Reform UK has launched an all-out attack on Andy Burnham’s record on standing up for victims of the grooming gang scandal.
The party’s shadow Home Secretary, Zia Yusuf, has pledged fresh action on grooming gangs should Nigel Farage win the next election, in order to secure justice for victims.
As the crunch Makerfield by-election heats up, Mr Yusuf today sticks the boot into Mr Burnham’s track record, citing damning criticism by former detective constable and whistleblower Maggie Oliver.
Mr Yusuf told the Daily Mail: ‘Andy Burnham has had the power to bring the perpetrators and enablers of the Grooming Gangs to justice, but in the words of Maggie Oliver he “turned away” from the victims.
‘Time and again he spurned opportunities to do what was necessary. The thousands of survivors are rightly furious, including the ones in the Makerfield constituency.
‘Now he seeks to use the very communities he betrayed to catapult himself to power.
‘Reform will quadruple funding for dedicated police taskforces to hunt down all perpetrators and enablers of the grooming gangs and release all files and internal communications of councils, police and ministers to the public.’
Alongside the stinging personal assault on Mr Burnham, Reform UK has today issued two fresh pledges aimed at finally bringing justice to the victims of the scandal, and accountability to those who allowed it to happen under their noses.
Zia Yusuf has condemned Andy Burnham’s record on grooming gangs, branding it a ‘betrayal’
Andy Burnham has repeatedly defended his track record on handling the grooming gang scandal in and around Manchester
The party has promised that within 100 days of a Reform government, they will open the books and release all files held by public bodies relating to the grooming gangs dating back 40 years.
They also pledge to increase police and National Crime Agency (NCA) taskforce funding by £300 million – a 300% increase – to sufficiently fund the investigation into both perpetrators and complicit authorities, including the police, social workers, and politicians.
Andy Burnham has been prominently criticised over his failings on child grooming gangs over previous years, including by one of the country’s most prominent and respected campaigners.
Earlier this month, Maggie Oliver, a former detective constable who blew the whistle on her own force’s handling of the child sex ring in Rochdale, said that Mr Burnham had failed to show ‘leadership and courage’ in tackling the scandal as mayor of Greater Manchester.
Ms Oliver said: ‘What I had come to see and believe is that whilst the PR machine [was] wheeled out very well about what was already in the public arena.
‘When it comes to leadership and courage and gripping what is going on now, unfortunately he turned away. We missed a huge opportunity to bring changes that are needed.’
Reform has now gone further, accusing Mr Burnham of engaging in a ‘conspiracy of silence and institutional avoidance’, adding that his track record is ‘shameful’.
They accuse Mr Burnham of resisting calling for a national statutory inquiry as Manchester Mayor ‘for several years’, while instead defending local processes.
Reform cites former chief constable and whistle blower Maggie Smith, who said Mr Burnham ‘turned away’ from grooming gang victims
The brutal attack comes as the Makerfield by-election heats up, with one poll putting Reform UK’s candidate, Rob Kenyan (right) within touching distance of beating Mr Burnham
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The mayor launched a local Manchester probe into historical child sexual abuse allegations in Manchester, Rochdale and Oldham shortly after being elected mayor in 2017.
But the narrow terms of reference for the review, allegations that cases had been ‘cherry-picked’, and claims that key documents had ‘disappeared’, fed into a sense that the investigation was not worth the paper it was written on.
One of the report’s co-authors, Malcolm Newsam, later defended his work, but argued: ‘The review was never set up to be a wholesale review of the prevalence of child sexual exploitation and grooming gangs.’
Reform is now demanding to know why Mr Burnham, as Greater Manchester’s Police and Crime Commissioner, did not help secure the review the access it needed to get to the truth.
The insurgent party also highlights a famous showdown in 2022, when Mr Burnham was notably heckled and booed throughout a meeting with survivors.
The meeting, allowing for residents to question Mr Burnham and other senior council and police officials, saw answers drowned out as members of the public demanded to know ‘who will be held accountable for the travesty happening in our town’.
Mr Burnham has previously said he ‘100%’ stands by his handling of the scandal since becoming mayor, and has accused those who claim local leaders were part of a cover-up of ‘creating hate’.
So far, not a single council worker or police officer in Greater Manchester has faced criminal proceedings for complicity in the scandal.
The row about Mr Burnham’s handling of the Grooming Gangs Scandal comes in the midst of the most high-stakes parliamentary by-election in modern history.
According to polls, the Makerfield seat – which Mr Burnham is hoping to use to return to the Commons and oust Keir Starmer – is on a knife-edge.
Reform UK is just three points behind Mr Burnham, but the further-right Restore Britain party threatens to take enough votes to secure a win for Labour.
Mr Burnham and the Home Office were approached for comment.
