Scotland Yard is too slow to identify children who might be at risk from paedophiles viewing abuse online, a report has warned.

       Inspectors found that detectives sometimes delayed alerting social services because they prioritised catching the criminal over protecting vulnerable children.

       In one worrying case, Met police discovered that a man who was uploading indecent images to the internet was living with youngsters, but they did not alert social care because they did not want to jeopardise the criminal investigation.

       A report by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) also warned that there were concerning delays in the time it was taking for detectives to upload indecent images to the national child abuse image database.

       And it was further disclosed that detectives were taking up to nine months to check a suspect’s device due to the growing backlog in cases.

       Inspectors warned the delays meant “victims are not identified and safeguarded as quickly as they should be”, and added: “We do not underestimate the size of this task. For instance, in one case, there were millions of images to review, classify and upload.

       “But delays in this process mean delays to all parts of the system designed to tag new photos, identify them on online platforms and remove them.

       “It also potentially means victims are not identified and safeguarded as quickly as they should be. This is a national problem, which we intend to inspect in more detail.”

       The findings are part of the latest round of assessments that were ordered after a 2016 review concluded there were “fundamental and widespread deficiencies in the way the force understood and dealt with the needs of and risks to children”.

       Inspectors said Scotland Yard had made significant improvements over the past five years, but there were still too many delays in the way they responded to vulnerable children.

       The report stated: “We found that investigations of the viewing and sharing of indecent images of children do not focus enough on quickly identifying and protecting any children at risk from the offender. This potentially leaves children at risk.”

       The HMICFRS report warned that staff remained under significant pressure and there was still a lack of detectives with the right experience.

       Matt Parr, Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary, said: “The Metropolitan Police Service has made some progress in how it keeps children safe since our last review in 2018, and we continue to see examples of good work by individual officers - but the pace of change has at times been slow.

       “There is still much more work to do to provide better outcomes for vulnerable children in London - from more quickly identifying and protecting any children at risk from offenders, to undertaking a skills audit to identify what specialist training officers need.

       “We are assured that the Metropolitan Police has plans in place to continue making improvements, and we will closely monitor their performance.

       “If we think it is needed, we will increase our scrutiny of the force’s child protection services.”