National Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation Strategic Group minutes: October 2025

Attendees and apologies

Co-Chairs

• Iona Colvin, Chief Social Work Adviser, Office of the Chief Social Work Adviser (OCSWA), Co-Chair

• DCS Sarah Taylor, Head of Public Protection, Police Scotland, Co-chair

Group members in attendance

• Alexis Jay, independent member
• Alison Mcintyre, Assistant Director, Barnardo’s
• Alison Wales, Senior Policy Officer, NSPCC Scotland

• Alistair Hogg, Head of Practice and Policy, Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration
• Angela Latta, Office of the Chief Social Work Office, Scottish Government
• Brian Taylor, Deputy Director Children’s Rights, Protection and Justice, Scottish Government
• Carrie Lindsay, Executive Officer, Association of Directors of Education Scotland (ADES)
• Catriona Scobbie, Education Scotland, Safeguarding Lead Officer
• Deirdre McCormick, Chief Nurse and Head of Public Protection, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde
• Jennifer Crocket, Chief Education Officer, Argyll and Bute, ADES
• Glenn Preston, Ofcom
• James Stevenson, Technology-Facilitated CSEA Data Specialist, Childlight
• Jane Scott, Head of Early Help and Protection, Centre for Excellence for Children's Care and Protection (CELCIS)
• Jillian Ingram, COSLA, Children and Young People Team
• Jillian Taylor, Child Health Commissioner & Chief Nurse, NHS Forth Valley
• Joanne Smith, Policy and Public Affairs Manager, NSPCC Scotland
• Laura Bradley, Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS)
• Mary Glasgow, Children First
• Mhairi Grant, Vice Chair, CPC Scotland
• Michelle McCargo, Renfrewshire Council, Social Work Scotland
• Ranald McTaggart, Children and Young People’s Centre for Justice
• Rhona Robb, Head of Public Protection, Scottish Ambulance Service
• Sharon Glasgow, Protecting Children Social Work Policy & Practice Advisor, Social Work Scotland
• Stuart Allardyce, Director of Lucy Faithful Foundation Scotland
• Tam Baillie, Chair, CPC Scotland

Also in attendance

• Alistair McAlpine, Chief Statistician, Scottish Government

• Child Protection Unit officials, Scottish Government

• Protecting Children team, CELCIS

Secretariat

• Child Protection Unit, Scottish Government

Apologies

• Doug Marshall, Pathway to Impact Manager, Childlight
• Lucy Coleman, Chair, National Organisation for the Treatment of Abuse (NOTA) Scotland
• Lydia Davenport, Technical Advisory Program Manager, Childlight
• Lynda Fenton, Early Years and Young People Lead, Public Health Scotland
• Kathryn Lindsay, Chief Executive, Angus Council, SOLACE representative
• Kevin Mitchell, Executive Director, Care Inspectorate
• Kirsty-Louise McNally, Senior Policy and Public Affairs Lead, Barnardo’s
• Jackie Irvine, CEO, Care Inspectorate
• Yvonne Friel, Health Improvement Manager, Public Health Scotland

Items and actions

Welcome, introductions and apologies

The Co-chairs welcomed all to the meeting and welcomed Jackie Irvine, CEO, Care Inspectorate as a new member to the group. The Co-chairs reported on recent engagement with the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs, Minister for Victims and Community Safety and Minister for Children, Young People and The Promise to update them on the work of this group and wider child protection activity. Ministers will be updated regularly on progress.

Clarification of Alexis Jay’s position on Inquiries

During the debate on the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill in Parliament on 16 September, the Cabinet Secretary for Justice quoted the views of Professor Alexis Jay on calls for further inquiries into child sexual abuse. Co-chair clarified that Professor Jay shared these views in January of this year in the context of her work on the Independent Inquiry in England and Wales and was not related to the debate on the Victims Bill or the position in Scotland.

Minutes of last meetings and actions arising 

The National Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation Strategic Group (referred to as the CSAE Group) previously met on 10 June, with an additional extraordinary meeting on 14 July to discuss the recommendations of Baroness Casey’s National Audit on Group-based Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse in England and Wales. Minutes of both meetings are published on the Scottish Government website.

Outstanding actions: 10 June 2025

An update on engagement with the Cross-Party Group (CPG) on Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse was provided as part of discussions on Mandatory Reporting.

The group was updated that engagement with the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce (SOCT) will be through the co-chairs, who will update on the work of the CSAE Group at a forthcoming meeting of SOCT.

