Across the country, the police, probation and prison services work with partner agencies to keep track of registered child sexual offenders. This process is called Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA).

MAPPA is responsible for managing registered sexual offenders, including child sexual offenders, during the course of the time which they need to report to the services, as well as violent offenders and other dangerous offenders.

Information from a MAPPA meeting might be given to another person or a group of people in order to protect them from the offender, or for them to protect others. This is called disclosure.

For example, leisure staff might be alerted where a local offender is felt to pose a risk to those using the centre.

The difference with this service is that it provides a more formal way for a parent, carer or guardian to ask for information about a person who has contact with their children, and for police to deal with this request. It may alert them that an offender may be having contact with a child or may be showing other worrying behaviour of which they had previously been unaware.