Official Report 1869KB pdf
Exploitation Networks (Children and Vulnerable Adults)
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the recent sentencing of a grooming gang in Dundee, what urgent action it will take to establish a national task force to identify and dismantle any exploitation networks targeting children and vulnerable adults in Scotland.
Protecting children and vulnerable adults from harm is an absolute priority for the Scottish Government. Police Scotland is already targeting those who abuse and exploit people, and is raising awareness so that victims are identified and can get support.
The national human trafficking unit of Police Scotland works with national and international partners to take swift and robust action to ensure that perpetrators are identified, their activities are disrupted and they are prosecuted, be they individuals or organised crime groups. That co-operation occurs at an operational level and via forums such as the serious and organised crime task force and the Police Scotland-led multi-agency tasking and delivery board.
Tackling sexual exploitation of children is also a key part of the work of the national child sexual abuse and exploitation strategic group, which recognises links to other forms of abuse, including child criminal exploitation. In addition, the child protection committees, through contextual safeguarding, promote practitioner support to tackle extra-familial harm.
The Dundee grooming gang case proves that Scotland is not immune to organised grooming gang sexual exploitation, but I agree that Police Scotland deserves real credit for bringing the perpetrators in Dundee, and in Glasgow’s beastie house case, to justice. To truly protect the vulnerable, however, we must detect the patterns of organised exploitation before the harm happens.
Police Scotland’s freedom of information response and the Government’s response to my recent written question expose fundamental gaps in our data systems. Police Scotland confirms that it has markers for exploitation but none for group or gang-based abuse. The interim vulnerable persons database has an at-risk marker for child sexual exploitation, but it cannot flag when that abuse is organised or networked. If we cannot even identify grooming gang patterns, how can we dismantle them? Will the Government now commit to an independent data collection audit as part of the work of a national task force, in order to close those dangerous data gaps?
Right now, Police Scotland is reviewing previous investigations, as well as current cases, of the nature that the member is rightly concerned about. She is correct to say that there is absolutely never any room for complacency.
One advantage of having a single police force is that it has one vulnerability database, which is able to feed into local and national child protection procedures and to make links with the national intelligence database. Police Scotland also works with the United Kingdom-wide National Crime Agency.
The member has made some specific points around data. I will raise them with Police Scotland, as well as with the Scottish Police Authority, which I will meet tomorrow morning.
I thank the cabinet secretary for that commitment.
Tackling exploitation means tackling the demand that fuels it. Every grooming network and every trafficking chain exist because there is a market, and that market is sustained by the unchallenged demand to buy sex.
If Scotland is to protect our most vulnerable women and children, we cannot just accept that people are vulnerable to poverty, coercion, addiction and grooming. We must target the demand that drives the profits from their exploitation. People are not products to be traded. Victims are trapped in cycles of exploitation through organised crime, online exploitation and prostitution. We need to tackle the root cause through a clear legal deterrent that makes the purchase of sex a crime.
Will the Government commit to criminalising sex buying through my unbuyable bill, in order to reduce that demand and dismantle the market for those heinous exploitation networks across Scotland?
It is important that we tackle the demand for the sexual exploitation of women and vulnerable adults. The member is correct to make the link between human trafficking and prostitution.
The member will be familiar with operation begonia. It has taken a victim-centred, trauma-informed approach that recognises women who are involved in prostitution as victims of exploitation and understands the importance of signposting them to appropriate support organisations, while also challenging and deterring men’s demand.
It is important that the Government gives any member’s bill full and careful consideration. I am conscious that the member’s bill is at committee stage, and I will look with interest at the deliberations of committee members on it. Our focus on the bill will be informed not just by the committee but by the implementation of operation begonia.
The member might also be interested to know that the next phase of our work with Police Scotland is to focus on tackling the online aspects of commercial sexual exploitation.
I, too, welcome the efforts of Police Scotland in bringing the perpetrators to justice, and the courage and fortitude of the victims during the case.
Will the cabinet secretary set out what support is offered to victims of such heinous crimes during and after criminal trials?
The Scottish Government is identifying more victims and ensuring that more victims of human trafficking are getting the support that they require. I also thank all those in the justice system who have brought the case to a conclusion. I agree with Mr FitzPatrick that the victims have shown enormous bravery by coming forward.
In terms of funding, we are providing necessary assistance for victims to begin rebuilding their lives. Between 2025 and 2027, we are providing £32 million to 23 organisations through the victim-centred approach fund, including support for victims of human trafficking and exploitation.
To take another example, we have embedded two victim navigators into the national human trafficking unit to assist Police Scotland in identifying and supporting victims of trafficking and exploitation to ensure that victims are treated with fairness and compassion from the very point of identification. Those victim navigators are providing on-going support for those involved in this particular case.
Other support is of course available through the national health service and the bairns’ hoose programme.
