A children's charity has reacted angrily after a senior police officer claimed men who had sex with girls of 13 or over should not be classed as paedophiles.

Terry Grange, chief constable of Dyfed-Powys Police and spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers on child protection and managing sex offenders, said he believed paedophiles should be classed as men who had sex with pre-pubescents.

The UK law states the age of consent is 16 and anyone who has sex with a younger child has committed an offence.

In an interview with the Sunday Times, Mr Grange said men who had sex with children should not be classed as paedophiles if their victim was between 13 and 15.

Mr Grange also told the newspaper that the law on child pornography should apply accordingly. "It's much more of an issue for me if a child is under 13," he said.

"I think the closer they get to 16, the more it becomes a grey area and I think everyone in the field of dealing with sexual health and sexual activity acknowledges that."

But his comments were rejected by Kidscape, a charity focusing on bullying and child sexual abuse.

Spokeswoman Michele Elliott said: "The definition of a paedophile is a person who is sexually attracted to children. In this country we class this as children who are under 16.

"I think he is being irresponsible, we have been having this debate for ages. He seems to be only talking about child protection for those under the age of 13. I think he is misguided - it is not a grey area.

"I do understand what he is saying about 18-year-olds having sex with 15-year-olds - that cannot be classed as paedophilia - but the law has to do a broad sweep. As for the rest, I disagree with him entirely."

 

terry grange, cheif constable of somewhere in wales reckons that not everyone who has sex with an underage girl should be classed as a p****..

 

SPOT ON

 

there are thousands of underage girls, 13-15 who have sex with boys over 16... i would suggest that there is no comparison between an 18 year old screwing a 15 year old and an adult having sex with a LITTLE girl, pre-teenage.

 

many 15, even 14 year old girls look and dress far older then their younger years, they have the equipment if not the maturity. the vast majority of girls who have sex do so with people within their age range... if they must do it, at least thats acceptable isnt it ? should boys of 16,17,18 be called peados if they have girlfriends 13-15?

 

the law already says that sex with under 13 is rape as the kid isnt mature enough to consent....

 

how many of YOU are peados by the current definition????

 

to me a p**** is an adult (mainly but not exclusively male) who finds pre-teen children sexually attractive.... kids who havnt reached full puberty.

He is setting a dangerous precedent with his comments, someone 18 having sex with a 14 or 15 year old is probably not a big deal but someone 50 having sex with a 14 or 15 year old very clearly is, if he wants the thing reclassified then it should only applt to a male aged 18 or younger or he gives a green light to people much older

He is setting a dangerous precedent with his comments, someone 18 having sex with a 14 or 15 year old is probably not a big deal but someone 50 having sex with a 14 or 15 year old very clearly is, if he wants the thing reclassified then it should only applt to a male aged 18 or younger or he gives a green light to people much older

 

 

that isnt the issue.... its still illegal for adults to have sex with underage kids, and its already illegal for an adult to procure an under 18 for sex.

that doesnt change.

 

but i certainly dont think that sex with a 'developed' 14,15 year old is the same as sex with a child who hasnt reached puberty... that is what a p**** should be classed as. as it stands a guy of 17 having sex with a girlfriend of 15 would be classed as a p****...... that is just wrong.

 

that isnt the issue.... its still illegal for adults to have sex with underage kids, and its already illegal for an adult to procure an under 18 for sex.

that doesnt change.

 

but i certainly dont think that sex with a 'developed' 14,15 year old is the same as sex with a child who hasnt reached puberty... that is what a p**** should be classed as. as it stands a guy of 17 having sex with a girlfriend of 15 would be classed as a p****...... that is just wrong.

 

Even if someone is physically mature at 14/15 in the sense they have reached puberty or whatever does not mean they are emotionally and mentally mature, people develop mentally at different ages and at that age young adults can be extremely vulnerable and the law changing so that anyone of any age can **** them without recourse in the law is playing with fire Rob, I give you the example again would you say that a 50 or 60 year old man having sex with a 15 year old should not be punished in law because of the fact she has pubes ?

 

I have no problem with decriminalising a guy under 18 having consentual sex with a 14/15 year old girl but to just allow a free for all in terms of the guy's age would be wrong.

