Nearly one in four rape victims are girls under 16, ‘unacceptable’ new figures reveal

Analysis often overlooks the fact that a large proportion of victims are children, experts say

In more than 61,000 rapes reported to police between spring 2016 and 2021, the victim was a girl under the age of 16 (Getty/iStock)

Girls under 16 were the victims in nearly a quarter of rape cases, according to Home Office data seen by The Independent.

The data shows that in around 60,000 of the 271,000 rapes recorded by police in the five years up to last spring, the victims were young girls.

Roughly 26,200 of these girls – nearly one in 10 – were under 13 years old, according to the data, which was requested by the Liberal Democrats.

Charities said that the figures for England and Wales were “unacceptable” and that the true toll was likely to be higher due to the under-reporting of this crime.

Lisa McCrindle, from the Centre of Expertise on Child Sexual Abuse, told The Independent it is “often overlooked” in analysis of rape and sexual assault data that “a large proportion of victims of these sexual offences are children”.

She said that most sexual assault offences – reports of which saw an increase of more than 20 per cent between 2020 and 2021 – are against children, including those classified as sexual assault on a female child under 13 and rape of a female child under 16.

Jayne Butler, the chief executive of Rape Crisis, said: “It is unacceptable that so many young women and girls are having to cope with the trauma of sexual violence.

“That a high percentage of reported rapes are committed against females under the age of 16 demonstrates the urgent need to address the misogyny that underpins sexual violence, as well as the need for proper sex education that covers consent and healthy relationships.”

The official data – provided by the House of Commons Library – showed that 23 per cent of victims in rapes recorded by police between spring 2016 and 2021 were girls under the age of 16.

Women aged 16 or over were the victims of most rapes reported to police during this time, accounting for 178,321 – or 66 per cent – of a total of 271,487.

Rebecca Goshawk, from women’s charity Solace, said: “This new research is upsetting and unacceptable, and, as we know rape is under-reported, the true figure is likely to be even higher.”

Wera Hobhouse, the Lib Dem spokesperson for women and equalities, told The Independent: “Let’s be clear, these disgraceful figures are a result of misogyny and sexist attitudes that are so prevalent in the UK.”

She said there needed to be a “culture change” and that misogyny needed to be made a hate crime in this country, and called for an independent review into “catastrophically low conviction rates”.

Last year it was revealed that convictions for rape had plummeted to the lowest level on record between 2019 and 2020. This was despite police recording the second-highest number of rapes since 2002 during the same time period (Office for National Statistics data was not available for reports prior to that date).

Other figures show that only 1.3 per cent of rapes resulted in a charge in the year up to September 2021.

A government spokesperson said: “Rape charges have increased, but we know that more needs to be done. That’s why we’re overhauling our entire response to rape.

“We are recruiting more sexual violence advisers, rolling out pre-recorded evidence faster, improving collaboration between the police and Crown Prosecution Service, and boosting funding for victim support services to a minimum of £440m over the next three years.”