Crime

• Child cruelty and neglect crimes double in past five years

  The number of child cruelty and neglect cases recorded by police have doubled over the last five years, a children’s charity has warned.

  

• FGM concerns raised by social workers increases at ‘alarming’ rate

  New data on Female Genital Mutilation has revealed that the number of children flagged by social workers as being at risk from the abusive practice has doubled in the last year.

  

• Birmingham to build crime prevention into social housing developments

  Birmingham City Council has become the first council to join a national police-run scheme which will see crime prevention techniques built into all its new social housing developments.

  

• Councils failing to protect tenants from ‘rogue landlords’

  Tenants and good landlords are being failed by a system unable to root out criminal landlords, the results of a freedom of information request show.

  

• Threat of prison over unpaid council tax ends in Wales

  People will no longer be sent to prison for failing to pay their council tax, the Welsh government has announced.

  

• Excluded schoolchildren at risk of violence and criminal exploitation

  Rising numbers of children being excluded from school are at risk of becoming involved in gangs and knife crime, charity leaders and MPs have warned.

  

• Whitehall ‘failing’ in fight against sexual harassment

  The Government is ‘failing’ to tackle the problem of sexual harassment of women and girls in public places, MPs have warned.

  

• ‘Lessons have been learned’ after child abuse case, council says

  Kirklees Council insists ‘lessons have been learned’ in the wake of what has been described as a seven-year campaign of rape and abuse in Huddersfield.

  

• Whitehall announces £5m fund to fight knife crime

  Local authorities are being given the opportunity to bid for funding to tackle youth and gang crime in high-risk areas.

  

• People convicted of serious crimes banned from councils

  Rules to prevent people found guilty of serious crimes from serving on local councils will be strengthened following a public consultation, the Government has announced.