Northern Ireland paramilitaries 'coercing and sexually exploiting young people'

The Province's Children's Commissioner Koulla Yiasouma described both loyalist and dissident republican paramilitaries using young people "to do their dirty work", such as drug dealing and civil disobedience.

Giving evidence to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee on the effect of paramilitaries on society, Ms Yiasouma criticised efforts by government to address the issue as not joined up, and said police have work to do to gain confidence among some young people from deprived backgrounds.

She also said the current collapse of the Stormont government is not helpful, and while some faith-based groups do good work, she said she felt church leaders have not spoken out enough. However, she stressed that the overarching factor of poverty and inequalities in the education system must be addressed to protect young people.

Ms Yiasouma described "peaks and troughs" of paramilitary influence, with a spike in April 2021 during disorder in the loyalist communities where young people were being ordered to take part in rioting.

Asked why young people get involved, Ms Yiasouma suggested for survival. "They do it because they need to do it to survive in their community and that's a really important point to make, and with a threat or a fear of significant repercussions if they didn't acquiesce," she told MPs.

"Government is not working together around what are ultimately the same group of young people who are working with social services, who are having additional education programmes, who are in our criminal justice system.

"I'm not convinced that government funding to vulnerable young people is being spent as wisely and as efficiently as it should."

Ms Yaisouma said there are "pockets of good practice" in terms of police engagement with young people on the ground. But she said she has told the PSNI that they "need to be much better at supporting your local officers on the ground in how they engage with young people".

She added: “The other top line for me is a radical reform of our education system.”