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News From Our School


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St Julie’s Catholic High School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and expects all staff, governors, volunteers and visitors to share this commitment

What You Need To Know About CSE

Feb 28, 2021

What You Need To Know About CSE

Child Sexual Exploitation is an increasing problem nationally and in Liverpool, numbers are rising. It is a type of abuse. It is when children are tricked into performing sexual acts. A child is anyone under 18 years old in the eyes of the law. It can happen to both boys and girls. At the start, the young person may think they are in a loving consensual relationship, because they get gifts, money, status, affection. They are being groomed. Having gained the child’s trust, abusers can control them through threats and violence. They may force them to have sex with other people and even make them groom other young people for sex.

CSE can happen in person online. An abuser will gain a child's trust or control them through violence or blackmail before moving onto sexually abusing them. This can happen in a short period of time.

When a child is sexually exploited online, they might be persuaded or forced to:

  • send or post sexually explicit images of themselves.
  • film or stream sexual activities.
  • have sexual conversations.

Once an abuser has images, video, or copies of conversations, they might use threats and blackmail to force a young person to take part in other sexual activity. They may also share the images and videos with others or circulate them online.

Child Criminal Exploitation is very closely linked to CSE.  Children are targeted by drug gangs to deliver drugs packages across the county and sometimes further afield.  These drug gangs use encrypted or untraceable phone lines, called County Lines.

Eyes Open

March 18th is CSE National Awareness Day.  Throughout the month of March, we will be providing information on what CSE is, the signs to look for and where to get help and support if you suspect someone is being groomed for it.

Shockingly after London, Merseyside’s drug gangs are the biggest abusers of children, targeting children as young as 10. The gangs groom kids by making them increasingly vulnerable, often buying the targeted kids gifts of clothes, food and bikes making the kids feel in debt to them but also making them feel part of the gang, or ‘family’.

St Julie’s is teaming up with Merseyside Police to promote the ‘Eyes Open’ initiative. The ‘EYES OPEN’ campaign has been driven by the rising numbers of children, from all sorts of backgrounds, being abused by drug gangs in an attempt to hide criminal activity. They choose children because they are easy to manipulate and exploit and they are less likely to be stopped by the police, saving drug gang members from being caught and reducing the risk of conviction.

Facts about Merseyside:

  • There are about 120 ‘County Lines’ running from Merseyside. That means that there are 120 places outside of the county right across the UK where Merseyside drug gangs have invaded vulnerable people’s home (‘cuckooing’) to set up the business of selling drugs with one of our young vulnerable children.
  • County lines gangs are using social media and bulk texts to offer drugs and recruit vulnerable people.
  • The estimated turnover for a typical active branded line is between £2K and £5K per day – profit drives county lines.
  • Heroin and crack cocaine remain the most common drugs. There has been an increase in crack cocaine only users and nationally, we are seeing Fentanyl as an emerging risk within county lines since the last report.
  • Vulnerable people have addresses that can be used by drug dealers from where they can run their business from unnoticed by most; accommodate runners and stash drugs, cash, and firearms.
  • The train and public transport network such as coaches is used because of the ease of use, links to other areas and because children do not drive.

The video shows the campaign being launched by Merseyside Police to tackle this problem.

 

Know what to look for.

You can spot grooming in several different ways.  Sometimes you may just get a feeling that something is not quite right.  The following examples might suggest that someone you know is being groomed:

  • displaying inappropriate sexualized behaviour for their age.
  • being fearful of certain people and/or situations.
  • displaying significant changes in emotional wellbeing.
  • being isolated from peers/usual social networks.
  • being increasingly secretive.
  • having money or new things (such as clothes or a mobile phone) that they cannot explain.
  • spending time with older individuals or groups.
  • being involved with gangs and/or gang fights.
  • having older boyfriends or girlfriends.
  • missing school and/or falling behind with schoolwork.
  • persistently returning home late.
  • returning home under the influence of drugs/alcohol.
  • going missing from home or care.
  • being involved in petty crime such as shoplifting.
  • spending a lot of time at hotels or places of concern, such as known brothels.
  • not knowing where they are, because they have been trafficked around the country.

Over the next month, we will be focusing on this important topic in school, through form time, wellbeing Wednesdays and engagement with our school Police Officers. There will be information available on the website on a weekly basis, with signs to look for and how to seek support if you think someone is being groomed for CSE or CCE.

Merseyside Police have produced a pocket guide as party of the Eyes Open campaign and all students will receive one, so they have this important information to hand at all times.