As you sit reading this at your computer, you’re probably quite comfortable. Maybe you’re at home, at the office, in an Internet café. But the odds are you’ve eaten recently, you’re warm and dry, you’ve a roof over your head. In short, you’re safe and sound.

If you were a young runaway, you might well be none of these things.

Every year around 100,000 young children under 16 run away from home or care. Some of these children are as young as seven or eight. Often what makes them run away is violence or abuse. But once they’ve fled they have nowhere to turn: they end up staying with someone they have just met and getting hurt. Or they end up sleeping rough on the streets in your town or city and risk being caught up in prostitution, crime or drugs just to survive: not safe and sound at all.