- Request
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1. Does the council have a standalone Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) strategy? If so, please provide a copy of the most recent version.
2. Does the council have any other strategies to tackle other forms of child exploitation? For clarity the primary focus of the strategy should be child exploitation, not included as part of wider safeguarding strategies.
3. Has the local authority undertaken any evaluation or impact assessment of any child exploitation strategy or services in the past 3 years? If so, please provide a copy of any relevant reports,
4. Are elected members given briefings or oversight of the council's work on child exploitation? (e.g. briefings, training sessions, regular reports at committee or scrutiny meetings?)
5. Please provide a copy of any current multi-agency protocol or partnership agreement relating to child exploitation (including CSE, criminal exploitation, trafficking, or online harm).
6. Please provide membership by organisation and frequency of meetings for the multi-agency partnership for child exploitation.
7a) Does the local authority undertake regular audits of child exploitation cases (including CSE)? If so, please provide:
7b) The number of audits carried out in the last 12 months
7c) The key findings from these audits
7d) Any improvement actions identified and their current status?
8. What specific services or interventions does the local authority provide or commission to prevent child exploitation?
9)How many children were referred to early help or preventative services due to risk of exploitation in the last 12 months? Please provide the number of:
a) Children identified as at risk of CSE in the last 12 months
b) Children identified as victims of CSE in the last 12 months
c) Children identified as at risk of other forms of exploitation (e.g. criminal exploitation, modern slavery, trafficking)
d) Children identified as victims of other forms of exploitation (e.g. criminal exploitation, modern slavery, trafficking)
10. What was the total budget allocated to child exploitation work (including prevention and victim support) in the previous three financial years (22/23, 23/24, 24/25)? - Decision
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I can confirm that some of the information requested is held by Lincolnshire County Council. I have detailed below the information that is being released to you.
Child sexual exploitation strategy - Find a freedom of information request - Lincolnshire County Council
1. Yes, Lincolnshire County Council (LCC) has specific procedures and processes around CSE. All partnership policies and procedures are hosted on the Lincolnshire Safeguarding Children Partnership website; Child exploitation – LSCP2. Lincolnshire operates a Multi-Agency Child Exploitation (MACE) process. Concerns around exploitation relating to victims and/or persons of concern and/or locations of concern are submitted via a Child Exploitation Screening Tool. Lincolnshire operates a two-stage approach to exploring these concerns; initially research is gathered, and a MACE Level 1 discussion is undertaken by Childrens Services, Police and Health to assess if there is sufficient information known for these concerns to progress to MACE Level 2. At MACE Level 2 a range of professionals explore opportunities to implement disruptive measures.
3. We haven’t done an evaluation or impact assessment in relation to a local authority CE Strategy (as our strategy is defined within the partnership LSCP strategy). There have been internal quality assurance processes that cover both operational and strategic elements within the MACE process. There were CE audits completed by the LSCP in 2024 which had operational and strategic themes.
4. Democratic Services will be able to provide an overview of the input to members – as part of the current induction, the LSCP will be doing an input on the partnership and Children’s Services on Safeguarding. Members of the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee receive the LSCP Annual Report which includes an update against their strategic priorities, one of which is on Tackling Child Exploitation. Last year’s annual report can be found here –
Local Resources5. Child exploitation – LSCP
6. The MACE process & framework is adopted by all partners in Lincolnshire, and we have regular contribution to operational and strategic MACE by all partners and have steering groups to focus activity across the partners and provide regular governance. Partners include:
• Police – Neighbourhood Policing AND Intelligence Support Officer
• Lincolnshire Community Health Services (Representing LPFT & Primary Care) and / or United Lincolnshire Hospital Trust
• Children Services – F4Me Child Exploitation and Missing Coordinator / Practice Supervisor or above
• Child Exploitation and Missing Business Support – minute taker
• Horizon – Substance use services
• District Council representative for the relevant area
• NEST (NACRO Education Support and Transition) Accommodation providers
• Invited Attendees (where applicable):
• Education Settings
• Registered Social Landlord
• Rough Sleeper Team (Change for Lincs)
• Involved Children’s Services Worker (Lead Professional)
• Ethnic Minority and Travellers Education Team
• British Transport Police
• Other Local Authorities (i.e. Police, Children’s Services)
• ProbationMACE Level 1 sits weekly and is attended by Childrens Services, Police and Health.
MACE Level 2 is also weekly and is attended by Childrens Services, Police, Health, Horizon (Substance Use Support Service), District Councils, Schools (where applicable) and involved case managers (where applicable).
MACE Working Group, MACE Steering Group and MACE Strategic Group each sit on a 6-weekly basis.
7a-d.The Local Authority contributes to the LSCP Multi-Agency audits, within the last 12 months these have focused on Domestic Abuse and Child Sexual Abuse. A CE audit was carried out in 2024 by the Lincolnshire Safeguarding Children Partnership.
8. There are no commissioned services specifically for CE as this is managed within our early help offer and is the responsibility of all professionals.Child exploitation – LSCP
9a-d. Any professional can identify CE concerns and submit these concerns via a CE tool – we can provide numbers for how many CE tools were received, what percentage of those cases were identified as being CSE or CCE and the level of risk. We are unable to determine all those scenarios where there may have been low level CE concerns which were managed in case management and did not reach the threshold for completion of a CE Screening Tool.
In the last 12 months 528 CE screening tools were received, these tools are completed when there are concerns that the child is being exploited criminally or sexually. Of the 528 referrals received 110 were assessed as containing concerns relating to CSE & 210 relating to CCE(including MDS)
10. Budget for CE work does not sit alone and has been incorporated into the early help offer. Figures for this are therefore not available.
- Reference number
- 12409004
- Date request received
- 14 May 2025
- Date of decision
- 9 June 2025