Sarah Champion MP: speeches

Speeches

• 18 Jun 2025 · Crime and Policing Bill · Hansard source

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  I appreciate being called to speak, Madam Deputy Speaker. I also really appreciate being able to follow in the wake of my two friends—my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi) and the right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Dame Karen Bradley)—who have been incredible campaigners on these issues. I know from first-hand experience of meeting the victims and survivors they spoke about that there are gaping holes in our legislation. I hope that the House will support their amendments, because that would do something to close them. I rise to speak first about my new clauses 9, 10 and 18, which seek to better protect child victims of sexual and criminal exploitation and empower our frontline responders to keep them safe. I welcome the Government’s introduction of the mandatory duty to report, which was recommendation 13 of the independent inquiry into child sexual exploitation, as it has the potential to strengthen our child protection system. However, following detailed conversations and meetings with Rotherham and Sheffield NHS safeguarding staff, I share their concerns about the finer details of its implementation. To put it bluntly, the duty will not protect children as intended unless mandated reporters are adequately trained. Recognising, reporting and—crucially—responding to child sexual abuse is far from straightforward, so to prevent overwhelming an already strained system, all those under the duty must be trained to know what to look for and how to report it. Let me give an example. A nursery nurse might see bruising around the genital areas of a toddler, and with the fear—I put it that way—of her duty on mandatory reporting, she will report it to the hotline or directly to the NHS safeguarding teams, which is absolutely the right thing to do. However, toddlers fall over and they fall in awkward places, so that nursery worker needs to have the skills and experience to be able to know when it is appropriate to report and when it is not appropriate, along with what evidence to gather and what not to. At the moment, I am scared that everything will be reported and that the system, which is there to protect and safeguard those children, will be unable to cope. I hope that a standard training package will be given to all people who fall under the duty. I will now turn to new clauses 10 and 18, on child criminal exploitation, which I know the safeguarding Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Yardley (Jess Phillips), is very familiar with, I having campaigned on this with her for many years in previous Parliaments. As Baroness Casey’s report states, right now criminally exploited children are at risk of prosecution rather than protection. These new clauses seek to change that. They have the backing of Action for Children. ECPAT UK, Barnardo’s and many other children’s charities. In 2024 alone, more than 2,891 children were referred to the national referral mechanism as potential child victims of criminal exploitation, but many more ended up in courtrooms, not safeguarding systems. As my police chief said to me, it is deeply sad that the first time we see these criminally exploited children is when we are looking to criminalise them. We cannot get above this and ahead of it. Clause 38 rightly creates a new offence of CCE, recognising the severity of that abuse. However, without corresponding changes to the Modern Slavery Act 2015, legal protections remain inconsistent and inadequate. New clause 10 seeks to fix that. In a similar vein, new clause 18 would insert a definition of “child criminal exploitation” alongside the offence in clause 38. Evidence from the Jay review into criminal exploitation of children demonstrates that the current lack of a definition contributes to significant inconsistencies in practice across the country and persistent failures to identify children as victims. I saw that time and again in Rotherham, with young, exploited girls all too often referred to as “child prostitutes” and not given the support they needed. The shift started only after we got the statutory definition for child sexual exploitation. Clear, consistent legislation empowers professionals to intervene earlier, prevents inappropriate prosecutions and ensures that exploited children receive the safeguarding support that they need. I turn to my amendment 9, on registered sex offenders, which is supported by 39 MPs from across the parties. It will not be new to many in the House as I have brought it up in the last three Parliaments. Between 2019 and 2022, 11,500 sex offenders were prosecuted for failure to notify changes of information. The same ongoing pattern allows offenders to slip through the cracks, with over 700 going completely missing in those years. I welcome the new measures in the Bill that require some offenders to seek police authorisation before applying to change their name on UK passports and driving licences, which will genuinely make a difference. However, I remain deeply concerned that many of the new measures lack strength and could lead to confusion. Clause 80 states that sex offenders must give seven days’ notice of using a new name but does not define what “using” means. The amendment seeks to provide much-needed clarity. It would require offenders to notify the police of an intention to change their name seven days before doing so by deed poll. That would allow vital time for the authorities to conduct appropriate risk assessments. More than that, I want to draw attention to the fact that the Bill still relies too heavily on a sex offender doing the right thing, which is something they rarely do. Finally, I will speak to my new clauses 99 and 100, in my capacity as Chair of the International Development Committee. Last week my Committee published its report on international humanitarian law. It is vital that those responsible for attacks on aid workers and unlawful blockages of humanitarian assistance are brought to justice. Throughout the inquiry, it became apparent that the UK needed powers to exercise universal jurisdiction over crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. There must be no safe haven for those who commit such heinous crimes. My new clauses would allow the relevant authorities to prosecute people suspected of those crimes without any requirement for a connection to the UK. At a time when the legitimacy and impartiality of some international courts is being questioned, the UK must stand firm in support of these important mechanisms for accountability, to prevent impunity for serious violations of international humanitarian law while ensuring that we have the domestic powers needed to hold perpetrators to account, no matter where their crimes are committed.

