LONDON: More than 2,000 children have been victims of systematic grooming for sex in Britain but many agencies are not doing enough to tackle the problem, according to a report on Wednesday.

The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) launched a six-month investigation in January over concerns that vulnerable children were being targeted for sexual abuse, dubbed “on street grooming”.

Its report found there had been 2,083 victims of child sexual exploitation since January 2008. Most of those targeted were girls, white, and aged 14 or 15 when they came to the attention of the authorities. The victims were those who frequently went missing or ran away from home, or were in the care system.

The study found that most Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs), made up of agencies such as police and social services, had not implemented key aspects of national guidance to tackle the issue.

It said in areas where agencies did not proactively look out for child sex exploitation, few cases came to light. This meant that the majority of such incidents in Britain were “unrecognised and unknown”.

“In this complex crime you cannot tackle it or support victims unless you can see this crime, and in order to see this crime, agencies need to look for it,” said Peter Davies, Chief Executive of CEOP.

“What we found from talking to academia, front line police officers and the wider safeguarding community was that very often understanding and awareness among agencies of this complex crime was not widespread enough.”

Concern about gangs grooming vulnerable girls for sex were raised after a mainly Asian group of men were jailed for raping girls in the Derby area.

Former Home Secretary Jack Straw stoked controversy when he said some young Pakistani men regarded white girls as easy target for sexual abuse.

The CEOP report said 2,379 offenders had been reported as possible street grooming offenders but there was a lack of information about a majority of the individuals.

Of those about whom most was known, 940 individuals, about half were aged between 18-24. The study found 38 per cent of this group were white and 26 per cent were Asian.

“Caution should be taken in drawing conclusions about ethnicity due to the relatively small number of areas where agencies have been proactive around this particular type of crime,” the report said.—Reuters