Child frisking in England and Wales: first complete dataset for 2018-2023, including new data from July 2022 to June 2023

In light of the shocking case of Child Q, a 15-year-old black girl who was stripped naked at school in Hackney almost four years ago, I wanted to use my statutory powers as Children’s Commissioner to investigate the practice of stripping children by the police. The case of Child Q was so extreme that I wanted to ensure it was a one-off – I was clear that a ‘sorry’ was not enough. Such a case would not and could not happen again.

The findings of my first project, which focused on the Metropolitan Police, were alarming. They exposed system-wide problems within the force with a lack of transparency, minimal oversight and non-compliance with statutory codes of practice when conducting searches of children with stop and search powers, exposing these children to unacceptable safeguarding risks.

My second report, in March 2023, used data from police forces in England and Wales and showed that these problems were systemic, not isolated – they could be seen nationwide. I am grateful to the many members of both Houses of Parliament for their efforts to draw attention to the findings and the urgent change needed, as well as the responses from a range of organisations in support of my recommendations, many of which were subsequently recognised in the Government’s recent review of the Codes of Practice for searching children and vulnerable people.

In this latest report, the third in my series of work, I present a full analysis of police frisking in England and Wales, conducted across five and a half years of data, from 2018 to 2023, including new data for 2022 to 2023. My research reaffirms that the problems are not confined to London – in fact, there is evidence that the problems are even more deeply rooted outside London. Across England and Wales, police officers continue to frisk children as part of stop and searches, exposing disturbing practices and widespread failures to uphold safeguarding procedures designed to protect children.

Senior police officers have told me that there will be certain, limited occasions when an imminent risk of harm means that such a search is both appropriate and necessary. My strong recommendation is that this should only be the case where there is a clear and imminent danger to the child or others. However, the majority of searches are still conducted on suspicion of drugs and almost half result in no further action, indicating that many traumatic searches, similar to those experienced by Child Q, could be avoided. If such an intrusive and potentially traumatic power is deemed necessary, it should be accompanied by robust safeguards after consideration of the potential long-term effects on children’s mental health.

At the time of publication, there has been a lot of attention paid to the involvement of children in policing, in the wake of violent riots across the country. This disarray is painful to witness and I am clear that anyone involved in it must face appropriate consequences. But – first and foremost – children are children and should be treated as such. Every interaction with a child should be seen as an opportunity to understand their situation, protect them from exploitation and work positively with them to prevent their involvement in crime.

More encouragingly, this third report shows that there are signs of clear and positive change. The overall number of searches carried out in England and Wales appears to be decreasing, particularly in London. This suggests that some efforts to address the problem are having an effect. Furthermore, the disproportionate number of searches experienced by black children is a critical concern, but the disparity has decreased. Black children are now four times more likely to be searched compared to national population figures, rather than six times as previously reported. This indicates that steps are being taken in the right direction, although much work remains to be done to address this disparity.

Furthermore, we see evidence that most police forces have made procedural changes to the way they conduct strip searches, with almost half of searches between July 2022 and June 2023 resulting in a referral from the force to safeguarding. This is a significant increase on previous years and an indication that more children undergoing strip searches are receiving support afterwards.

In total, 457 searches were made for children in England and Wales between July 2022 and June 2023 – an average of one child every 19 hours over this period. Half of these resulted in no further action being taken – calling into question the need for such an intrusive search in the first place.

Furthermore, this report presents new evidence that police services are on average twice as likely to routinely record additional vulnerability markers, such as whether a child is in care, has a medical condition or is being sexually exploited, for searches in custody compared to searches during stop and search. Given that stop and search strip searches are conducted in a less controlled environment and often under highly tense, time-pressured circumstances, strip searches during stop and search should be more heavily policed ​​than those conducted in custody, not less so. More needs to be done to protect vulnerable young people and to reduce significant unrecorded data that currently hinders effective transparency and scrutiny.

The current system still lacks effective safeguarding procedures. It relies heavily on frontline officers, who are not specialists, to always do the right thing, without sufficient oversight to ensure compliance with essential safeguards, and with little regard for the impact on vulnerable children. It cannot be the job of police officers alone – we need health and childcare services to step up as the other legal safeguarding partners, and consider how we can bring in mental health and neurodiversity support. Consideration also needs to be given to involving education, youth work and youth justice services.

My continued focus on this issue is not on internal whistleblowers or inspection reports, but on the courage of a young girl speaking out about her traumatic experience. There is an urgent need for tougher guidelines around child searches, surveillance and inspection, and reform of a culture that has allowed non-compliance to go unpunished. It is unacceptable that police forces in England and Wales fail to adequately consider the need, circumstances and outcomes of protecting every child search they have conducted. The way these searches have been conducted shows that police too often forget that children are children. The primary duty of the police, like all professionals, should be to protect children from harm. We must strive for a system where an officer who encounters a child suspected of carrying drugs or a weapon always prioritises their safety.