Oldham council leader: ‘Grooming gang survivors are the only voices that matter’

The ‘grooming gangs’ scandal is one of the darkest moments in Britain’s recent history.

In 2022 a national inquiry into child sexual exploitation was commissioned and conducted by Professor Alexis Jay. It reported back and its central findings mirrored those of numerous local and regional independent investigations including Oldham’s Assurance review, commissioned in 2019 by Greater Manchester Combined Authority.

They all concluded the same thing: too many victims were let down by too many organisations who should have done better.

To our shame, Oldham Council was one of those institutions.

At the time, my predecessor who led the council said: “We fully accept the findings of this independent report. It highlights clear failings, where our services at the time were not good enough to protect vulnerable young people suffering the most awful abuse. For that I am deeply sorry.”

No stone will be left unturned

Since the publication of that report we, as a council, and I, as a leader, have pledged to do everything we can to help the victims of these historic assaults and to protect young girls and vulnerable people in our town. That also means the evil people who perpetrated these crimes are brought to justice. No stone will be left unturned.

The report from the National Inquiry which Prof. Jay chaired identified 20 recommendations to be implemented to ensure such horrific crimes were prevented in the future.

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While the previous government dragged its feet on implementing Jay’s recommendations, in Oldham we have started the process of listening, helping and healing victims, and have put new rules, initiatives and safeguards in place to protect our residents.

We are taking action. It hasn’t been easy and there is nothing to be proud of, but it is our responsibility to act and my administration remains committed to supporting the victims and working to prevent future exploitation.

We are working across parties

One of our first initiatives was to create the cross-party group which reports every quarter on progress. This initiative was to bring council together on this issue and to provide all our elected representatives with a voice. The group works closely with Keeping Our Girls Safe (KOGS), a local survivors charity, to afford victims a voice and include their suggestions in shaping and improving our responses.

This is a matter of trust for our residents too. To ensure our efforts are open and transparent, the Complex Safeguarding Hub, consisting of council, medical and police representatives, reports to the Safeguarding Board, who provide regular public reports and an annual review.

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We also recognise how important it is to give victims a voice. So in March last year I launched a Survivor’s Charter. This outlined our commitment to survivors of abuse and how the council will respond and engage with victims going forward, one of the key areas of criticism identified in our report.

We have also put the required resources into our Complex Safeguarding Hub, so it can provide prevention programmes as well as responding to those who have suffered abuse.

These prevention programmes include awareness-raising and training for young people, communities, families and organisations  in spotting and resisting exploitation.

Oldham has become a target for the far right

But these are heinous crimes committed on some of the most vulnerable people and it is also vital that justice is done – and is seen to be done – especially for the victims who have bravely come forward.

Since 2022, there have been 86 arrests made by GMP’s dedicated CSE Team and Operation Sherwood, which commenced following the report into historic child sexual exploitation is also carefully working with victims to identify their attackers and bring them to justice.

Sadly, following the unwanted and unwarranted involvement of online commentators and political opportunists, this important issue has been hijacked by those with an agenda of hate and division and Oldham has, once again, become a target for the far right.

No community condones this behaviour

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 else other than for these men to be punished to the full extent of the law.

Here in Oldham we won’t be distracted from doing what is right and that is prioritising the plight of the victims or those at risk of child sexual exploitation.

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There is more to be done still.

In July last year the council voted to ask the government to conduct an inquiry into non-recent child sexual exploitation in Oldham or, should the government turn down that request, as previous governments already had, to conduct our own further independent inquiry.

We did this at the request of local survivors who felt that what our previous review into social care practice lacked was an opportunity for them to have their voices heard, their individual experiences looked at.

In October, when the government confirmed we should carry out a local inquiry, we began liaising with Oldham survivors about how we work together to commission and inform that local approach. That work continues.

Nothing will ever wipe away the past – but at the same time we shouldn’t want to as the failures of the past should be a warning for the future.

By coming together, by listening to survivors and by learning from our mistakes we can and should better protect children and young people from these horrors.

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