SCHOOLS can be too reluctant to take action to help deal with the grooming of young boys, a charity has warned,

The annual Yorkshire Child Sexual Exploitation conference took place in Bradford Academy yesterday, hosted by the BLAST Project, a Bradford and Leeds based charity that works with young boys at risk of sexual grooming.

The day featured talks by experts in dealing with child sex exploitation, politicians, and a survivor.

During the conference, representatives of BLAST spoke of difficulties in engaging with schools over the issue of sexual grooming of boys.

Those in attendance were also told that boys at risk of grooming often saw the police as a barrier to coming forward, and that many groups or social workers felt they needed more evidence a boy was being abused before they flagged it up.

Over the past two years, BLAST has been working with local authorities and other organisations that work with young people to look at how they approach the issue of sexual exploitation of boys. Members have found that many did not have the skills or understanding of the issue to effectively help at risk boys.

The conference was addressed by Emma Bunch and Phil Mitchell, of BLAST.

"Boys aren't always recognised as victims in the same way as girls," said Mrs Bunch.

"A lot of times very few boys are recognised as being at risk of exploitation."

Mr Mitchell said: "A lot of training to deal with the issue is girl focused. There needs to be more equality."

Those in attendance were told that boys were less likely to report being exploited than girls, and so it sometimes gave the impression that the number of boys being groomed was low.

Mrs Bunch added: "Sometimes schools we approach tell us they are worried what parents might think, and they are reluctant to engage in any prevention work.

"This is optional for schools, we can't make them do it. We want them to be proactive and not re-active."

Mr Mitchell said: "Sometimes schools get in touch and ask us to do a workshop on how boys should respect girls, that automatically assumes boys are always the perpetrators and not the victims. When schools say to us 'this doesn't happen here' we say 'how would you know if it it was happening?'"

The conference was told that police were often seen as a barrier to getting help.

Mrs Bunch said: "Some of the services offered to boys at risk of grooming are based in police stations, and boys don't always want to go to police stations, they feel intimidated. Some may have been in trouble with the law before. There are some fantastic police out there, but some young people say they have been treated appallingly when they go to police, and some weren't put in touch with a CSE worker when they came forward."