UK ‘can’t afford more delays’ on child abuse reform, says Survivor’s Trust

We spoke to Lucy Duckworth from the Survivor’s Trust, who is herself a survivor of child abuse.

Cathy Newman: Lucy, when you hear what Elon Musk has said about Keir Starmer, about Jess Phillips and so on, does that help survivors of abuse or not?

Lucy Duckworth: I don’t think this conversation is helped by picking out any individuals and making any criticism of them. Especially when we’re using hateful language in the same way as perpetrators do towards their victims.

Cathy Newman: You see it as hate speech do you?

Lucy Duckworth: I think that if anybody is calling for somebody to suffer and experience a crime, which is what Elon Musk has done, then… I’ve heard MPs today, as well, refer to that as hate speech. Child sexual abuse and the problem that we are encountering in the UK is really complex. That’s why we are in the situation we are in and we need to make sure that those making comments on it and who are receiving publicity for that really, fully understand the complexities of it and what needs to be done to finish it.

Cathy Newman: So it shouldn’t be reduced to a, you know, tweet here and there? And apparently politicians jumping on the bandwagons, as Keir Starmer says.

Lucy Duckworth: Exactly that, I mean, this subject affects people for their entire life. There’s over 13 million adult survivors in the UK today. They will experience adverse health conditions, lower rates of employment. They’re even more likely to die earlier than their non-abused peers. These are the issues which are much more important than what we see on Twitter.

Cathy Newman: Nevertheless, because this row has blown up, the home secretary, we assume she’s responded to that, has now said that if anyone works with children and fails to report child sexual abuse, they’ll face prosecution. You’ve been calling for that for a while, haven’t you?

Lucy Duckworth: We have. We’ve been calling for that since before the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse even began. It’s great to hear. We know that mandatory reporting is something that in the UK we’re very behind on. The fact that a child can be abused, and another professional can know about it and not take action, should be something that the public are outraged about. It’s great to hear that’s going to happen. It must be done correctly and it must incorporate all institutions.

Cathy Newman: Right. I’ll come back to that in a minute. But, you know, do the Conservatives have a point that the Alexis Jay child sexual abuse inquiry didn’t devote sufficient attention to the grooming gangs and therefore there could be a need for a new inquiry into that issue specifically?

Lucy Duckworth: Professor Jay was really clear in her report that she wasn’t going to look at areas that had already been looked at. It did have a report on organised networks. Now what do we mean by organised networks? All child abuse when it is perpetrated by groups of men, is an organised network. We’re seeing this online, we’re seeing this through forums where men are sharing the abuse of children. We’re seeing this in the Church of England by priests who are organising themselves and are abusing children. This is everywhere. This is so much bigger than one particular area. Now I know the pain and the frustration that the survivors have experienced. That’s why they’re calling for another inquiry. They want action. They want accountability.

Cathy Newman: So would another inquiry help?

Lucy Duckworth: Well, it’s two years later and we haven’t even acted on the report from the first inquiry.

Cathy Newman: Do that first?

Lucy Duckworth: We cannot afford any more delays. We’ve got 20 clear recommendations that will provide a roadmap to beginning to end this pandemic in child sexual abuse, and we need to act on it now.

Cathy Newman: Did political correctness inhibit authorities from taking action in the grooming gang scandal in particular?

Lucy Duckworth: I mean, I couldn’t possibly answer that because I wasn’t on the inside of any investigation. I think what inhibits anyone taking action is not understanding this subject, as much as we should.

Cathy Newman: Does that apply to the church as well?

Lucy Duckworth: I think it does. I think people are so scared by it that understandably we want to think it’s happening to other people, so we don’t want to engage with it. And one of the main recommendations of Alexis Jay’s report was to have a single core set of data and to have a public education campaign. They haven’t been done.

Cathy Newman: Well, briefly, we’ve got a new leader of the Church of England today, the Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, who has himself been accused of safeguarding failings. Is he fit to lead the church, in your view?

Lucy Duckworth: I mean, he promoted a known abuser and this abuser had paid his victim. Stephen Cottrell, promoted him to area Dean, thereby putting him in a bigger position of trust. I think it’s down to the public to see whether they really believe that this is a man who should be in charge of 4700 Church of England primary schools.