Children at risk as plan to extend position of trust laws to coaches is dropped
The Government is backtracking on plans to extend Abuse of position of trust law to cover sports coaches, despite a 51% increase in the number of recorded offences since 20121.
It’s currently illegal for some groups of professionals, like teachers, care workers and youth justice staff, to be involved in sexual activity with a 16 or 17-year-old child under their supervision2.
Our Trust to Lead campaign has been calling for this to be extended to other adults working with children, including sports coaches.
There were a total of 1,406 offences of Abuse of a position of trust recorded by police forces in England and Wales and the British Transport police between 2012/13 and 2017/183.