Former children’s commissioner vows to ‘follow evidence’ in grooming gangs probe

A former children’s commissioner who will chair the national inquiry into grooming gangs has vowed to “not shy away” from difficult truths as she was appointed after months of delays.

Baroness Anne Longfield will lead the inquiry over three years with a budget of £65 million, the Home Secretary announced on Tuesday.

It comes after mounting pressure on the UK Government to move forward with the inquiry first announced in June, and after the final two candidates for the role of chair dropped out of the process in October.

Five women also resigned from the inquiry’s victim liaison panel in a row over the scope of the probe being potentially widened, and some also criticised Baroness Longfield’s appointment on Tuesday.

Of her appointment, Baroness Longfield said: “The inquiry owes it to the victims, survivors and the wider public to identify the truth, address past failings and ensure that children and young people today are protected in a way that others were not.

“The inquiry will follow the evidence and will not shy away from difficult or uncomfortable truths wherever we find them.”

Baroness Longfield and the inquiry panel wrote an open letter to survivors as their role was confirmed, saying: “We know that trust must be earned.”

But her appointment has caused backlash from survivors who quit the panel, with one former member Fiona Goddard rejecting it is an independent inquiry when Baroness Longfield is a Labour peer and said remaining panel members have not been consulted.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood told MPs she would step down from the party while she carries out the inquiry work.

Ms Goddard posted on X: “All us that resigned from the panel over concerns of this just being a box ticking exercise and being used by the government to give the impression of engagement without actually being listened to, are about to be proven right.”

Another survivor who quit the panel, Elizabeth Harper posted on X: “While Annie longfield has done some undoubtedly amazing work, but this needed to be legally led.”

Reacting to the announcement, shadow home secretary Chris Philp also said it should not have taken six months to find a chair “and the threat of a vote in Parliament to agree to this inquiry in the first place”.

The inquiry follows a recommendation made by Baroness Louise Casey in her rapid audit in June looking at the scale of grooming gangs across the country.

Baroness Longfield served as children’s commissioner from 2015 to 2021 and last year founded the Centre for Young Lives think tank aimed at improving the lives of children and families.

The Home Secretary told MPs the probe will focus on child sex abuse committed by grooming gangs specifically, and will look at the background of offenders including their ethnicity and religion.

Baroness Casey’s findings published in June raised concerns over the lack of data showing the ethnicity and nationality of sex offenders in grooming gangs as “a major failing over the last decade or more”.

The draft terms of reference will be consulted on before being formally adopted by March.

“The inquiry will act without fear or favour, identifying individual, institutional and systemic failure, inadequate organisational responses, and failures of leadership,” Ms Mahmood said.

“It will also work hand in hand with the police where new criminality comes to light, be that by the perpetrators or those who covered up their crimes.

“The inquiry will pass evidence to law enforcement so they can take forward any further prosecutions and put more of these evil men behind bars.”

The inquiry will have full statutory powers and will oversee a series of local investigations including in Oldham.

Ms Mahmood said Baroness Longfield will sit on a three-person panel joined by Zoe Billingham, a former inspector at HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services, and Eleanor Kelly, former chief executive of Southwark Council, who supported survivors of the London Bridge terrorist attack and the Grenfell Tower disaster in 2017.

“Each individual was recommended by Baroness (Louise) Casey, and her recommendation follows recent engagement with victims,” she added.