Rotherham child sex abuse scandal: 10 years since shock report revealed scale of issue in town

This summer will mark 10 years since the publication of a damning report which blew the lid off a child sexual exploitation (CSE) scandal in Rotherham.

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The report revealed that around 1,400 Rotherham children were sexually exploited between 1997 and 2013. The author, Professor Alexis Jay, said the “true scale” of the exploitation and abuse was unknown but the 1,400 figure was a “conservative estimate”.

Prof Jay said it was “hard to describe the appalling nature of the abuse that child victims suffered”.

Many victims were white and the vast majority of the perpetrators were Asian.

Prof Jay’s report found that “collective failures of political and officer leadership were blatant”.

Despite there having been growing evidence that CSE was a serious problem in Rotherham - coming from those working in residential care and from youth workers who knew the young people well - the scale and seriousness of the problem was underplayed by senior managers in social care, the report found.

Prof Jay said that South Yorkshire Police had failed to prioritise CSE, regarding many child victims with contempt and failing to treat their abuse as a crime.

Further stark evidence of CSE came in 2002, 2003 and 2006 with three reports known to the police and council, which could not have been clearer in their description of the situation in Rotherham, the report outlined.

Prof Jay said the first was effectively suppressed because some senior officers disbelieved the data it contained.

The other two reports set out the links between child sexual exploitation and drugs, guns and criminality in the area. Prof Jay said the reports “were ignored and no action was taken to deal with the issues that were identified in them”.

The abuse was allowed to continue without action being taken.

But following Prof Jay’s report, the National Crime Agency was brought in and Operation Stovewood - the single largest law enforcement investigation into non-familial CSE and abuse in the UK - was launched to look into allegations of abuse in Rotherham between 1997 and 2013.

Around 200 officers are working on the operation and to date, according to the NCA’s website, 1,367 crimes have been recorded, 1,080 survivors have been identified, 209 arrests have been made and 26 convictions secured.

Systems have been improved since at both Rotherham Council and South Yorkshire Police.

South Yorkshire Police’s website states: “Exploitation of children, in all of its forms, is absolutely abhorrent, and tackling it continues to be a high priority for South Yorkshire Police.

“CSE remains an issue in South Yorkshire and across the country. Our understanding of this type of offending has developed considerably since the time of the Jay Report in 2014, and the way we deal with it has greatly improved.

“We now have dedicated teams who work closely with partner agencies to proactively investigate this type of crime. The development of our response has been shaped by listening to the experience of survivors of CSE. The most recent report by HMICFRS – published in January 2023 - found South Yorkshire Police to be ‘outstanding’ at protecting vulnerable people.”

Rotherham Council’s children’s services have been bolstered. The frontline has been strengthened, more social workers continue to be recruited and caseloads have been reduced to manageable levels. “Our response to child sexual exploitation is being delivered by strengthened, multi-agency teams and initiatives,” the council’s website states.