Get a grip
THE national inquiry into grooming gangs has been a shambles from the start.
Survivors of appalling abuse have pulled out of the process having lost all trust after a series of setbacks.
In an attempt to grip the scandal, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has insisted the inquiry will now look at the ethnic background of the perpetrators, who have been disproportionately of Pakistani origin.
And she has finally appointed former Children’s Commissioner Anne Longfield as chair.
Not unreasonably, some victims who demanded an inquiry of total independence are questioning whether Baroness Longfield, a Labour peer, is really the right figure to be investigating a string of Labour councils who failed to protect women and girls.
Others remain disappointed that Mahmood has refused their calls for a judge-led system.
Labour spent months trying to avoid having any inquiry at all.
Now it must prove it really will do all it can to deliver the justice denied to victims for so long.
Keminism
KEMI Badenoch yesterday nailed the absurdity of a broken welfare system that leaves six million people on benefits.
Launching her own review into Benefits Street Britain, the Tory leader revealed the Government’s decision to scrap the child benefit cap means £74million will be paid over five years to 1,000 families on benefits with five or six children living in Hackney alone.
Some families will get a staggering £14,000 extra a year.
While the Tories aren’t blameless in this mess, it’s Labour now hiking taxes to record levels so welfare spending can rise by another £16BILLION.
What is needed is bold action that ministers are too petrified of their own left-wing backbenchers to even attempt.
That includes scrapping benefits for anxiety and ADHD and removing handouts from those who won’t work.
Open doors
WHAT is the point of an asylum process that allows 91 per cent of all claimants to remain in the UK, one way or another?
Ministers are constantly telling us how they are tackling the backlog of cases.
But the truth is, if only nine per cent of the claimants who are refused get deported, our borders are an international fiasco.
A national Audit Office report today reveals 35 per cent of 5,000 claimants sampled had been successful.
But more than half are still awaiting a decision, like the two illegal Afghan migrants who raped a teenager in Leamington Spa.
Who knows how many more people who entered the country illegally are a threat to national security or public safety?
