PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
(11 December 2024)

The Child Sexual Exploitation Police Taskforce (or ‘Grooming Gangs Taskforce’) provides practical, expert, on the ground support for local forces investigating complex, group-based child sexual abuse and exploitation, with a focus on grooming gangs. It supports force-led investigations rather than running its own investigations.

Data is collected and reported quarterly. Arrest data is currently available from 34 out of the 44 forces that the Taskforce collects data from. In the most recent data collection – which is for Quarter 3 of 2024 (1 July – 30 September) - those 34 forces recorded 222 arrests for group-based child sexual abuse and exploitation offences. ‘Group-based’ offending in this context includes any offence with two or more perpetrators. This will include – but is not limited to – ‘grooming gang’ type offending; other ‘group-based’ offending includes intra-familial and peer-on-peer abuse, for example.