The fledgling official inquiry into the child rape grooming gang scandal is facing accusations of being compromised as members of the victims’ panel resigned on Monday, citing “disturbing conflicts of interests” among those set to lead the investigation.
Following months of domestic and international pressure, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer backtracked from his initial opposition to conducting a national inquiry with statutory authority on the grooming gang scandal, after previously tarring the idea as “far-right”.
In addition to examining the scourge of mostly Pakistani Muslims sexually exploiting and raping mostly young working-class white girls, the inquiry is set to examine the failures of local officials, police, and care workers, many of whom have been found to have ignored or covered up the scandal out of politically correct concerns. Victims, who were often exploited for years, were frequently dismissed by authorities at the time as “prostitutes” despite being under the age of consent.
On Monday, Fiona Goddard, a grooming gang survivor, resigned from the inquiry’s Victims/Survivor Liaison Panel, after discovering that the planned chairs of the inquiry are reportedly set to include a police officer and a social worker, which she asserted were the “very two services that contributed most to the cover up of the national mass rape and trafficking of children.”
“This is a disturbing conflict of interest, and I fear the lack of trust in services from years of failings and corruption will have a negative impact in survivor engagement with this inquiry,” Goddard wrote in her resignation letter.
She noted that in the 2019 trial against her abusers, members of the jury were dismissed if they had any connection to the police or social services to prevent bias from impacting the decision.
“This inquiry should be held to the same stands as a criminal case, if not higher,” Goddard said. “Having a police officer or social worker leading the inquiry would once again be letting services mark their own homework, the shortlisting of these potential chairs shows the government’s complete lack of understanding of the level of corruption and failings involved in this scandal.”
Hellbound and Down 