HOUNDED OUT FOR SPEAKING UP ON CHILD SEX GANGS
Labour MP forced to quit equality role after she confronted groomers’ race
THE equalities watchdog criticised Labour yesterday for forcing an MP to quit after she spoke out over Pakistani men and grooming gangs.
Jeremy Corbyn told Sarah Champion to resign from the Shadow Cabinet or be sacked – five days after she wrote that Britain had a ‘problem’ with Pakistani men targeting vulnerable white girls. Miss Champion – who has cam- paigned for years about child grooming in her Rotherham seat – resigned as shadow women and equalities minister.
But last night, Equality and Human Rights Commission chief executive Rebecca Hilsenrath said it was wrong that a respected MP had been hounded out for speaking
candidly about child sexual exploitation. In a strongly worded intervention, she said an ‘ over- sensitivity about language’ had resulted in a climate that had led to the ‘neglect, for so long, of the victims of these terrible crimes’.
And former EHRC chairman Trevor Phillips told the Mail he was ‘gobsmacked’ and ‘dispirited’ by the news that Miss Champion had been forced out. ‘It feels to me like the Stalinists have decided to remind everyone that they are in charge,’ he added.
Miss Champion sparked anger on the Left with a newspaper article last week that confronted what she described as the ‘horrifying problem’ of grooming gangs. She wrote that for too long, society had ‘ignored’ abusers’ race – saying that the ‘common denominator was their ethnic heritage’.
She wrote: ‘Britain has a problem with British Pakistani men raping and exploiting white girls. There. I said it. Does that make me a racist? Or am I just prepared to call out this horrifying problem for what it is? For too long we have ignored the race of these abusers and, worse, tried to cover it up. No more. These people are predators and the common denominator is their ethnic heritage.’
In TV interviews, she said such crimes involved ‘predominately Pakistani men’ and a fear of being called a racist was hampering the authorities’ investigations.
The article came after 17 men were convicted of forcing girls in Newcastle to have sex. Mostly British- born, they were from Iraqi, Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Indian, Iranian and Turkish communities. Their convictions sparked another debate about sex grooming gangs and whether political correctness was preventing the issue from being tackled.
When the Newcastle gang were sentenced, former director of public prosecutions Lord Macdonald demanded that the abuse of white girls by Asian gangs be recognised as a ‘ profoundly racist crime’.
But in the days after the publication of Miss Champion’s article, Labour members took to Twitter to demand that party leader Mr Corbyn sack her.
West Lancashire councillor Paul Cotterill called the piece ‘a sinister piece of propaganda’, and Labour activist Tony Greenstein said she should be dismissed, just as Ted Heath sacked Enoch Powell in 1968 following his ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech. Fellow MP Naz Shah described the article as ‘irresponsible’ and ‘setting a dangerous precedent’.
She accused Miss Champion of making ‘ blanket, racialised, loaded statements’ that would set up stigmatised Pakistani boys to fail. Her criticism came despite the fact that a year ago she was suspended from the party for sharing anti- Semitic messages on social media.
But critics said Miss Champion had been hounded out by the intolerant Left for being brave enough to speak out about grooming gangs.
Equalities chief Miss Hilsenrath said: ‘It is a real shame that a respected advocate of equality has felt the need to step down due to an over-sensitivity about language.’ Mr Phillipslips added: ‘Last week I said that, at last, a Labour spokesman had dropped the kind of bland evasion that there is child abuse in every community – and called this for what it is. I cannot see what it is that she has said that is so difficult and controversial.’
And Philip Davies, Tory MP for Shipley, said: ‘Anyone who speaks the truth is hounded out by Momentum bullies.’
He added: ‘This shows what a deeply unpleasant place that the Momentum-run Labour Party has become. You’d think that protecting children would be more important that protecting PC shibboleths. It seems that Momentum are prepared to sacrifice their children to maintain its politically correct charade.’
Former Ukip leader Nigel Farage tweeted: ‘ Telling the truth about tough issues is now impossible in the modern day Labour PartyParty. PatheticPathetic.’’ Miss Champion, who has been MP for Rotherham since 2012, has campaigned for years about the organised sexual abuse which took place in her constituency. At least 1,400 children were found to have been exploited in the town between 1997 and 2013.
Miss Champion said last night: ‘I apologise for the offence caused by the extremely poor choice of words in The Sun article.’
Earlier yesterday, Miss Champion sought to distance herself from The Sun’s article, claiming the opening paragraphs had been altered and ‘ stripped of nuance’.
But the newspaper hit back, saying all changes had been approved by the MP’s office.
Miss Champion is the 95th person to resign from Mr Corbyn’s frontbench since he took over two years ago.
‘Horrifying problem of grooming gangs’