The Home Secretary has insisted that local inquiries into grooming gangs in five towns will be going ahead despite accusations the plans were being watered down.
Yvette Cooper blamed “party political misinformation” over the claims as she said the reviews were being progressed.
The “victim-centred, locally-led inquiries” including in Oldham, Greater Manchester, were first announced in January as part of a series of plans to tackle grooming gangs and child sexual abuse.
Asked if all of the local investigations would take place, Yvette Cooper told LBC: “Yep. We’re still going ahead. The framework is being drawn up at the moment.
“There’s been, sadly, a lot of, I think, party political misinformation about this. What we should be doing is all working together to support victims and survivors of these really vile crimes.”
Pressed again on whether they will go ahead, the Home Secretary added: “Yeah, there may be more.”
The framework which will support the inquiry in Oldham, and can be applied to other reviews, will be published next month, the Home Office said.
Questions about whether the inquiries would not go ahead arose when safeguarding minister Jess Phillips did not provide an update on them in the Commons, as she updated MPs on the Government’s latest steps to tackle child grooming on Tuesday.
Ms Phillips told MPs that local authorities will be able to access a £5 million fund to support locally-led work on grooming gangs.
She added that “following feedback” from local authorities, the fund will have a flexible approach to support independent local inquiries as well as victims’ panels or locally-led audits into the handling of historic cases.
After the statement, Conservative frontbencher Katie Lam said local inquiries are not good enough and now the Government is “watering them down even further”.
Sir Trevor Phillips, the former chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, also hit out at the Government’s approach as “utterly shameful”.
But Ms Cooper said: “What we’re also doing is we’re putting in place stronger measures.
“We’re strengthening the law into these gangs and we’re also increasing police investigations, which is the most important thing of all, because, frankly, these perpetrators should be behind bars, and if you don’t get the police investigations in place, that won’t happen.
“That is the best way to get people justice and to keep communities safe.”
The move comes after the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), led by Professor Alexis Jay, found institutional failings and tens of thousands of victims across England and Wales.
The seven-year probe made 20 recommendations in the final report published in 2022, as it described child sexual abuse as an “epidemic” across the two nations.
The Government had knocked back calls for a national review in favour of locally-led inquiries, saying it was focused on implementing recommendations from Prof Jay’s report.
A rapid national audit, led by Baroness Casey, looking at the scale of grooming gangs across the country, is expected to report back after Easter.
It is understood an announcement on how local authorities can apply for funding will be made in due course.
A Home Office spokeswoman said: “The £5m funding announced in January will support local authorities to strengthen their responses to child sexual exploitation. All local authorities will be able to apply for funding for local inquiries.
“Any claims that the funding has been watered down, or that we are backing down from supporting local inquiries, is patently false. A flexible approach to funding will allow us to support more than five inquiries.”
