Ann Coffey MP

The true scale of Greater Manchester's 'lost' and runaway children crisis was spelled out in Parliament today.

Stockport MP Ann Coffey is calling on the government to act now to stop vulnerable missing children falling into the hands of sexual predators.

She says the system is failing to protect youngsters ' and told ministers at a debate she led on missing children and sexual exploitation that they were blind to the true scale of the problem, due to misleading figures.

Thanking the M.E.N. for our investigation ' in which we revealed that there were more than 11,000 missing children reports in Greater Manchester last year ' she was unveiling the real size if the challenge facing her own constituency.

In Stockport, where police believe dozens of vulnerable girls have been disappearing to be abused by a paedophile ring, she has discovered kids have already run away from care 771 times this year.

Ms Coffey is currently chairing an inquiry into missing people, which has heard evidence from Madeleine McCann's mother Kate.

And she has highlighted the disparity between police figures and those of the Department for Education, which are based on reports from local authorities.

Government figures indicate only 45 children have disappeared from Stockport care homes for more than 24 hours in the last three years. Yet the police give a figure of 25 in the first four months of this year alone.

Ms Coffey said: 'Missing children will only be protected when they are seen as a priority for every local authority, every police force, every school and every community and youth worker in every part of the country.'

'Together we must make sure that everybody working in this area understands the link between missing children and harm from sexual abuse and exploitation.It is only then that we will be able to protect and safeguard our children in the future from some of the horrific experiences suffered by our children in the past.'