Starmer: Grooming inquiry must go “where evidence takes it”

ODN

The Prime Minister has said the grooming gang inquiry must “of course” look into ethnicity if that is where the “evidence takes it”. Sir Keir Starmer also defended his government after criticism from Tory ministers that they took “too long” to set up an inquiry, stating he “stands by his own record”.   Report by Faragt. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn

Transcript

00:00I've set up the National Enquiry and it's got to go wherever the evidence takes it and if that's

00:04into question of ethnicity then of course it must go into that place. What I can tell you is that,

00:09hear me out, I was the chief prosecutor when the first of these cases was brought. I was absolutely

00:14clear with my prosecutors that ethnicity should not be a reason to take decisions other than on

00:21the evidence and in the public interest. But look, this inquiry now needs to go wherever the evidence

00:27takes it into those issues, into question of whether public officials didn't act in the way

00:32that they should or other assumptions that were made. What I was calling out was politicians,

00:37I was absolutely clear in my words, not other people, politicians and the point I was making

00:42is this, that they were in power and when they were in power... But you're a courteous person,

00:46you've got to accept this looks inappropriate. Robert, hear me out, these were people who were

00:50in power for many years when others of us, myself included, were calling for mandatory reporting

00:56in child sexual exploitation cases. It fell on deaf ears. Kemi Badenoch in particular was minister

01:02I think for children and for women and not once mentioned this issue. That's what I was calling

01:07out. I certainly wasn't calling out any wider group than that and I stand by that. Having campaigned

01:12and worked on this for 15 years, I stand by my own record and I gently point out courteously as ever

01:20that some of those with the loudest voices now, when they were in power did absolutely nothing

01:26about it and didn't even raise the issue and others will draw their own conclusions in relation to that.

Category

Transcript

Recommended