Introducing a new indicator tracking trends in violence against young women and girls 

Violence against women and girls (VAWG) is a growing concern in the UK, and children and young people are often at the centre of these harms – both as victims and perpetrators. While anyone can experience gendered violence, it overwhelmingly affects girls and young women. Tragic stories such as the recent case in Fordingbridge where two boys were charged with rape highlight the urgent need for better prevention.  

To better understand these trends, YEF is introducing a new VAWG indicator that tracks children’s involvement in sexual offences over time. This fills a critical gap in national data and supports efforts to prevent gendered violence among young people. 

What is violence against women and girls (VAWG)?

VAWG refers to a range of violent and abusive behaviours that disproportionately impact women and girls. These include, but are not limited to, rape and other sexual offences, domestic abuse, sexual abuse and exploitation, sexual harassment (such as upskirting, flashing, revenge porn and sending unsolicited sexual images), stalking and harassment, so-called ‘honour-based’ abuse (including forced marriage and murder) and harmful practices including female genital mutilation (FGM).

Why do we need a VAWG indicator? 

At YEF, our core mission is preventing children from becoming involved in violence. This must include preventing violence against women and girls. We know that VAWG is a serious issue affecting children and young people; nearly half (47%) of teenagers in relationships have used or experienced emotional or physical abuse in their relationship. We also know that the majority of sexual offences experienced by children are committed by other children. And many children using these types of behaviours have been victims of it themselves. In this context, the government has committed to halving VAWG by 2034. To make this a success, children and young people must be at the centre of those efforts. 

However, one key challenge is there’s very little reliable data that allows us to track levels of VAWG involving children. The complex and often hidden nature of VAWG means it’s hard to gain an accurate estimate of its prevalence. The current metric being used by the Government to track progress against their mission – a new domestic abuse measure from the Crime Survey for England and Wales – only includes individuals aged 16 and above (the minimum age at which domestic abuse is currently recognised as a crime). The government are currently working with the Office for National Statistics to develop a measure of VAWG for children under the age of 16, but in the meantime we’re publishing our own measure to address this gap. 

What is our new indicator? 

Every year we publish a set of indicators tracking violence affecting children and what’s happening in the sectors key to supporting them. This year we’re adding our new VAWG indicator, which we’ll update year on year to track changes. Our aim was to create an indicator that: 

1. Measures VAWG affecting children specifically. 
2. Focuses on those causing harm. 
3. Is based on publicly available national data, published annually. 

To do this, we’re using the number of children arrested for sexual offences as our core indicator for violence against young women and girls. This provides us a measure of children’s involvement in VAWG that we can track over time and isn’t affected by system changes such as increased use of diversion for children in the same way that data on cautions and convictions are.  

However, it’s important to acknowledge its limitations. Firstly, it doesn’t tell us the gender of victims, though we know from other sources that the majority are girls. Secondly, sexual offences are only one form of VAWG amongst young people; this measure doesn’t include offences such as stalking, harassment or image-based abuse, for example. Thirdly, arrests can be affected by changes in reporting and policing, for sexual offences even more so than other types of violent offence (e.g. robbery), given the nature of the crime. Finally, it’s likely to be a vast underestimate of the total prevalence of violence against young women and girls; the Office for National Statistics estimates that less than a quarter of domestic abuse cases are reported to the police and only 2% have suspects referred for prosecution. Because of these limitations, it’s important we also look at wider contextual data alongside our core indicator. 

What does the indicator show? 

The data shows us that the number of boys arrested for sexual offences is growing. In the first half of the past decade, arrests of children for sexual offences showed a similar pattern to the total number of arrests of children for all offences, falling nearly every year until they reached a low in the year of the pandemic (2020/21). But, unlike all offences, they’ve risen every year since. In the latest data (2024/25), the number of children arrested for sexual offences rose for the fourth year in a row. It’s now 74% above where it was the year before Covid (2019/20) and has climbed back up to 12% above where it was ten years ago (2014/15).

The increase we’re seeing in arrests for sexual offences has a few possible drivers. It could reflect a real increase in the number of children committing sexual offences, but it could also reflect more positive contextual and system changes. For example, an increase in the number of victims reporting their experiences to the police and in police taking action on these reports. This is important because we know that criminal justice measures of sexual offences severely underestimate the true prevalence of sexual violence. Victims often face significant barriers to reporting their experience, and when sexual offences are reported to the police, they’re the least likely of all offence types to be successfully investigated.  

What else do we know about VAWG? 

Other data paints a more undeniably concerning picture. Tech-facilitated abuse in particular is a fast-growing concern. In 2024/25, the number of child abuse image offences recorded by the police was five times the number a decade ago (2014/15), while the number of children cautioned or convicted for these offences was up 42% on 2014/15, and the real number of child sexual abuse images online once again rose year on year. 

This work forms part of a wider programme at YEF of funding, evaluation and research over the next three years on what works to prevent and respond to VAWG, as part of our central mission to prevent children and young people becoming involved in violence. 

In November we’ll publish our CVV survey, which directly asks children about their experiences and will build on the picture we are developing of how gendered violence affects young people – in their relationships and online.