Understanding of child exploitation and the scale of the problem is still limited. What we do know is that there is a need for agencies to work together to understand the bigger picture, using tools such as contextual safeguarding alongside an understanding of the different ways in which children and young people may be exploited.
As Raquel Vieth, part of the Tackling Child Exploitation Support Programme (commissioned in 2022 to help support multi-agency collaboration), says:
A strong response to these types of harms requires a collaborative and aligned partnership working across agencies, communities, families, and with children and young people.
Raquel Vieth, 2023