OUR story about young children who go missing from home and are potentially being lured into the seedy side of life will make worrying reading.
The children’s charity Barnardo’s has revealed that it is currently working with 60 children who have gone missing in Huddersfield and then returned home.
This is only part of the 229 missing incident referrals they have dealt with over the last year.
When the youngsters have vanished from home, some have been exposed to drugs, alcohol, crime and even prostitution.
A gut reaction by some people would be to blame the parents for a lack of guidance, but it is a far more complex problem than that and some teenagers can be exceptionally difficult – some would even say impossible – to control.
So Barnardo’s works closely with the police, social services and other agencies to try their hardest to speak to the young person to find out the reasons why they go missing and to try to dissuade them from doing it again.
It can be a harsh and dangerous world out there, but it seems several organisations are working closely together to do all they can to make sure that when young people go missing it doesn’t end in tragedy.