 

There needs to be a sea change in attitude by young girls too though.

 

These days sleeping around at 14/15 or whatever is considered to be "cool" and losing your virginity well before 16 can give you credibility and higher status in the in crowd and all that needs to change. My 15 year old niece said to my sister (her mum) the other week that she feels under a lot of pressure from her friends to get a boyfriend or a one night stand and lose her virginity. It was much better in the old days when it was considered something that was frowned upon and considered shameful and there was not 1/10th the teenage pregnancies in those days that there are now.

 

Girls of 14/15 sleeping around because it is "cool and hard" will only increase teenage pregnancies and paedophilia

Edited November 20, 200618 yr by Kimi Räikkönen

I suppose it depends on the context.. If you are talking about a hypothetical situation where a 14/15 year old is in an over-18s nightclub and gets picked up by an older bloke, then there is the reasonable defence that he just didn't know the girl's true age simply because she just aint meant to actually be there in the first place... I dont think anyone should be branded a perv in that situation...

 

Now, if you're talking about a teacher who starts fooling around with his/her pupils, well, that's not so easy a defence, the teacher would know perfectly well how old the pupil is...

 

I think the word here is 'inent'.. Is there a specific intent on the part of the pro-active party to go specifically after under-agers...? This involves looking at patterns of behaviour.. Take the example of Ian Huntley, he didn't start on pre-teen girls, he was targeting a lot of 14/15 year old girls as well, there's a lot of evidence for this, and I reckon had police actually been a bit more proactive in his case a lot earlier then I think those two little girls might still be alive today.. So, I dont think that this is all as 'simple' as this copper is making out tbh....

Even if someone is physically mature at 14/15 in the sense they have reached puberty or whatever does not mean they are emotionally and mentally mature, people develop mentally at different ages and at that age young adults can be extremely vulnerable and the law changing so that anyone of any age can **** them without recourse in the law is playing with fire Rob, I give you the example again would you say that a 50 or 60 year old man having sex with a 15 year old should not be punished in law because of the fact she has pubes ?

 

I have no problem with decriminalising a guy under 18 having consentual sex with a 14/15 year old girl but to just allow a free for all in terms of the guy's age would be wrong.

 

 

that is not the issue, and i have already said that it is against the law for adults to have sex with underage kids ... rightfully too.

 

im not advocating a free for all, that isnt the issue either, but in reality underage kids of both sexes are having sex with people over 16.... if john(16) had sex with his g/f cat (15) technically he would be classed as a p****!!!!! now thats just wrong. .... how many of you on here have had sex with an underage person even though you were only just over 16? .... these people are NOT peadophiles

 

the laws are already in place and its illegal for anyone to have sex with an underage person, if its a fellow teen then its not peadophillia. if its a middle aged man/woman then its illegal, but still not peadophillia... just wrong. many 14-15 year old girls often dress up way ahead of their years, and they will naturally attract the attention of males over 16, i call that pretty normal. are they peados?.... whilst being attracted to LITTLE KIDS is obviously unnatural and abhorrent, that IS peadophillia.

 

 

There needs to be a sea change in attitude by young girls too though.

 

These days sleeping around at 14/15 or whatever is considered to be "cool" and losing your virginity well before 16 can give you credibility and higher status in the in crowd and all that needs to change. My 15 year old niece said to my sister (her mum) the other week that she feels under a lot of pressure from her friends to get a boyfriend or a one night stand and lose her virginity. It was much better in the old days when it was considered something that was frowned upon and considered shameful and there was not 1/10th the teenage pregnancies in those days that there are now.

 

Girls of 14/15 sleeping around because it is "cool and hard" will only increase teenage pregnancies and paedophilia

 

 

agreed.

The law is always going to be an ass as it can't define intent.

In the current climate you are not going to have a law that can cover more then the majority of situations.

Under age sex seems to be more of an issue, perhaps the law on the age of consent could be lowered. So that a 14/15 Year old having sex with a 14/15/16/17 year old is no longer considered an offence. Although clearly the problem comes at whatever line you draw a boundary, and lowering the limit would seem to encourage sex at a younger age, which from a pregnancy point of view doesn't look good.

 

The law is always going to be an ass as it can't define intent.

