Cameron hits out at ‘truly dreadful case’

JAILED for nine years: Oldham takeaway worker Kabeer Hassan

A SEX grooming scandal which saw an Oldham man jailed was a “truly dreadful case” which must be investigated further, David Cameron said.

Last week nine Pakistani and Afghan men who groomed white girls as young as 13 in Rochdale, were sentenced to prison terms between 19 and four years.

Among them was takeaway worker Kabeer Hassan (25), of Lacrosse Avenue, Oldham, who was jailed for nine years for rape and conspiracy.

Speaking during Prime Minister’s Question Time Mr Cameron said: “There are particular problems in particular communities ... and we need to face up to these problems if we are going to deal with them.”

Mr Cameron said England’s Children Commissioner, Maggie Atkinson, would investigate the girls’ plight and he would consider launching a serious case review after calls from local MPs.

The PM added: “It is a truly shocking case and we need to look very carefully at what went wrong.

“We need to look at why information wasn’t passed more rapidly from children’s homes to police, why action wasn’t taken more rapidly. It’s very important we get to the bottom of a truly, truly, dreadful case.”

Mr Cameron praised Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk for raising the issue along with Manchester Central MP Tony Lloyd who urged Mr Cameron to consider an inquiry into whether privately-run care homes were well funded with properly-trained staff, and demanded a better inspection regime.

Mr Danczuk said: “I want to speak about the girls in that case — the vulnerable girls who went to hell and back through what they experienced. I pay tribute to their bravery in coming forward and standing up to their abusers. They did it to get justice and to stop it happening to others.

“Vulnerable girls like that do not usually get heard by politicians. They do not get easy access to power or influence.”



ALLEGED mistakes by police that allowed children to be systematically abused are “unacceptable”, says a police chief.

But Peter Davies — the Association of Chief Police Officers’ lead on child protection and chief executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre — told MPs he was not “terribly surprised” by reports that victims had reported their plight to police several times, but nothing was done.

The comments followed last week’s convictions of the Oldham and Rochdale gang of plying girls as young as 13 with drink and drugs to “pass them around” for sex.

A chance to stop the gang was missed in 2008 by the police and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), who apologised.

“Police forces are huge warehouses of information,” said Mr Davies. “Information which sits within police forces sometimes goes astray, sometimes doesn’t end up at the right address, and that’s a common issue, not just in police forces,” he said.



The full version of this story can be read only in our print and eChron versions



Follow us on Twitter - @OldhamChronicle