150 children missing from care in Lancashire in one year

A worrying number of children in care are regularly going missing across Lancashire.

In Blackpool, youngsters in the care system have vanished from the place meant to be looking after them an average of seven times each.

In total, 150 kids across the county were reported missing in 2017 alone.

Overall, one in ten children in care have gone missing.

The Office for National Statistics has only recently recorded cases of children vanishing from care, and class these results as experimental.

But Richard Crellin, from the Children's Society, is now calling on councils to do more to protect them from being exploited:

"There's lots of evidence of criminal gangs, adults who want to sexually exploit children actively targeting children in care. Because they're so vulnerable and they can be groomed through gifts and making them think that they really care about them, they can manipulate them into doing things that are actually really very dangerous for them.

"The government really needs to bring the national register of missing children forward so that we can see better data about when children are going missing. Police forces need to respond more sensitively to these young people, who aren't just troublemakers. Ultimately, the buck stops with the Local Authority. They are these children's parents and they must do more.

"Ask them 'Well, why are you going missing? Tell me what's going on.' And then listen to those concerns, because if they're unhappy in their placement what can be done to make that better, and if they are going missing and being exploited, then it is not just about having those conversations, it's about putting necessary measures in place.

"It's really concerning that 10% of children in care are going missing every year, and that on average they're going missing more than five times. It's not just something that's happening occasionally, its' repeated for these young people and it's disappointing more hasn't been done to bring these figures down."

Susie Charles, Lancashire County Council's cabinet member for Children, Young People and Schools, said:

"I'm pleased that Lancashire has the lowest percentage of children who go missing from care compared to other councils in the North West. We aim to reduce this number further.

"Our social workers and care staff do all they can to ensure children don't go missing from care placements. When a child looked after does go missing, we work closely with the police and our missing children's provider to relocate them as quickly as possible.

"We gather information about why they went missing and store it on our safeguarding systems to help prevent similar incidents in the future."