POLICE chiefs are ‘hugely concerned’ by the rising cost and demand on officer time to deal with reports of kids in care going missing from children’s homes.
South Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner, Dr Alan Billings, said missing person incidents generally involve significant numbers of police resources due to the potential risk of harm to the person - and that youngsters reported missing from children’s homes is a ‘growing issue’.
A freedom of information request made by the Chronicle to South Yorkshire Police shows that for Barnsley there were 1,573 reports of missing and absent children made to the force between September 2016 and August 2017. Of these, about a third (518) were for ‘looked after’ children.
Of those reported missing, 919 were male and 648 female. Six were recorded as gender unknown. Teenagers accounted for the highest number of reports - with 633 made for 15 to 17-year-olds and 412 for 12 to 14-year-olds.
Mr Billings said a significant issue the force faces is reports where the same child goes missing several times.
Police data shows in the 12 months leading up to August 2017, there were 110 repeat missing persons reports made in Barnsley - with one person reported as missing from a children’s home 19 times in one month alone. The ages of those reported missing the most were boys and girls aged between 14 and 16.
Mr Billings said: “It’s a growing problem, not just across South Yorkshire but across all police forces, and takes up a huge amount of time because officers have to go and find these people who are missing and bring them back.
“This is a particular concern in Barnsley because there is a disproportionate number of children’s homes compared with other districts.
“What you find happens is a home often sets a curfew, say for a 15-year-old to be back at 11pm, and if that child doesn’t come back at that time, what do they do next? They may not have the resources, even if they know where they are, to bring them back and have to phone the police.
“The police cannot ignore that because they are potentially vulnerable. They may go missing in that way several times a week or in a month.
“That is demand coming on the force and is not really ‘core’ business as you may say but has to be because of the nature of it.”
The matter has been discussed by the crime commissioner’s public accountability board. It was told that based on the cost to investigate, and average officer time to do so, up to a quarter of available officer time is spent on missing person incidents across the four districts at a cost between £10m-20m per year.
Mr Billings said one children’s home is costing more than £300,000 a year to bring back children who go missing.
“Clearly that’s something that cannot continue at that rate. We have to have honest and proper conversation with children’s homes.
“A critical point is the time they children’s homes have told them to come back - and if they set a certain time and are not back and they immediately reach for the phone and call the police, and are acting quite rightly and properly and safeguarding their children - but it has a knock on effect on the police because then police will have to go looking for them and it is a huge amount of time and a big resource.
“That’s why I have said to the Chief Constable they have have to look at this demand coming in.
“Sometimes it’s the same child repeating this in a week or month and more often than not they know where they are and know they are going to come back but do not want to take any risks.
“The police themselves are finding they are going to get the same child from the same place time after time so conversations need to be had. I can understand how it’s grown. Everyone is more anxious these days.”
Chief Constable Stephen Watson has already told Barnsley councillors that work needs to be done to look at what is driving demand on officer time, looking at the top 20 children who go missing from children’s homes, the top 20 locations and the top 20 repeat vulnerable victims and drawing up a bespoke plan to get on top of the issue.
