Greater Manchester child sex offences 'highest outside London'

Greater Manchester Police has yet to comment on the figures

Greater Manchester has more recorded child sex offences than anywhere else in the country outside London, according to a children's charity.

The National Society for the Prevention of Child Cruelty (NSPCC) said there were 1,825 recorded offences against under-18s between 2013 and 2014.

It marks a big rise from 864 recorded offences in the region in 2012-2013.

Greater Manchester Police is yet to comment but previously said tackling the issue was "an absolute priority".

The figures released in the charity's report titled How Safe Are Our Children? cover the period from 1 April 2013 until 31 March of last year.

Nationally the report said 31,238 offences - 85 a day - including rape, sexual assault and grooming, were reported to police in the period.

'Social norm'

In October a report ordered after the Rochdale grooming case in 2012 found child sexual exploitation had become a "social norm" within some areas of Greater Manchester.

The author of the Real Voices report, Stockport MP Ann Coffey, said girls in uniform were regularly stopped by men outside schools and the "prevailing public attitude" blamed children, leading to 1,000 convictions from 13,000 cases over six years.

Nine men were jailed for running a child sex ring in the Rochdale area.

The newly-released figures were for a period prior to Greater Manchester Police's launch of the It's Not Okay campaign to tackle child sexual exploitation in September.

The force made 22 arrests in the week-long crackdown on child grooming.