The Co-chair highlighted the publication of Scottish Government’s refreshed Trafficking and Exploitation Strategy in July, which directly highlights child criminal exploitation and its links to other forms of harm. Members were informed that work is underway on a delivery plan which will be informed via engagement with young people impacted by exploitation and stakeholders.

The CSAE Group previously asked for the development of a ‘benchmarking’ paper to consider the relevance for Scotland of the findings of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) in England and other key reviews and reports. The paper was circulated to the group for their consideration and members are invited to give initial views. The paper refers to the 20 final recommendations of IICSA, but not the recommendations made directly to institutions. It was proposed that consideration should be given to reflect which of these were also relevant for Scotland.

Child Protection Committee Scotland (CPCS) highlighted a previous national campaign in 2024 on child sexual abuse and exploitation and welcomed the recognition of this in the benchmarking paper. CPCS welcomed being involved in any future activity.

It was noted that the CSAE Group’s prevention-focused Outcomes Framework was updated following the last meeting to reflect the Group’s feedback and to reflect the cross-cutting outcome of ‘data and information sharing’. A revised version was shared with the Group with the papers for the meeting.

The update and actions arising from the Workforce ‘Deep Dive’ Group were discussed as part of the agenda.

Outstanding actions: 14 July 2025 

The actions arising from July’s extraordinary meeting on the Casey Audit recommendations were shared with the CSAE Group including updates from Police Scotland.

Police Scotland update: Police Scotland has created a timeline of action on child sexual exploitation since 2012, and reviewed actions taken including training of officers and specialist roles in investigations. This concluded that there were no present day large-scale investigations known to Police Scotland that meet the definition of group-based abuse as outlined in Baroness Casey’ audit in England and Wales. Police Scotland has also reviewed five previous relevant large-scale investigations and reported that the expected investigative standards were applied to those inquiries. Police Scotland continues to work with the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) to contribute to the UK-wide Project Hydrant by gathering data from its own police systems.  

Police Scotland also reported on self-assessment activity being undertaken from both a national and local policing perspective across seven thematic areas: victims and survivors; data analysis; investigations; training and development; partnerships; disruption; and investigative resources. Police Scotland advised that work was also underway to align Police Scotland recording systems to capture ethnicity data for suspects. 

Public inquiry: the Co-chairs reported on the continued calls for a public inquiry by members of the Scottish Parliament into group-based abuse, and reiterated Ministers’ current position that there continues to be a lack of evidence at this time to necessitate such an inquiry in Scotland, but that there is no room for complacency on this most important issue. The Co-chairs highlighted that, with support from Professor Jay, Scottish Government officials were considering what alternative approaches might be available to scrutinise practice and approach to CSAE-based harm in Scotland, and they will engage group members and local leaders as options are developed. It was also noted that the voice and opinion of survivors should also be considered as part of any approach. It was proposed and agreed that a further extraordinary meeting of the Group should be held at the end of November to discuss any such options.

CSAE data roundtable 

Scottish Government’s Chief Statistician provided an update of a recent roundtable meeting in August with Scottish Government analysts and policy leads on data in relation to child sexual abuse and exploitation. The aim of the roundtable was to discuss the challenges of gathering and sharing accurate data in relation to child sexual abuse and exploitation in Scotland, which is a national threat requiring robust accurate data and shared intelligence from all stakeholders. 

In England and Wales, the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) found that recorded data on child sexual exploitation was unreliable because of the variation of criteria and definitions applied locally identifying that a need for a consistent definition was critical. It was also recognised that a key challenge identified in the Casey Audit Report was to address the trend of decreased child protection plans for child sexual abuse and exploitation against increased reporting of these offences.

The roundtable meeting considered what data on child sexual abuse and exploitation is currently gathered across agencies in Scotland and what additional data was required. The Chief Statistician clarified that incomplete or inaccurate existing data can often be a good starting point from which inferences can be made to support data improvement activity. The data gathered across agencies was set out in a summary paper prepared for this meeting and shared with the CSAE Group, and members were invited to share their views. 

The Chief Statistician also reported on recent engagement with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) as the organisation was taking forward survey work on child abuse across the UK. The importance of aligning with this work and for continued liaison with the ONS was recognised. There was also discussion of the overlap with the data improvement ambitions of the National Public Protection Leadership Group (NPPLG).

