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Starmer’s Govt Abandons FIVE Rape Gang Inquiries, Gets Pushback

April 9, 2025 GOVERNMENT, Spotlight 0

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ER Editor: So the unpopular-on-steroids UK Labour government appears to have abandoned five inquiries into the rape gang scandal, redirecting 5 million pounds of funding elsewhere. Independent MP Rupert Lowe is attempting to right that wrong. Neil Wilby elaborates below.

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Worth listening to (4 minutes) —

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Daily Sceptic also picked this up —

What’s Happened to the Rape Gang Inquiries?

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Labour scraps pilot grooming gang inquiries, sparking outrage and renewed calls for justice

The Labour government has abandoned its commitment to hold five local inquiries into grooming gangs, redirecting a £5 million fund to “locally-led work” following feedback from local authorities, a move that has ignited fierce criticism from MPs, campaigners, and victims’ advocates.   The decision, announced in Parliament earlier this afternoon (8th April 2025), by Safeguarding…

NEIL WILBY

The Labour government has abandoned its commitment to hold five local inquiries into grooming gangs, redirecting a £5 million fund to “locally-led work” following feedback from local authorities, a move that has ignited fierce criticism from MPs, campaigners, and victims’ advocates.

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The decision, announced in Parliament earlier this afternoon (8th April 2025), by Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips, marks a significant reversal from promises made in January this year by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper to investigate the systemic abuse of vulnerable children across Britain.
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Conservative MP, Katie Lam, led the charge against the policy shift in a passionate speech to the Commons, accusing Labour of perpetuating a cover-up of one of the nation’s most harrowing scandals.
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Ms Lam, MP for Weald of Kent and a former Home Office adviser, addressed a near-empty chamber this afternoon, decrying the government’s failure to deliver justice for victims of grooming gangs: “Children across Britain have been sexually tortured by gangs of men,” she declared, emphasising the scale of the abuse—estimated to span dozens of towns—and the complicity of those in power who allowed it to persist unchecked. She argued that local inquiries, even when promised, lack the scope and authority to “join the dots” across regions, a point she reiterated in calling for a national inquiry. “Local inquiries are not good enough—they can’t,” she said, cutting off mid-sentence as she underscored the urgency of a broader approach.
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Her speech, delivered hours before this article’s deadline, has yet to be fully transcribed in Hansard, but its thrust aligns with growing discontent over Labour’s handling of the issue.
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The policy shift came to light earlier today when Sammy Woodhouse, a prominent grooming gang survivor and campaigner, posted on X: “BREAKING: Labour will no longer be holding five local inquiries into rape gangs. The £5 million will now go towards ‘locally-led work,’ following feedback from local authorities.”
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ER insert —

Sammy’s statement, timestamped around 4:00 PM BST, preceded a flurry of corroborating posts from named accounts, including news outlets and political figures, confirming Phillips’ announcement occurred in the early afternoon.
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The redirection of funds—initially pledged to support inquiries in pilot areas like Oldham—has been framed by Labour as a response to local councils’ preferences, though specifics remain sparse pending official records.
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The decision caps a turbulent three months for Labour’s grooming gang policy. In January, Cooper outlined plans for five local inquiries, backed by £5 million, to be modelled on the Telford inquiry led by Tom Crowther KC.
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The move followed intense pressure from opposition MPs, including Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch and Reform UK’s Nigel Farage, as well as public outcry amplified by tech billionaire Elon Musk’s interventions on X.
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By 20th March, however, the funding model shifted to a competitive bidding process for councils, a change criticised as diluting accountability. Today’s announcement scraps the inquiries entirely, prompting accusations that Labour is retreating from its commitments under pressure from local authorities reluctant to revisit past failures. Oldham and Bradford top that particular list of shame.
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Public reaction has been swift and scathing. Campaigners, including Sammy Woodhouse, have long argued that only a comprehensive inquiry can expose systemic failings across police forces, councils, and the Crown Prosecution Service—failings Sir Keir Starmer acknowledged in 2012 as DPP, when he admitted the CPS had let victims down.
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Sammy’s collaboration with independent MP Rupert Lowe on a crowdfunded “Grooming Gang Inquiry,” launched on 28th March with a £100,000 target, reflects this frustration. Whilst lacking statutory powers, their effort—supported by survivors, ex-police, and experts—has been positioned as a grassroots alternative to government inaction, a narrative likely strengthened by Labour’s latest move.
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The beleagured government, the most unpopular in living memory, defends the shift …

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