Child sex abuse in Rotherham

02 Sep 2014
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab): As the Home Secretary will accept, I am very glad that my Front-Bench team has taken the steps it has on this matter, because the historical fact is that it is children and communities such as these that the Labour party was set up to protect. That is why it is important that we have taken the steps we have. I am afraid I do not accept that political correctness alone is responsible for those girls being abused. In the end, people at the top of the local state in Rotherham thought those girls were worthless and did not care enough to read the reports, to go to the seminars and to act. It is long past time that the Government looked at the employment arrangements for heads of social services, because all the way back to Victoria Climbié and the Laming report there has been a concern that terrible things happen to children and the most senior people paid to protect them do not seem to pay any price and, worse, go on to other senior jobs.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mrs Theresa May): The hon. Lady has raised a number of issues of concern generally in relation to these matters. I absolutely agree with the first point she made, which I have alluded to in my statement and in my replies: what underlay this was a feeling that somehow it did not matter and that because of where these girls came from—in some cases it was boys, but in the overwhelming number of cases it was girls—nobody needed to do anything about it. That is absolutely appalling, and we must reject that culture and do everything we can to make sure it no longer exists.


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