14 hours ago
'All communities' want to see grooming gangs punished, says Council leader
A Council Leader has said that all communities want nothing more than to see the members of grooming gangs "punished to the full extent of the law."
Oldham Council Leader Arooj Shah welcomed a national report from Baroness Louise Casey, which looked at the scale of grooming gangs across the country and the failure to recognise how ethnicity affected local investigations.
Cllr Shah said: "So clearly on the back of Baroness Casey's report, she made it very explicit and clear that there was, she felt her findings found that there was some reluctancy to discuss ethnicity.
"Child Sexual abuse is perpetrated by people of all races and religions, and inflicted on people of all races and religions. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't ask questions about any drivers of this very specific type of offending.
"We need to do more to understand why this particular pattern of abuse is more prevalent among some groups of men.
"To say so is not racist. What is racist is to suggest that all Pakistani men are groomers or the implication, the suggestion, that any one community condones this behaviour - it does not.
"Nobody I have spoken to, from any community, wants to see anything other than for these men to be punished to the full extent of the law."
The report criticised local authorities for failing to understand the nature and scale of young girls being exploited.
Oldham has been the subject of a number of investigations into grooming gangs and sexual exploitation dating as far back as 2006.
Responding to the report, Cllr Arooj Shah said: "In Oldham, we recognise the failings of the past and are determined not to repeat them.
"We apologise again to those who were failed and thank the survivors who have been bravely telling their stories to not let these injustices go forgotten.
"Baroness Casey has shone a bright light on uncomfortable and distressing issues that will now help us navigate a path to protect our children. Anyone who cares about the safety of children should read and digest this report.
"All agencies with responsibility for safeguarding children should implement its recommendations in full."
A local review published in 2022 found that Greater Manchester Police (GMP) and Oldham Council had failed a number of young girls who became the victims of grooming and child sexual exploitation. At the time, both organisations said they were "deeply sorry" to all those affected.
Baroness Casey's National Audit found that the ethnicity of those involved in grooming gangs has been "shied away from" by authorities, and there was enough evidence in Greater Manchester that there was "disproportionate numbers of men from Asian ethnic backgrounds amongst suspects for group-based child sexual exploitation".
While Cllr Shah said investigations should not shy away from asking why patterns abuse are more prevalent in certain groups, she highlighted that it is not Oldham's South Asian community that needs to ask these questions but instead the authorities.
She said: "I don't think there's anything about reflection or inward looking because that makes the assumption that there's been denial from a community about this."As far as the community's concerned, the Pakistani community, the South Asian community, is like any other community, a crime is a crime."
Oldham Council became the subject of international headlines in January, after the Labour Government denied their request for a public inquiry.
The refusal was criticised by Tech billionaire Elon Musk, sparking a wave of interest in grooming gangs in Oldham, which eventually gave way to calls for a UK-wide child sex abuse inquiry.
The Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer initially denied this request, and instead set up a number of local investigations into individual towns across the country.
However the latest review from Baroness Casey laid out a number of recommendations for the Government, one of which was to hold a full national inquiry that co-ordinates targeted local investigations into abuse.
The Government has now accepted all of the recommendations including the inquiry; something which Oldham Council has welcomed.
Cllr Shah said: "We share Baroness Casey's desire to see a national inquiry, which is why we requested one to be commissioned back in February.
"reI hope that this report will make it clear that this must happen, for the sake of everyone affected by child sexual exploitation, and that survivors' voices will be at the heart of it.
"We are working with the Home Office to understand how the local and national inquiries will align, and we are in conversation to get clarity and next steps."
Cllr Shah also welcomed calls from a number of victims and activists, including former Greater Manchester Police detective Maggie Oliver, to see those who failed in their duties to safeguard victims face the justice system.
She said: "I think absolutely anyone who has failed these young people, girls, women and boys need to be held to account. It's a huge shame on society that they haven't for this long... so anyone that's failed them absolutely should be held to account and be prosecuted."