• 18 Jun 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q5. Mr Deputy Speaker, I welcome the— [ Interruption. ] I apologise, Mr Speaker—there are too many deputies in the place today. I welcome the Government’s announcement on grooming gangs. I am sorry for stumbling; I have been floored by the point scoring going on around them—on all sides. I wonder whether the Deputy Prime Minister is aware that the victims and survivors of grooming gangs are being denied compensation by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority on bizarre technicalities, as are all children who have been victims of online abuse. For me, that is a grave injustice. The authority thinks it is better than a judge and jury. I wonder what the Deputy Prime Minister plans to do. Personally, I think it should be abolished.

• 4 Jun 2025 · Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories · Hansard source

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  The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is no such thing; it is a group of trigger-happy private security employees. Under international law, Israel, as the occupier, has a duty to the people in Gaza. The International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion on 19 July 2024 stating that Israel’s “policies and practices are contrary to the prohibition of forcible transfer of the protected population” under article 49 of the fourth Geneva convention. The Government have still not given their response to this, and if I were to be very uncharitable—and, hopefully, very wrong—I would say that this has created a limbo whereby the Government are not using their full toolbox of sanctions, prohibitions and legal accountability to hold Israel and indeed Hamas to account. When will the Government act and acknowledge that they have duties under this advisory opinion?

• 16 Jan 2025 · Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse · Hansard source

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  I think I heard the Home Secretary adopting my five-point plan, so I thank her for that and thank everybody across the House who has been campaigning on the issue. If I could ask for some clarity: did the Home Secretary say she will adopt all 20 of the IICSA recommendations or just those in the grooming gang strand? Do local authorities as well as police forces have to do a review into their cases of CSE? She cites Telford, which was victim-focused—that was why it was so important, because we must have those victims’ and survivors’ voices—but what Telford and Greater Manchester said they lacked was the ability to compel witnesses. A big strand of what we need to do is ensure that there have been no cover-ups, and we can only do that if requirements are on a statutory footing. With respect, Telford cost £8 million and the Home Secretary said she was providing £5 million for the whole inquiry across the country. Why do we need another inquiry in Telford when we know this is happening nationally? Can she assure us that there will be transparency of the findings of all the inquiries, reviews and audits? Is it possible that the inquiry could be UK-wide, because I do not believe this is only happening in England and Wales? It needs to be across the whole of the UK.

• 8 Jan 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  The inquiry the hon. Gentleman seeks was part of the overarching inquiry. There were 12 separate inquiries. One of them lasted two years, and resulted in a 185-page report that was specific about grooming gangs. What more information do we need? We know who the perpetrators are, we know the model and we know the victims. What we want is prosecution, and support for the victims.

