Legal Literacy – Using the tools at our disposal

I have recently attended a number of policy discussions and forums relating to forms of abuse and exploitation including ‘honour-based violence’ (HBV) and human trafficking. These issues cross-cut with child sexual exploitation (CSE) at an operational level and therefore need a joined-up approach at a strategic level.

I’m sure many of you will be aware of the ongoing drive to move away from a siloed approach to supporting vulnerable children, but to me this is never more obviously still happening than in regard of the legislation we do, or don’t use to tackle exploitation.

Perhaps the example I have the most experience of trying to overcome is the ongoing reluctance in some quarters to use trafficking legislation to prosecute those who traffic children for the purpose of CSE. When you think about the reasons why its easy to understand why CPS’ Rape and Serious Sexual Offences Units (RASSOs) might prefer to use the Sexual Offences Act (SOA) – their bread and butter, rather than the Modern Slavery Act (MSA).

But this represents a missed opportunity – trafficking legislation can often be an effective alternative to sexual offence charges, particularly in cases involving 16 and 17-year old victims. It feels like prosecutors and other professionals have decided the MSA is for trafficking, the SOA is for CSE and coercive control legislation is for dealing with domestic abuse.

I don’t think it has to be like that. We should see all these pieces of legislation as part of a broader toolkit to deal with abuse and exploitation. At one of the events I attended a delegate agreed with this view and attributed it to a lack of ‘legal literacy’ – in their words we have lots of specialists but not enough professionals who have a broader understanding of the law and its application.

The NWG has already taken the opportunity to raise this with our contacts in government and we will be promoting the term ‘legal literacy’ and its benefit in the coming months.

Phil Ashford – CSE Response Unit Operational Lead