Victims urged to come forward amid national grooming gang scandal

Petition calls for local inquiry into issue

- Phil Corrigan Local Democracy Reporter

VICTIMS of child sexual exploitation have been urged to come forward following a national report on grooming gangs.

Cabinet members at Stoke-on-Trent City Council received a briefing on the local work being undertaken to tackle child abuse in the city.

This work includes safeguarding around child sexual exploitation (CSE) as well as child criminal exploitation (CCE), which can involve youngsters being coerced into working for county lines gangs.

The briefing followed the recent publication of Baroness Casey's report on group-based CSE, which called for a new national inquiry into grooming gangs.

Baroness Casey found deep-rooted institutional failures that allowed CSE to continue, and specifically condemned organisations' reluctance to acknowledge the over-representation of Asian and Pakistani men as perpetrators due to the fear of being branded racist.