The announcement that there will, after all, be a statutory inquiry into the child rape and pimping gang scandal – euphemistically referred to as ‘grooming gangs’ – should be welcomed. The words ‘euphemism’, ‘whitewashing’ and ‘cover-up’ apply to more than just the language used to describe this phenomenon. I first investigated the scandal back in the early 2000s, and published the very first piece exposing it in the national media in 2007. A quarter of a century later, little has changed. A small number of victims have had compensation from local authorities and public apologies from police. But the vast majority of victims have never received support, compensation or validation. They struggle to get on with their lives while their perpetrators, often considered pillars of the community, continue living amongst them.
The cowards and the deniers who for so long refused to accept the harm being done to children by violent exploiters are going to have to own up to being part of the problem.
When I was interviewing social workers and sexual health professionals in the early 2000s about the gangs predominated by Pakistani Muslim men, many white liberals gave me the cold shoulder, not wanting to be quoted in an article asking, ‘Why this community? Why these men?’
Even though they knew I was on the left and determined not to fall into a racist rabbit hole, they were more concerned about keeping their noses clean than they were about the girls being sadistically abused right under those same noses.
It may be true that racist opportunists have rejoiced at the idea that the crime of child abuse can be pinned on brown-skinned Muslims, whipping up racial hatred off the back of it – but white liberals have also spectacularly failed these girls.
Child sexual abuse is known to happen mainly in family settings and care homes. We are often told that the majority is perpetrated by white men – an unsurprising statistic, given that more than 70 per cent of our population is white. Liberals continue to insist that any mention of ethnicity can only be underpinned by racist motivation, but this inquiry must look at the specifics – including ethnicity and cultural factors.
As a feminist, I am interested in patriarchy as a cultural factor, so how can we possibly ignore the role played by Islamism in the normalisation of the degradation of females? To do so would be as counterproductive as ignoring the structures of the Catholic Church in producing so many clergy who abused children and subsequently covered it up. We would have to deny that watching violent and degrading pornography on a regular basis has any effect whatsoever on men’s attitudes and sexual behaviour.
Time and again, we have heard excuses as to why a statutory inquiry is unnecessary. First, we were told local ones might be more suitable – but what about cities like Bradford, long known to have a huge problem with gang-related child sexual exploitation? Do we trust those tasked with looking at their own failures? The police, the local authorities? Why would they admit what’s been going on all these decades, when they could just as easily plead ignorance?
The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) published its report in 2022. It fell a long way short of getting to grips with the issues relating to street-based rape gangs. Rather than focusing on geographical areas already known to have a major problem with grooming gangs, random towns and cities were chosen; a shameful waste of public money. In the final report, just five pages (out of hundreds) were dedicated to gang-related abuse, which largely focused on police and social services. It scarcely looked at specific religious or cultural factors involved in what may have motivated, or provided cover for, perpetrators. The voices of survivors were barely heard.
Any new inquiry needs to be fearless. Data on ethnicity, occupation, and family structure must be included. Are these men able to evade the law because they operate within a clan? The gang leaders are pimps, making money out of these girls, yet the words prostitution and profit are rarely mentioned. How come so many abuse victims have been criminalised? Not just for misdemeanours such as being drunk and disorderly but also – because gang leaders tell girls to ‘bring along your friend’ – for pimping.
Unless we ask these difficult questions, we won’t know. Racists (such as those suggesting that mass deportations will solve the problem of child sexual abuse) will continue to control the narrative until we can come up with some answers as to why there is a predominance of men from these backgrounds doing the abusing.
Since these child abuse gangs came under public scrutiny, we have learned shocking details of the scale of the problem, and the unimaginable horror these girls have endured. A national inquiry will lift the stone to uncover exactly how police, social workers, health professionals, and wider society have failed the victims. But the fact remains that some –and not only the perpetrators – would rather leave the stone unturned.
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