Belated justice
THE Prime Minister has finally agreed to a national inquiry into the child grooming scandal that has seen countless young white girls raped and abused by mostly Asian gangs.
It should never have taken so long.
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For decades councils, police and officials turned a blind eye to the appalling crimes going on under their noses, supposedly to protect “social cohesion”.
The pain and suffering of girls as young as ten was apparently judged a price worth paying to avoid community tensions. That is appalling.
Most of the known grooming cases happened in areas where the local Labour authority relied on the Asian vote.
But this is not just an historic scandal.
As recently as January, Sir Keir Starmer and others in the Government accused those calling for a national inquiry of “jumping on the band-wagon” and “amplifying” the far-right.
Now he has made yet another U-turn — almost certainly because he has been forced to, rather than because he’s suddenly realised it’s the moral thing to do.
The inquiry findings are unlikely to reflect well on his party, but there can be no more cover-up.
The politicians and officials who allowed this scandal to carry on for so many years must be held to account.
Trigger point
NO sane person is comfortable with the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran.
But Israel’s precision bombing of Iran’s nuclear development sites and military leaders is hardly unprovoked.
Iran’s mad mullahs have been waging war on Israel, through their terrorist proxies, for years.
With their avowed intent to destroy Israel, Iran’s rush to develop nuclear weapons in breach of international agreements presents an existential threat the Israelis could not ignore.
But Israel is not just defending itself by thwarting Iran’s nuclear ambitions — it is also making the world safer.
Moderate Iranians despair at how their hardline leaders have squandered the country’s wealth to fund a murderous ideology.
Anyone fighting the Tehran regime’s corner is blinded by the same anti-Israel hatred.
Daft punt
LABOUR’S nannying backbenchers might reckon ramping up tax on online horse-racing bets is a safe punt but senior MPs — on both sides — know better.
It would hammer a sector that employs thousands of voters, and decimate horse-racing and other sports that rely on gambling revenue.
Rachel Reeves, with her previous tax decisions, has already shown a habit of backing losers.
This would be another.
