More than 5,000 children have been strip-searched by police in two years, figures revealed, as South Wales Police paid compensation to an innocent 12-year-old who was searched without escort.

According to figures released by 13 police forces in England and Wales, requested by the BBC’s 5 live investigates, the searches were carried out in London by the UK’s largest force, the Metropolitan Police.

The searches – which are normally carried out to detect drugs or concealed weapons – totalled 113,000.

Only 13 out of 45 police forces responded with information and these included Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, City of London, Cambridgeshire, North Wales, Bedfordshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, Essex, Cleveland, Hertfordshire and Lancashire.

'Horrible and demeaning'

Not all searches were carried out without controversy, and in the case of Georgia Wood, who was 12 when she was strip-searched, she felt the experience was “horrible and demeaning”.

She was taken into police custody in South Wales eight years ago by officials who suspected her mother of possessing drugs.

She told BBC Radio: “They didn't explain to me until we got to the police station. And they literally just said 'this is what's going to happen and we're going to do it'.

"For someone to just be so horrible and demeaning, I just thought 'well, if I'm meant to respect my elders, aren't my elders meant to respect me'?"