Child abuse and exploitation can happen to any child, anywhere.
We know through research from the NSPCC that half a million children a year suffer abuse in the UK*.
We have dedicated teams who are committed to identifying and protecting children and young people at risk and seeking out those that cause them harm, whether that’s through abuse, exploitation, or neglect.
We ask our officers to ‘think child’ in everything they do, looking for signs that something isn’t right, looking beyond behaviour to identify where a child or young person may need our help.
But we can’t do the work alone.
We all have a role to play in helping to protect young people from abuse and exploitation.
It is often when small pieces of evidence, shared by members of the public and professionals, are pieced together that we are able to identify and protect a child who may be at risk of harm.
We’ll be sharing a series of short videos from some of our colleagues who work hard every day to keep children safe, on our social media channels. They’ll explain more about their work, and how we can all play our part in helping to spot the signs, to make sure children and young people in our society are safe.
We have four specialist teams who deal with investigating and managing cases involving children, covering interfamilial child abuse, child exploitation, safeguarding and early intervention.
We train our officers and staff to understand that:
- Safeguarding children is everyone’s responsibility
- We must capture the voice of the child and really listen to what they tell us
- Every single child matters
Kristina Windsor, Detective Chief Inspector is asking people to support us in keeping children safe:
“I just really want people to feel that personal sense of responsibility and to help us. If you see a child that you’re concerned about, and you’re worried – please call it in.”
If something isn’t right, report it.
Source: Think child – safeguarding children is everyone’s responsibility | Avon and Somerset Police
Categories: News