The chaos of the grooming gangs inquiry

美容团伙调查的混乱

Today in Focus

2025-10-30

30 分钟
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Geraldine McKelvie reports on a tumultuous couple of weeks for the national grooming gangs inquiry, beset by resignations, provocative political interventions and accusations of a cover-up. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/infocus
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  • This is The Guardian.

  • Today how the grooming gang's inquiry became such a mess.

  • for the urgent question to ask the Home Secretary to make a statement on the recent criticism of the statutory inquiry into the rape gang scandal.

  • It was never going to be easy to run a national inquiry into a subject as contentious as so-called grooming gangs.

  • It hasn't even started and already things seem to be going unusually badly.

  • Last week, a group of survivors on the advisory panel quit.

  • They worried the inquiry was going to duck the hard questions and were unhappy with the potential choices of chair.

  • one a former social worker and the other an ex-police officer.

  • Some called for the resignation of Jess Phillips,

  • the safeguarding minister in charge of the inquiry.

  • But others said they would quit if Phillips was forced out.

  • And this week, Nigel Farage decided to get involved.

  • Calling for MPs, of all people,

  • to take the whole thing over and get it done and dusted by Christmas.

  • It's time for Parliament to step up and to do its job.

  • It's an almighty mess.

  • An inquiry mistrusted by the very people it's set up to serve.

  • With no chair, no terms of reference,

  • and no justice for victims who've already waited years, sometimes decades.

  • Women now, girls then.