operated, similar patterns emerged: victims were ignored, law enforcement complicit and political officials more concerned about reputational damage than lives affected. Local authorities can hold their own inquiries, of course. But given the scale of these crimes, the fact they took place over decades, in many towns, suggests a level of institutional complicity requiring the attention of central government.
Labour’s stance is made harder by its previous support for such inquiries. The party has launched a review every two-and-a-half days it has been in office. If the two-child benefit cap gets a task force, then surely child abuse warrants an inquiry? In its election manifesto, the party pledged to stand for open government.
‘Too many victims of historical injustices have had insult added to injury by years of legal delays’, it said, promising to right the historic wrongs of Hillsborough and the Battle of Orgreave. Phillips herself previously claimed that Tory ministers ‘literally don’t give a toss’ about ‘violence against women and girls.’ Critics will ask if that stance stacks up with her decision on Oldham.
If any recent scandal is just crying out for a government inquiry, it's surely this. Overlooked, ignored – too embarrassed – the whole business is a national scandal dwarfing, say, the recent Post Office affair. Central to the whole business is the fact that this rape on a massive scale was carried out by men of Pakistani heritage on vulnerable young white girls. This has always been a factor – probably the major factor – in why there's been a reluctance by the authorities to carry out any more investigation, and really it's not at all clear that anything's about to change.
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