by Carmen Aguilar García, Sally Weale and Johnny McDevitt, Guardian
Exclusive: Average of nearly five sexual crimes a day against under-13s were reported to police between 2021 and 2025
Lawyers and campaigners have condemned the “horrifying” scale of child-on-child sexual abuse in schools after a Guardian investigation revealed thousands of sexual offences against under-13s, including multiple rapes, are reported to police every year.
Close to five sexual crimes against children aged 12 and younger were recorded on average by police every day in primary and secondary schools in England and Wales, according to Guardian analysis of police data for 2021-25.
The figures include reports of almost 2,000 rapes and attempted rapes, which is equivalent to an average of one allegation of rape at a school received by the police every single day. More than a third of the rape victims were children under 13.
The new data showed at least 8,500 sexual offences against under-13s were recorded by police as having occurred on school premises or nearby between 2021 and 2025 – equivalent to 4.7 offences reported each day.
While most of the police reports did not specify the age of the alleged perpetrator, they are likely to be fellow pupils, and in at least 1,890 of the offences reported as being committed against under-13s the offender was described as under 18.
Girls are more likely to be victims of sexual offences than boys, according to the analysis, which found that close to two-thirds of reported crimes affecting under-13s where the sex of the victim was documented had involved female victims.
Responding to the figures, the children’s commissioner for England, Dame Rachel de Souza, described peer-on-peer abuse in schools as “widespread, normalised and too often brushed under the carpet”.
“We have taken important steps in the last few years,” she said. “But as these figures show we have a long way to go. This is not simply a school or college issue, it is a societal one.”
The data, obtained via freedom of information requests, also includes reports of a further 6,140 crimes involving the possession, taking, making or distribution of indecent or prohibited images of children under 18.