Gov refuses home office investigation into historic child sex abuse in Oldham

[Perzival]

I've just read on x that Jess Phillips has formally declined Oldham council's request for the HO to investigate the grooming gangs in Oldham. Why on Earth would they do this? Apparently JP says it should be a local investigation? Clearly that is a conflict of interests and if the council are asking for help they should?

The only link I can find other than x is GB news (apologies).

https://www.gbnews.com/news/oldham-grooming-gangs-labour-government-inquiry-abuse-scandal

• because I didn't know he had refused one. Thanks to Elon we know about this one.

Who’s refused what?

I'll all for having loyalty to your party, but how can you not put the poor, exploited girls first? Why are your posts all trying to deflect from the main issue here? Why are you not outraged at the lack of action? Instead you want to engage in he said/she said. I honestly can't get my head around posts like yours. There's an empathy bypass somewhere.

Thankyou... so what would another inquiry, whose terms of reference would be set by the very people you accuse of letting down children, help?

Surely the way forward to look at the previous ones and start enacting their findings?

As far as i can see, its like another pp said, the PO inquiry... talking shop, no real consequence or the CV one, where minister after minister said "i cannot recall"

These things take years & meanwhile, abuses go on, unhindered.

No idea what you re talking about as i have repeatedly said that we need action on the ground to prevent abuse, not another inquiry after abuse has happened.

so resources, leadership justice system

You ve taken my replies to one particular poster out of context.

As i said in another post, i'm not a Labour supporter, certainly not of Starmer.

I said this much earlier but I think it needs to be said again. I wish some posters would stop trying to turn this into a partisan issue when it is not and should not be a partisan issue. Making excuses on the basis of party loyalty is just plain wrong. Many, many people have been at fault over more than two decades. This is a key issue and has still not been tackled.

That said,@Barr77 and @MyDeafEar are right that Labour has let down the working class more in a sense because they were traditionally the party of the working class and have not been for the last 3 decades, but continue to pretend that they are.

Overall, all of these politicians and many others love the infighting that always takes place on these threads and in all other forms of media. It gives them the green light to keep on not doing their jobs and behaving badly.

Can we not just agree that these poor girls have been let down by pretty much everyone in authority? That includes all political parties (at both local and national level), most of the police service, entire swathes of social services and religious and 'community' leaders.

So, we are where we are...

I am open-minded about the need for a new national enquiry but the right now, I think the first thing that needs to established is if the recommendations that were made in previous reports have been been in put in place (and if not, why not?). Then we need to establish whether these gangs are still operating (it appears that they possibly are) and if this is the case they need to be cracked down upon pronto.

I strongly dislike the way that posters from the Starmeristas thread are actively trying to report these threads, and failing that, to fill them up with deflections and "talking about the weather".

Clearly, there is a widespread feeling that something must be done - something that goes further than the anodyne recommendations of the previous inquiries, which either a) whitewashed the data, b) covered a limited scope in either geographical area and/or time period, or c) covered such a wide range of CSE/CSA profiles that the "Rotherham" style cases were obscured.

There are reasonable objections to whether an inquiry is the right approach and who would lead one - but I do believe many people would be satisfied as long as they saw very, very clear action on this specific issue immediately, as Starmer demonstrated he was able to do with the very fast sentencing after the Southport riots. For instance: video footage of immediate deportations for some of the ringleaders who for some reason still remain in this country! These are not reasons to dismiss the discussion entirely.

If you passionately believe in the previous "recommendations" - why haven't they been implemented, what are the substantive barriers to it and what needs to change now so that they can be? What different action should be taken?

Keep talking about this and keep it in the news, keep discussing it, keep platforming the Maggie Olivers of the world, keep the pressure up and ignore the people who want to suppress this.

Of course they are. It’s their way. Then they will come on here and gaslight everyone and feign innocence whilst trying to get people shadow banned. It would be pathetic if it wasn’t deflecting from the real issue here. The systematic failing of these young girls who were reapeatdly raped and failed by everyone.

I think the most distressing thing I’ve ever seen on here - was one of the victims posting on here in one of these threads. The distress was palpable and she asked them to stop minimising and saying the things they were. She was ignored and they continued. Their behaviour is shameful and out there for all to see. These people are the exact reason people are turning away from their beloved Labour. Labour need to get a grip of the hateful extremism of their hard left.

They won’t succeed in shutting people down anymore with their patronising, old fashioned, offensive views.

This says it all. Thank you, you've hit the nail on the head

If you passionately believe in the previous "recommendations" - why haven't they been implemented, what are the substantive barriers to it and what needs to change now so that they can be?

All excellent questions. I’d like answers to them too.

I think you are right to point out the cultural factor - most white British people would instinctively realise that "Christianity" covers a wide range of practices around the world.

I understand that many of the British Pakistani population in places like Bradford etc come from a very rural, very conservative part of Pakistan and this has influenced many of the issues that people are concerned about including forced marriages, cousin marriages etc as well.

Modernist Muslims from say Indonesia aren't committing these kinds of crimes at this scale (even per capita). I have close Muslim friends from other countries who are appalled at this story.