Members of the group welcomed data being a priority area for the group, with several offers from the membership to engage on this work as it develops and to share relevant organisational data. It was noted that there were several data sources outside Scotland which were also worth considering, including:

• the UK Government funded Centre of Expertise on Child Sexual Abuse (CSA Centre). While the prevalence data published by the CSA Centre does not include Scotland, their findings and resources were worth exploring
• potential data available from the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF)
• role of, and data held by third-sector organisations
• improved understanding about perpetrators in relation to this work

There was discussion of the issues around harmonisation of data within health, and it was noted that there was a proof-of-concept project underway to bring data together from health, Police Scotland and social work in Greater Glasgow and Clyde using the Microsoft PowerBI platform. Other data sources were also mentioned which could provide useful data including a multi-year review of adolescent sexual assault services.

Workforce discussion 

The Workforce ‘Deep Dive’ short life working group (SLWG) co-chairs (Lucy Faithfull Foundation Scotland and Social Work Scotland) provided an update on workforce activity which had taken place during the summer as reflected in the paper circulated to the Group for the meeting. The Co-chairs highlighted the information gathering exercises and interviews undertaken by the working group and provided an overview of their findings. These included: 

• challenges around professional knowledge and confidence amongst frontline practitioners
• misclassification or overlooking of harm especially in complex family cases 
• the balance between criminal justice and safeguarding responses 

It was noted that solutions are likely to be more complex than straightforward improvements in learning and development or training, and there needs to be a greater focus on skills building and a tiered approach to training. It was felt there were lessons to be learned from the approach taken to Equally Safe training framework in Scotland.

The SLWG recognised the challenges and barriers to disclosure and issues around identification, which require careful consideration. Safeguarding thresholds were also raised, and the need to ensure appropriate responses even in situations which fall below the level of criminal prosecution. The Co-chairs also reported on the need for leadership and support in organisations, and to align improvement activity with other initiatives including work underway by the National Public Protection Leadership Group (NPPLG).

The SLWG proposed that it should become an established subgroup of the CSAE Group to begin to prioritise and take forward the findings of this first phase of work into a second phase of work, supported by CELCIS, involving focus group activity with frontline professionals in all agencies.

There was also discussion on challenges of the wider public protection system and why some children most at risk may not be recognised. While it was agreed this was not within the remit of the SLWG, this would inform consideration of these issues as part of wider work underway e.g. improvement priorities identified by the NPPLG.

There was discussion that current systems sometimes place an emphasis on children or young people disclosing. This can place great pressure on children and was often a significant barrier for them communicating their concerns. The responsibility for raising concerns should be with adults, and within a broader picture of how systems respond.

More work was needed to support practitioners and organisations in recognising the signs of child sexual abuse and exploitation, improve working with children and building skills in relation to assessment. It was highlighted that there are great developments taking place around extra-familial harm which also gives opportunities for experiential learning for the workforce.

It was commented that the recommendations should enable examples of good practice to be highlighted and shared more widely. It was noted that, with reference to recognising and responding/recording, any training should enable improved data collection. It was also noted that there was work currently underway to support the workforce to better identify and respond to criminal exploitation of children, so there should be opportunities to share learning, given the clear overlaps of these forms of exploitation.

There was agreement for the workforce deep dive group to become a permanent subgroup, for work to proceed for focus group engagement and for members to consider the report within their organisations.

Mandatory Reporting (MR) discussion 

CELCIS provided a short overview of key findings from its recently produced discussion paper on recent developments in England in relation to mandatory reporting (MR), the legislative frameworks in four countries outside the UK and an initial exploration of the evidence. This highlighted that there were considerable variations in the frameworks for MR in different countries, but whilst there are concerns of system overload, evidence suggested that the initial increase in referrals settled. CELCIS highlighted that responding was as important as reporting and that any form of MR would demand significant resource investment.

Professor Jay provided an outline of the development within the UK Government that led to the current proposals now part of the Crime and Policing Bill progressing through the UK Parliament, and where the approach differs from the recommendations of IICSA. Professor Jay also reflected on the wide range of views from adult survivors in support of MR who engaged as part of IICSA but commented on their overall support for mandatory reporting. 

The Co-chairs shared feedback from a meeting with the Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse Cross Party Group on 1 October. The survivor group supported the introduction of mandatory reporting but reflected that the UK Government position was insufficient. Survivors also raised the need for criminal penalties and for safeguards for professionals who report concerns. There were mixed views on some specific issues such as who MR should apply to, in what capacity, and the approach in relation to peer-on-peer abuse.