In the current climate you are not going to have a law that can cover more then the majority of situations.

Under age sex seems to be more of an issue, perhaps the law on the age of consent could be lowered. So that a 14/15 Year old having sex with a 14/15/16/17 year old is no longer considered an offence. Although clearly the problem comes at whatever line you draw a boundary, and lowering the limit would seem to encourage sex at a younger age, which from a pregnancy point of view doesn't look good.

 

Well, if you look at Scandinavian countries where the age of consent IS 14 and there is much more open attitudes towards sex, you see much, much lower instances of teenage pregnancy... I reckon it's our stupid attitudes towards sex that's the problem more than anything tbh.. Christ, you cant even publish a sodding book for teenagers which speaks in frank, open language, and distribute it around schools without the sodding Daily Mail and its Tabloid ilk thinking that society will fall into chaos and anarchy....

 

indeed, i think the problem is our attitude, after all ... many european countries have a lower age of consent without the problems our teens incur.

 

maybe its lack of moral fibre...lol.. religion does have its uses!

indeed, i think the problem is our attitude, after all ... many european countries have a lower age of consent without the problems our teens incur.

 

maybe its lack of moral fibre...lol.. religion does have its uses!

 

Hmm, I dont think Scandinavian countries are particularly 'religious' Rob.... :lol: Their system of Socialist/Democratic Govt with strong environmentalist and humanist principles I feel plays a bigger part than any strong religious convictions...

 

The law is always going to be an ass as it can't define intent.

In the current climate you are not going to have a law that can cover more then the majority of situations.

Under age sex seems to be more of an issue, perhaps the law on the age of consent could be lowered. So that a 14/15 Year old having sex with a 14/15/16/17 year old is no longer considered an offence. Although clearly the problem comes at whatever line you draw a boundary, and lowering the limit would seem to encourage sex at a younger age, which from a pregnancy point of view doesn't look good.

 

Absolutely, if you lower it to 14 then you will have 11-12 year olds shagging because it will give them status among their friends as being rebellious etc I really think that the laws should not go down that road, when I was 16 there was quite a lot of status attached in getting into an 18(X) movie or getting served in a bar and the "forbidden fruit" culture was very much the order of the day and I can see 11-12 year olds getting it on to impress their mates if the age was dropped to 14

 

Other European nations people behave responsibly, its very much an English disease, same with drinking, in France and Italy and Holland and so on people drink responsibly and sensibly it is very much a young British culture of getting so drunk that fall over all over the place and puke in the streets and smash up bus shelters and bare their arses etc, young Brits can't handle responsibility as has been shopwn with drinking so I don't think the law should be changed in terms of sex as Brits are by and large not responsible enough to handle it although of course there are a lot of exceptions to that rule

Edited November 20, 200618 yr by Kimi Räikkönen

Absolutely, if you lower it to 14 then you will have 11-12 year olds shagging because it will give them status among their friends as being rebellious etc

 

You seem to be under the impression that this isn't actually happening already.... :mellow:

 

You seem to be under the impression that this isn't actually happening already.... :mellow:

 

Oh I have no doubt it probably is, almost daily there seems to be something in the media about some chav or the other getting pregnant at 11 or being pregnant to their 3rd child by 3rd different father at 13 or whatever, I would not think it is widespread though and lowering the age of consent to 14 would I believe make it more widespread than it is now

Some countries age of consent is 12 :o

 

Some countries age of consent is 12 :o

 

Yeah, Holland does.. Seems shocking, but they dont seem to have even a fraction of the problems we do with teen pregnancies, yobbish behaviour, binge drinking, etc.... As Craig said - the 'British' disease of irresponsibility seems totally alien to our mainland European friends....

 

maybe its the legacy of our 'hippy' era and 'punk' (oposite fashions/music but similar ideology) when anything goes ... them are parents now.... grandparents even..

...how can someone be attacked for being a realist? OK, I don't like the idea of kids under 16 having sex, but we have to wake up and realise it happens all the time. This guy wasn't saying it's ok - just that it happens. All the time.

 

He also made a clear definition between kids both being under 16.... and lads OVER 16 sleeping with underage girls, which is another far more serious matter altogether.