Reform steps up name for rape gang inquiries after triumph in council polls

Nigel Farage plans to mobilise his new regional energy base of Reform councillors to check out to drive the Government to behave at the scandal of kid intercourse grooming gangs.

After successful 677 seats and seizing ten councils within the native elections, the Reform UK chief says his councillors will foyer Home Secretary Yvette Cooper for an inquiry into how males of Pakistani heritage have been in a position to abuse basically white women in spaces equivalent to Rotherham and Oldham.

The Government has resisted requires a countrywide inquiry, arguing that it will have to be performed at native degree.

But Reform says this has been successfully blocked by way of Labour councillors within the affected spaces.

The celebration’s electoral good fortune, together with two councils seized from Labour, has modified this dynamic.

Mr Farage mentioned Reform councils would write to Ms Cooper to call for grooming gangs inquiries of their spaces.

He mentioned: ‘We’re placing the Government on understand: Reform councils won’t ever sweep abuse by way of rape gangs beneath the carpet.’

The grooming scandal spread out in 2001 when the names of taxi drivers who allegedly picked up women from care properties in Rotherham to abuse them have been handed to the police and native council.

The first convictions weren’t till 2010, with the most recent in 2024 – a complete of 61.

The scale of abuse used to be set out by way of Professor Alexis Jay’s impartial inquiry in 2022, however none of her 20 suggestions has been carried out but. Reform mentioned that councillors equivalent to Simon Evans, the deputy leader-elect of Lancashire Council, were running with sufferers of the crimes to boost the will for inquiries.

Elizabeth Harper, who used to be 13 when she changed into a sufferer, joined Mr Farage at a Reform rally in Chester this yr.

Commons Leader Lucy Powell used to be pressured to apologise this month for suggesting on Radio 4’s Any Questions that elevating fear over grooming gangs used to be ‘canine whistle’ politics.

When Reform’s Tim Montgomerie attempted to query why Labour had blocked a countrywide inquiry, she mentioned: ‘Oh, we need to blow that little trumpet now, can we? Let’s get that canine whistle out, we could?’

Ms Powell is MP for Manchester Central which covers portions of Oldham, the place one of the crucial sufferers lived.

She briefly issued a ‘rationalization’, pronouncing: I used to be difficult the political point-scoring, no longer the problem itself.’

Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood has promised ‘a second of reckoning’ for individuals who grew to become a blind eye to the grooming scandal.

The Reform UK chief says his councillors will foyer Home Secretary Yvette Cooper for an inquiry into how males of Pakistani heritage have been in a position to abuse basically white women in spaces equivalent to Rotherham and Oldham

A overview by way of Baroness Louise Casey into the ‘tradition and societal drivers’ of the abuse will conclude this month.

Both Mr Farage and Conservative chief Kemi Badenoch have subsidized requires an 18-month nationwide inquiry, with powers to compel witnesses to wait.

Ms Cooper’s spokeswoman mentioned: ‘We welcome native spaces running with us on native inquiries so we will be able to discover the reality, be sure that extra evil perpetrators face justice and extra kids are safe. Great that Farage and his staff percentage this purpose.’

Nandy and her whole division face chop

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy’s whole division is prone to disappear along with her if she is fired by way of Sir Keir Starmer within the subsequent reshuffle.

The Mail on Sunday printed in March that Ms Nandy, proper, used to be tipped for the awl as No 10 concept she used to be no longer ‘running onerous sufficient’. 

Now insiders say the Culture Department can be abolished, bringing to an finish 33 years of a standalone division for humanities and cultural issues.