The discussion was then opened to all members. There was general consensus across the CSAE Group in exploring the establishment of some form of MR in the context of CSAE. Education colleagues reflected on potential challenges for teachers in being sufficiently trained and supported, understand the implications of sanctions for their profession, and noted that union engagement would be required. Health representatives agreed work would be needed with NHS services to understand the potential impact and how it would work for their specific context. Other members indicated messaging and timing was important, and that existing child protection protocols and responsibilities would not change significantly.

Concerns were raised that all frontline practitioners across services could become or will be identified as mandatory reporters - with implications for their own professional lives and practice. This would require clear guidance on any legislative framework, as well as resource, capacity and support for practitioners. One view suggested that MR should apply to all forms of abuse as often children only disclose in an incremental approach and often the extent of the risk or abuse can take time to fully become apparent. 

There was agreement across members that more work was required to understand how different approaches to MR might work in practice, and more exploration of the types of harm and risk included in implementation of MR legislation. It was recognised that implementation of MR would need to be within a multi-agency whole system approach, properly resourced and part of an overall improvement programme implemented simultaneously with wider interdependent improvements. 

Work to develop a solution would need to engage the survivor voice and consideration given to who else should be consulted, for example children and young people. It was noted that proposals for MR legislation will involve consultation providing opportunities to engage with experts and those involved ahead of tabling and implementation of new regulations. 

The impact and culture change of introducing any form of criminal sanctions must also be considered, as this could have unintended consequences on workforce behaviour and recruitment. It was noted that it would be helpful to set out different scenarios to understand how MR might work. One organisation noted that careful consideration was required about the role of independent helplines and how mandatory reporting might apply to those providers. 

It was noted that the CSAE Group would benefit from legal expertise in developing options. There was a call for the Scottish Social Services Council to be brought into engagement with this issue.

Scottish Government representatives highlighted that further work will be carried out to develop models from existing IICSA and UK Government models for the CSAE Group to consider key issues. It was confirmed that preparatory work was underway ahead of the next legislative session should there be agreement by Ministers to introduce MR, however, timescales could not be confirmed due to the Parliamentary election in May 2026.

The Co-chair proposed setting up a task and finish group to develop options for the CSAE Group’s consideration. This was agreed by the Group.

Position papers developed by representative organisations were referred to as part of the discussion:

Mandatory reporting - Social Work Scotland position paper

Make failure to report sexual abuse a crime, says Scottish-based global child safety institute - Childlight

Mandatory reporting postion statement - Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH)

The Right to Recover: Therapeutic services for children and young people following sexual abuse: an overview of provision in the West of Scotland

Any other business

The Co-chair noted that the CSAE Group had been invited to a National Public Protection Leadership Group (NPPLG) hosted Learning Event - Child Exploitation: Learning from the Experiences of Greater Manchester. 

Next steps and close 

The next meeting of the national Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation Strategic Group is planned for 14 January, Given the continued profile and pace of collective efforts on CSAE, it was agreed a meeting will also be held at the end of November to discuss and consider the work underway.

Actions

• CSAE Group to submit comments on the benchmarking paper to the Child Protection Unit (Scottish Government) to review and prioritise gaps noted and consider how the paper aligns with the CSAE Group’s prevention-focused Outcomes Framework and the work of the CSAE Group
• Child Protection Unit to engage with Alexis Jay to consider which further IICSA recommendations are relevant for Scotland
• CSAE Group to review further revisions to the prevention-focused Outcomes Framework and offer feedback
• Police Scotland to share self-assessment methodology with relevant partners from within the group
• Secretariat to arrange a meeting for end of November to discuss options on local scrutiny activities
• Secretariat to liaise and engage with CPG Adult Survivors
• Members of CSAE Group to engage in sharing organisational information on CSAE data
• Co-chairs and CPC Scotland to update Scottish Government’s National Public Protection Leadership Group on the CSAE Group’s data discussions
• Childlight to engage Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) to explore availability of Scotland-specific data
• Secretariat to coordinate Chief Statistician, Scottish Government and Police Scotland engagement with Greater Glasgow and Clyde proof of concept project in first instance
• Secretariat, CELCIS and Workforce Sub-Group co-chairs to consider next steps to develop this work
• Members to discuss report within their organisations and report back to the sub-group
• Members to engage with their organisations on this issue and report back to the Group
• Child Protection Unit to engage Scottish Social Services Council
• Organisations that have not shared their position paper to share by email with the secretariat
• Child Protection Unit to begin work to establish a task and finish group on MR and report on progress to the Group