• 8 Jan 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  I welcome the Bill because it addresses a lot of the underlying problems we have in our schools and education and, indeed, in the protection of children. I welcome the Secretary of State’s commitment to make this a child-centred Bill. I feel disgusted by what the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Rupert Lowe) has just said. Can anyone imagine listening to that as a victim or a survivor? I am sure his intent is to get to the truth and get justice, but the language—I ask him please to think about who hears our words. On 26 November 2024, in her letter to the chair of the child safeguarding practice review panel, the Secretary of State for Education said: “The forthcoming Children’s Wellbeing Bill is a vital mechanism for improving the lives of vulnerable children… there is a renewed government focus on tackling child sexual abuse… which will necessarily include our response to the IICSA recommendations.” I want to take this opportunity to ask the Secretary of State which of those recommendations fall squarely within the Bill. I hope, with cross-party support, that we can encourage the Secretary of State to adopt them. The independent inquiry into child sexual abuse published 20 recommendations, trying to address the whole of child sexual abuse in this country, to get support for those victims and survivors and early intervention to prevent the crime, and to get the prosecutions we all desperately want. Recommendation 1 was that there should be a core dataset. Currently, the Bill’s single unique identifier number is not the same as a core dataset. There is a need for a unified set of data that allows authorities to understand better the prevalence of abuse, to identify patterns and to inform evidence-based policymaking. We have a patchy, fragmented data system that hinders effective prevention and intervention. IICSA asked for the creation of a single core dataset that includes the characteristics of victims and alleged perpetrators of child sexual abuse, vulnerability factors and the settings and contexts in which the abuse occurred. Recommendation 2 is for a child protection authority for England and Wales. Recommendation 3 is for a Cabinet Minister for child protection, and that needs to be someone who cuts across all the different Departments, because that is where we are failing children right now—we do not have a joined-up approach to child protection. Recommendation 4 is for a public awareness campaign, and cultural awareness is included throughout the recommendations. We need to make children aware of the risks they face, but we also need to tackle cultural insensitivities and much worse wherever we find them. That is particularly pertinent to me, because I am proud that I got the previous Government to ensure that every child, from primary school, had relationships education. However, in September 2024 the Department for Education published an independent evidence review on “Teaching relationships education to prevent sexual abuse”. It found that teachers were still not receiving adequate training. There are not adequate resources for those teachers, so I urge the Secretary of State to use the Bill to do something about that. Specifically, will she ringfence relationships, health and sex education training budgets?

• 23 Jul 2024 · Immigration and Home Affairs · Hansard source

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  This morning we woke to the horrifying confirmation that violence against women and girls in the UK is endemic. The national policing statement detailed that there are 3,000 offences recorded each day, but let us remember, that will be the tip of the iceberg. For example, 83% of women do not come forward to report rape to the police, and many offences will not even be recognised as such by the victims because of the deep-seated misogyny in this country. The system, as it currently stands, fails women and girls. What we need now is root and branch change. In March 2023, the now Prime Minister promised to halve violence against women and girls if Labour won office. He said he would put domestic abuse specialists in police control rooms and set up dedicated courts for rape trials. I am proud that in the King’s Speech the Prime Minister is living up to his promises. In my Government’s proposed Bills, I was reassured to see specific measures to tackle misogyny, from teaching children about healthy relationships and consent, to putting rape victims back at the heart of our criminal justice system. Until now, rape conviction rates have been appallingly low. A total of 68,387 rapes were recorded by the police in 2023, but, by the end of that year, charges had been just 2.6%, and the average wait time for rape cases to get to court was 839 days. That should shame us all. I am hopeful that the plans to introduce specialist rape courts to fast-track cases will make the change and I support them. On that note, I wish to take a moment to thank the victims and survivors, as well as the past and present Victims’ Commissioners, for the hard work that they have done in campaigning to make these necessary changes. I thank my Government for acting on my campaign to stop registered sex offenders from changing their names. And I greatly look forward to working with those on the Front Bench to close all legal loopholes that allow dangerous sex offenders to slip through the net. Following many years of fighting alongside inspirational survivors, including Della and the Safeguarding Alliance, I am optimistic that we are finally nearly there with Della’s law. Now I turn to a topic that needs all of our attention—child protection. Safeguarding should start with every parent and every child having access to a Sure Start. Unfortunately, most people are not automatically born to be a good parent, but Sure Start can give them the support and encouragement that they need to become one. Early intervention is always the best and cheapest solution. I urge the Government to rebuild this inspirational offer, after the Tories tried to demolish it one centre at a time. I welcome the Home Secretary’s plan to introduce a statutory definition of “child criminal exploitation”. This is something that I have been campaigning on for many years and could never understand why the previous Government resisted it. Until now, there have been multiple definitions, resulting in a confused and fragmented response by authorities. Between 2022 and 2023, more than 14,000 children were identified as at risk of, or a victim of, child criminal exploitation. I hope to work with the Government to ensure that the new statutory definition is in line with international standards of child trafficking, not just an extension of the adult definition. For too long, we have seen the abuse of child victims being misinterpreted as “choice”. A child can never “consent” to their abuse or exploitation. I wish to end where I started, with Labour’s commitments to halve violence against women and girls. I urge my Government to seize this moment and to be bold and ambitious. We owe women and girls more than just lip service. They deserve real, tangible action. I stand ready to assist as a friendly critic, but also as a helping hand.