Obviously "not all British Pakistanis" - but I do think we should be more aware of different sects of Islam and the different cultural groups/practices instead of just "Asians" or "Muslims".

I agree.
What you said about the Starmer's v swift and firm response to the Stockport riots is an important point imo. He has shown that it is possible to deal with legal matters decisively and promptly if there is a will but he also appears to have shown his bias in doing this as he did not promptly visit the bereaved families and only acted after the 'far right' riots started. Just to be clear, I am absolutely not defending these violent criminals or the trouble makers on social media but just commenting on Starmer's behaviour.

Human rights appear to be only for some people. Large sections of the population are losing theirs. We have to tolerate the rape and torture of children, trafficking of women and girls, organised crime, a huge drug problem, county lines, modern slavery, the removal of women's sex based rights, because nobody in authority dares address the issues. Politicians of all flavours are, in the main, cowardly and self serving. Things should never have got to the point where anybody is in fear of losing their job or their life if they speak up about the evil things that are going on all over the country.
My local area is rife with organised crime. Everybody knows. It is so far out of hand that there is no chance of doing anything about it. It has taken around 20 years to get to this point and I can't see how things will ever improve.

Why would he have visited the bereaved families @rainingsnoring? If you were recently bereaved would you want the PM showing up on your doorstep? I wouldn’t. And if he had the media would have been full of stories about him exploiting tragedy and using it for political capital. Starmer’s behaviour was appropriate to his role.

I disagree @BIossomtoes. He could certainly have visited the families and others in the area. King Charles did exactly this. Of course you would say that his behaviour was appropriate. You appear to have missed the other point that, where there is a will, things can be dealt with efficiently. Why do you suppose that was?

You cannot compare people on cctv, on FB X etc promoting violence and taking part in violent acts with CSA prosecutions, all of which will involve the Crown Court and a jury, with evidence presented beyond reasonable doubt.

All the rioters admitted guilt, it is simply not the same thing at all.

Of course things must be done differently but please compare like with like...

You can’t compare the King with the PM. Visiting bereaved families is literally part of the monarch’s job. You can’t surely deny that the media would have interpreted a visit from Starmer negatively? I’m not entirely sure what the other point is.

"Fine argument in whataboutism here; claiming that human rights aren’t an issue in the UK simply because things might be worse elsewhere misses the point entirely." I didn't say human rights aren't an issue in the UK, just that claiming that there are NONE for white working class people is a lie and that some perspective is needed. Don't twist my words.

https://x.com/maggieoliveruk/status/1875931731204952256?s=46&t=YzcSqQzfsUng4hFEr96nxg

Andy Burnham trying to claim this is an ‘issue of the past’ slammed by Maggie Oliver on X. How many media interviews has she been given in the last few days (other than GB news). I only knew of her from Triggernometry.

To be clear, I backed away from the thread because of the court transcripts. I hadn't read them previously, they are harrowing. I live near Rochdale and the whole thing is too close to home for me. I have incredibly strong feelings about this subject but I don't want to be dragged into a social media discussion about it. Many people will be utterly horrified by what's come out of the Oxford transcript.

These threads usually turn nasty very quickly and I don't want to be associated with any of it; wether that is racism, calls for an mp to be put in prison or the underplaying what the girls went through. I don't believe that people who live in an area unaffected by these issues can understand them and quite often concerns are belittled.

I have discussed this on mn previously and it never ends well. I don't think there is anything else that can be said which hasn't already.

I did ask for the thread to be removed. Mn said they would keep it up as it doesn't breach their guidelines. I don't want to change my username, which I've had to previously because of similar posts.

Again, in plain English:

The Tories have never promised to address the issues because they don’t care, and Labour just pretends to.

Suddenly howls of dismay and horror from all political parties after Elon Musk’s SM comments.

In the meantime they’re all desperately hoping the next headline will come along quickly and sweep the story away.

But as one poster mentioned above this story is not going to go away.

Anyone who says CSA abuse is in the past, is an idiot.......

However, i just listened to Burnhams interview on Sky and he never says its an Historic issue, in fact he says he commissioned on going inquires as early as 2017 and the 3rd stage of these are still happening.

Along with prosecutions and jail sentences, he also then says he would be welcome to a wider inquiry.....

So unless there is another Sky interview...... ?

& neither should it, nor will it, its too serious an issue for that.

But there does seem to be an awful of misinformation being thrown around.

We become complicit in this by ignoring the very real differences some men have with women. Some cultures have women at the very bottom of the rung. They are owned and managed by men. That is not the way in the UK, arranged child marriages, cousin marriages, treating women as their property.

Yet we turn a blind eye, we dare not call it out. So it continues and in fact gets worse. We have 23 barbers in our local town taking cash only and numerous nail bars with people working there that we clearly know nothing about. Labour said they would smash these operations and yet it’s all gone quiet. Cooper deliberately said she would remove the people working on Rwanda and put them on this. Certainly in the nail bars it’s known to be a place that the traffickers use.

Yet we do nothing….

Same with the rape gangs. Why are some of the guilty parties who were meant to be deported still here? Show that we are serious about addressing this. Do I want a public enquiry? Nope - not really. We know the issues. We need to send out clear messages that this won’t be tolerated regardless of race, colour, sex or anything else.