing requirement in Working Together.

The impact assessment modelled a 1%, 2% and 3% rise in the number of annual CSA referrals to children’s social care, with different estimates over the proportion of new referrals that were “precautionary”, where CSA was not then identified.

Based on this, its central estimate was that its proposal would result in an additional 575 children being assessed as having experienced CSA in the first year of its introduction, an average of just under four per local authority.

The Home Office consultation runs until 30 November 2023.

To respond, complete this online questionnaire.