The Criminal Justice Bill 2023 was introduced in the House of Commons on 14 November 2023. The Bill seeks to:
- Ensure criminals face the consequences of their actions and spend longer behind bars.
- Give probation officers more powers.
- Tackle violence against women and girls.
- Crack down on crimes and anti-social behaviour.
- Counter evolving threats and sophisticated technologies.
- Build a better justice system.
As part of the Bill, the Home Secretary has introduced measures designed to better protect children from sexual predators. Under these new measures which will be introduced as amendments at the report stage of the Bill:
- There will be a legal requirement for anyone in regulated activity relating to children in England, including teachers or healthcare professionals, to report it if they know a child is being sexually abused.
- Those who fail to report child sexual abuse they are aware of, falling short of their legal duties, face being barred from working with young people.
- Anyone who actively protects child sexual abusers – by intentionally blocking others from reporting or covering up the crime – could go to prison for 7 years.
The Police are to be given greater powers to prevent registered sex offenders from changing their name if they believe that they still pose a risk to their communities, something registered sex offenders have been able to do in the past to evade scrutiny.
In introducing these measures, the Government is fulfilling a promise to act on recommendations of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse to make mandatory reporting a legal requirement.
The Government has also promised to invest £6.5million this year for the Tackling Organised Exploitation Programme and £1.9million for the new Child Sexual Exploitation Police Taskforce which has a particular focus on group-based child sexual exploitation including grooming gangs.
How can we help?
Dianne Collins is a Senior Associate in our expert Personal Injury team, which has been ranked in Tier One by the independently researched publication, The Legal 500, and Commended in The Times Best Law Firms 2024. Dianne specialises in accident claims, including child abuse claims, criminal injury compensation claims and public liability claims.
For more information on the subject above, please contact Dianne or another member of the team in Derby, Leicester or Nottingham on 0800 024 1976 or via our online enquiry form.
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