The cabinet secretary is aware of the five Romanian criminals serving long sentences—and rightly so—with the victims aged from as young as 16 to 30. Given what the cabinet secretary has said previously in relation to early release of prisoners and the complicated question of foreign nationals serving time in Scottish jails, can I have her assurance that those criminals will serve their full sentence in a Scottish jail, as they rightly should?
I want to reassure the member on two fronts. First, Police Scotland is of course in close contact with the criminal justice system in Romania. Secondly, any early release or return of foreign nationals to their own jurisdiction is currently restricted to short-term prisoners under very specific restrictions—and there are statutory exclusions.
The member will be well aware that the return and deportation of foreign nationals is an issue for the Home Office. The Scottish Prison Service fits into that process in that it co-operates with the Home Office, but that is in and around the transfer of prisoners. However, there is a scheme in statute to facilitate that in Scottish legislation.
As the member perhaps recalls, I will be laying a further statutory instrument in this regard to enable certain groups of foreign nationals to return earlier, perhaps, to their own country, but that is specific to those serving shorter sentences, as opposed to hefty, long-term custodial ones. Those matters relate to extradition and treaty-by-treaty arrangements country to country.
I tried to amend the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill to set up a Scottish grooming gangs inquiry, but Scottish National Party and Green MSPs voted against that amendment, so it fell. In light of this shocking case, and having had a chance to reflect—[Interruption.]
Let us hear Mr Kerr.
In light of this shocking case, and having had a chance to reflect on the huge disappointment that was expressed by so many people after that vote, does the cabinet secretary now think that rejecting such an inquiry was a missed opportunity? To enable lessons to be learned and to prevent future abuse, will she now order a Scottish grooming gangs inquiry?
It is important that we focus on the facts. As Mr Kerr knows—because I specifically wrote to him on the matter—the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill was not the right route. As he well knows, the Government has always been clear that we are prepared to give every consideration to a grooming gangs inquiry if that is assessed as a necessity.
Police Scotland is actively involved right now in reviewing investigations; right now, the child sexual abuse and exploitation national group is working with Police Scotland and people such as Professor Alexis Jay; and right now, the group is reviewing the very important work that was done by Baroness Casey in her audit.
What Mr Kerr proposed would certainly not be analogous with or the same as a national inquiry; his amendment proposed that the victims and witnesses commissioner—who is still to be established and still to be recruited—do some research at some point further down the line. If there is any reflection to be done, it should be done by Mr Kerr, who has been completely disingenuous about the integrity of the majority of members of the Parliament, has played politics with child abuse and has dangerously gaslit other members of the Parliament. That is a disgrace.
I, too, thank the police officers who have investigated what is an absolutely heinous crime. The offenders ruthlessly preyed on the weak, entrapping and abusing their victims, with lifelong consequences. Since the sentencing, members of the online hard right have been trying to link this incident to others involving migrants in Dundee, painting a picture of a broad criminal conspiracy tied together by race. We should all be clear that they are doing that without evidence, without concern for victims and without care for my city.
The questions posed on systematic grooming should be fully answered by the Government. What evidence has it seen? What questions is it asking of Police Scotland? How will it update the Parliament on those matters? Does the cabinet secretary recognise that tackling such crimes is all the harder in Dundee, given that the number of local front-line police officers has reduced by 71 in recent years?
Let me start by agreeing whole-heartedly with the first part of Mr Marra’s question. There are people in this country associated with the hard right, particularly in communities where there are vulnerable people and high levels of poverty, who are exploiting the pain of members of our society, whether they are new Scots or old Scots who were born and bred in Scotland. He is right to say that we need to stand united against that.
In relation to the need for us to probe deeply, there is no room for complacency. There is never any room for Scottish exceptionalism when it comes to the protection of vulnerable adults and our children. I point to the work that we have been able to do as a result of the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015, which was passed unanimously by the Parliament. I wonder whether legislation of that nature would pass unanimously today. I am sure that many of us recall the passing of that legislation and were very proud to support it. Other legislation that is crucial in this area includes the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act 2007.
The Minister for Victims and Community Safety will be bringing forward further measures, such as the duty to notify. Ministers have the power to place a duty on public services to report when they come across or encounter someone whom they believe to be a victim of human trafficking.
I hope that that, along with my answers to Ms Regan and other members, demonstrates that we are very serious about tackling those who seek to harm, control and exploit.
At the beginning of 2025, I stood in this chamber and called on the Scottish Government to take action against grooming gangs. It is almost 2026, but we have yet to see any progress from the Government. SNP ministers refuse to even say the words “grooming gangs”. [Interruption.]
Let us hear Ms Gosal.
I would like a yes or no answer—does the cabinet secretary agree that Scotland faces a grooming gangs problem?
I wonder whether Ms Gosal will answer yes or no to whether she has listened to any of the answers that I have given to other members of the Parliament at this hour.
I have always accepted that there are people in this country who seek to harm children and vulnerable adults. At the end of the day, all I want to do is maximise our resources, our will and our opportunities to detect, deter and disrupt such heinous behaviour. This week, we have seen success in our criminal justice system that has brought people to justice.
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