In refusing to agree to research into child sexual exploitation, the SNP is sacrificing children's safety rather than admit we might share the same problems as our neighbours, says Labour MP Joani Reid.

This week, Scotland's parliament had the chance to do something simple: commission research into the scale of organised child sexual exploitation. It chose not to. The proposal, backed by Labour and Liberal Democrats, would have required the new Victims Commissioner to investigate group-based child sexual exploitation within three years. The SNP and Greens voted it down 62-51.

Their justification? Justice Secretary Angela Constance told MSPs there are currently no ongoing police investigations into organised child abuse in Scotland, as if this statistical triumph somehow proves our children are uniquely safe from predators.

The SNP's response reveals something darker than mere complacency. It exposes a government so invested in Scotland's mythical exceptionalism that it will sacrifice children's safety rather than admit we might share the same problems as our neighbours. This is an attempt to protect a political narrative that places party ideology above child welfare.

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But here's what should terrify every decent person in Scotland: official statistics show that last year, only 13 children across the entirety of Scotland were identified as potential victims of child sexual exploitation. Yes, 13. Anyone with an ounce of common sense knows this isn't evidence of Scotland's moral superiority, it's evidence of a system that has chosen not to look.

We've seen this playbook before. When Scotland's drug death rates became the worst in Europe, the SNP spent years denying the crisis. When our........

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