Missing children: the reality

Every year in the UK around 100,000 children under 16 - one ninth of the age group - either run away or are forced to leave home or care. Mark Sylvester reports

Ella first ran away from home when she was just eight. By 11 she was using heroin and by 14 she was selling sex on the street to survive. Ella may be a fairly extreme example of a runaway, but she is far from unique.

While most of the 100,000 kids who run away each year will return home after just one night, up to 1,300 will still be missing two weeks after being reported to the police. Some will disappear for months on end. They risk being physically and sexually assaulted while on the streets, or falling prey to drugs, crime or, like Ella, prostitution. Many end up permanently homeless.

The good news is that most children are recovered within 24 hours of going missing, says Chief Inspector Tim Bonnett, in charge of the police-led UK Missing & Exploited Children Web Site. 'Of the children that were missing last year, only 300 are still outstanding.'

The triggers
There are literally thousands of different reasons why kids run away. In Ella's case, it was physical abuse at home. Now in her late teens and living in a hostel while undergoing counselling, she says: 'I never wanted to live with my mum because my step dad used to beat me up. I told my aunt, who's a police officer. She believed me and I was interviewed by the police, but I guess they believed my mum and step dad over me.'

No action was taken and Ella ran away, sleeping wherever she could find shelter. Like most runaways, she didn't take any food, clothes or money and was forced to shoplift to survive. By 14 she was heavily into drugs, permanently excluded from school and living in a children's home, from which she continued to run away - on one occasion, sleeping rough for six months.

  • Over the page: the dangers

    Tragically, one in 14 runaways are the same age, or younger, than Ella was when she first left home. One volunteer, manning the National Missing Persons' Helpline, was shocked to discover the little girl on the other end of the phone was just six years old.

    Family problems, ranging from arguments over tidying a room to physical or sexual abuse, are one of the main causes of children running away, says the government's Social Exclusion Unit.

    The dangers
    The longer a child is missing, the harder the task of finding them becomes. 'If a child is missing for more than 24 hours, the chances of them being found decrease significantly,' says Chief Inspector Bonnett. 'In terms of children that are missing for an extended period, the recovery time is not very good, particularly with teenagers who have made a conscious choice to go missing.

    'Studies show they are likely to become involved in crime because they have to sustain themselves. That can have a long-term effect on their future. One of the key problems for both boys and girls is that they are very vulnerable to sexual exploitation or manipulation by people with drugs.'

    Children's Society spokeswoman Rachel Petty says that 13 per cent of child runaways who sleep rough are physically attacked, while eight per cent are sexually assaulted. Runaways are five times more likely to end up with drug problems and three times more likely to get into trouble with the police than they would otherwise have been.

  • Over the page: forced onto the streets

    Petty adds: 'The younger a child is, the more vulnerable they are, and the more easily they can become exploited. The danger is that they fall into that world where people have been on the streets for a while and know the ropes. They can then easily get stuck in the street 'system' where they can become victims of crime, or are forced to commit crime to survive.'

    Forced onto the streets
    The problems are exacerbated by a lack of safe accommodation for children who run away. Of five hostels set up for minors under the 1989 Children's Act, only one - in London - remains. Nobody under 16 can be admitted to an adult hostel, forcing thousands of vulnerable youngsters onto the streets.

    Petty explains: 'We would never encourage adult hostels to take anyone under 16 in any case, because they would be likely to mix with 'hardened' street people.' Anybody harbouring a child under 16 could be prosecuted under the Child Abduction Act.

    Around 70 per cent of all child runaways return home of their own accord, but for the rest there can be long, cold nights, fraught with danger. The Social Exclusion Unit says that, physical or sexual assaults aside, almost a quarter of runaways reported being hungry and thirsty, almost a third admitted being frightened and 39 per cent confessed to being lonely.

    Tackling the problem
    There are some agencies working desperately to tackle the problem. Groups like the Children's Society, NSPCC, Centrepoint and Barnardos run street projects where young runaways can seek help and advice, as well as workers who actively tour the streets looking for possible runaways.

  • Over the page: the future

    Petty of the Children's Society says: 'We have projects in London, Leeds, Birmingham, Manchester, Bournemouth, Torquay, and Essex, where people try to find runaways. They try to get the kid's trust, take them for a burger and sit them down for a chat. We encourage them to come into the projects where we can help with laundry, warm clothes, and give them advice. We also hand out cards with a helpline they can call at any time if they feel scared.'

    Light at the end of the tunnel
    All groups concerned believe the way forward lies with a government-backed national strategy involving small-scale, safe emergency accommodation; a national network of street work services; awareness raising schemes in schools and policy guidelines for local authorities. They also believe more support needs to be given to youngsters who are considering running away through family mediation services, and more publicity for phone lines and websites that kids can turn to with their problems.

    The light at the end of the tunnel could be a report being prepared by the Social Exclusion Unit, which began last June. The Children's Society's Patricia Durr said: 'There are a lot of positive signals coming from the unit in terms of the things we are calling for. To be honest a lot of the things, like better street co-ordination, and refuge provision, are down to money. If the Government is prepared to throw money at the problem, we may have a chance.'