When a child goes missing, the episode is rarely the whole story - catch up on our latest episode of 'Easier Said Than Done'

When a child goes missing, the episode is rarely the whole story

Every year, police forces across England and Wales record hundreds of thousands of missing person reports. The majority involve children. Many of those children go missing again and again. For decades, each episode tended to be treated in isolation - find the child, complete the paperwork, close the case. The evidence now tells a more complicated and more urgent story.

Episode 9 of Easier Said Than Done, SEBP's webinar series produced in partnership with the Youth Endowment Fund, brought together two of the leading voices in this field to examine what the research actually says about repeat missing episodes, what policing is doing with that evidence, and where the gaps remain.

The demand is concentrated - and the data is partial

Dr Jessica Phoenix, principal researcher at the Greater Manchester Combined Authority and a longstanding researcher in this field, outlined the pattern that has emerged consistently across studies: a small proportion of children account for a disproportionate share of missing person demand. Children in care, those with mental health vulnerabilities, and those at risk of exploitation are over-represented in this group.

But the data that captures this pattern is incomplete by design. As Alan Rhees-Cooper, who works full time on the NPCC's missing persons portfolio, set out in careful detail, police statistics reflect three things simultaneously: the behaviour of the young person, the reporting behaviour of carers, and police recording practices - none of which are consistent across forces. Children in care are reported missing earlier and more frequently, in part because carers operate under different obligations. Children in some family settings may disappear for weeks before anyone calls the police at all.

Dr Phoenix reinforced this from her own research experience, noting that a significant proportion of the children she studied who had been through return home interviews did not consider themselves to have been missing at all. Getting useful intelligence from a child who doesn't believe they needed finding is, as she observed, a significant challenge.

The harm problem is more complicated than it looks

One of the most striking points in the session came from Alan Rhees-Cooper's description of NPCC-commissioned research led by Aidan Sidebottom. That research identified three statistically significant risk indicators across age groups: out-of-character behaviour, suicidal ideation, and previous harm whilst missing. The finding attracted some media coverage suggesting police should prioritise missing adults over missing children because the harm rate is higher in adults.

Alan was direct about why that framing misses the point. Harm is frequently not disclosed, particularly by children who are being exploited. It is inconsistently recorded. And much of the most relevant harm data sits in free-text fields that standard analytical approaches cannot reach. Asking whether a child suffered harm whilst missing is, he argued, the wrong question. The more useful question is whether they were exposed to harm - including incidents where police intervention prevented something worse.

New research commissioned through Liverpool University is attempting to address this, with vetted researchers accessing police records directly to extract contextual data that has never been systematically analysed before. The findings are not expected before mid-2027, but the framing alone represents a meaningful shift in how the evidence base is being built.

Risk assessment: consistency without rigour

Risk assessment practice emerged as a thread running throughout the session. Forces apply broadly similar questions when a child is reported missing, but reach very different conclusions. Some forces grade 70% of cases as high risk; others fewer than 5%. The College of Policing's Authorised Professional Practice is under enhanced review, and HMICFRS plays an important role in driving consistency - though, as Alan noted, inspection pressure can sometimes produce blunt policy responses that create new problems rather than solving existing ones.

He described a force that, in response to criticism, graded all children with certain risk flags as high risk automatically. Their specialist team went from investigating four high-risk cases a day to eighteen, with no additional resource. The four children who most needed intensive police attention received a diluted response. The solution, both speakers agreed, is not policy standardisation alone but better training - particularly multi-agency training that puts police officers, social workers, residential carers and foster carers in the same room, working through anonymised real cases together.

The partnership data problem

Dr Phoenix's current work at the Greater Manchester Combined Authority brought a different dimension to the conversation. Even where agencies genuinely want to share information and work collaboratively, practical barriers frequently prevent it. Different systems, incompatible terminology, information governance obligations that are neither uniform nor straightforward - these are not marginal obstacles. They are structural features of the landscape that practitioners navigate every day.

The data that could most improve how risk is assessed and harm is prevented is often held across multiple agencies in formats that do not speak to each other. Return home interviews, where they exist and where they are well-conducted, can yield genuinely useful intelligence. But the quality and consistency of that data varies enormously.

What does good look like?

Both speakers pointed to examples where better practice is emerging. Alan highlighted the Children Missing and Care framework piloted in West Yorkshire, and the positive impact it has had on how residential care homes understand and respond to missing episodes. He also cited multi-agency training workshops, which he described as among the most effective tools available for getting different professionals onto the same page.

One area of ongoing challenge is the supported accommodation sector, 16-to-18-year-olds in provision that does not always recognise the same duty of care obligations as registered care homes. Training, registration and accountability in this sector remain inconsistent.

Helen also flagged forthcoming national research from Missing People, which indicates that children are twice as likely to disclose harm to the Missing People helpline or to a return home interview professional as they are to police officers - a finding with significant implications for how information flows and where investment should go.

What the evidence tells us - and what it doesn't yet

The honest picture from this session is that the evidence base in this field is growing but incomplete. The data is partial. Risk assessment tools have historically lacked the rigorous evidence foundation needed to be operationally credible. The new Liverpool University research may change that - but the findings are some way off.

What the session made clear is that the practitioners working in this space are not waiting for perfect evidence before trying to improve. They are working with what they have, being honest about its limitations, and building the foundations for something more robust.

The recording is now available on our Members Hub.

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