Protecting Children from Criminal Exploitation: New Powers to Hold Exploiters Accountable

Protecting Children from Criminal Exploitation: New Powers to Hold Exploiters Accountable 

Summary:

This webinar is aimed to raise awareness and help preparation for the new provisions on criminal exploitation of children and criminal exploitation protection orders within the Crime and Policing Act. It will raise awareness of what these measures offer, how they may strengthen existing responses, and how they connect with the powers, duties and child protection approaches already available. It is intended as a starting point, with further guidance and learning to follow as implementation develops.

Bios: 

Donna McEwan

Donna works as a Practice Development Advisor and one of the main areas she is involved in is advancing the Whole System Approach. The Whole System Approach is an opportunity to achieve the best outcomes for our children and young people; to meaningfully support them across all levels of youth justice and promote practice development. Prior to working at CYCJ Donna worked as a social worker in both Children and Families and Justice locality teams.

Detective Sergeant Stephanie Bertram

I have over 16 years policing experience in various roles within response/community policing, CID and Public Protection Departments. In my current role within the Retail Crime Task Force, I lead a small yet very successful team “Operation Dynos” that specialises in Criminal Child Exploitation and youth offending. The team and I work closely with some of the most vulnerable young people across the West of Scotland, implementing inclusive and effective responses to mitigate risk of harm whilst adopting a contextual safeguarding approach. I am passionate about child protection and have a positive mindset and approach my role with a “can do” attitude by being a visible leader and ensuring I consider the welfare, views and opinions of my staff, the organisation, external partners, and the young persons.

Relevant links:

CEC Framework - https://www.cycj.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Scotlands-Framework-for-Practice-The-Criminal-Exploitation-of-Children-2025.pdf and Screening tool, multi-agency evaluation.

Practice Note https://www.cycj.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Practice-Note-Referring-a-child-to-the-Childrens-Reporter-with-concerns-around-criminal-exploitation.pdf

Important Info:

This webinar will not be recorded. Cameras and mics will be switched off to all attendees, only the speakers and organisers of the event will have their cameras on. If you have any questions throughout the webinar you will be able to add them into the chat and the speakers will try to answer as many as possible at the end.

All registered attendees will be contacted with team's link 24 hours before each session. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to contact cycj@strath.ac.uk.

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