Overview
- The inquiry will run for three years with a £65 million budget and full powers under the Inquiries Act to compel evidence and witnesses.
- It will explicitly examine offenders’ ethnicity and religion alongside institutional responses, with terms to be consulted on before formal adoption by March.
- Local investigations will be overseen by a national panel, with Oldham confirmed as an initial site and further locations to follow.
- More than 1,200 cases have been flagged for reinvestigation, including about 200 priority rape cases that will be passed to police where new evidence emerges.
- Longfield will step down from the Labour whip and serve with panellists Zoë Billingham and Eleanor Kelly, as some survivors and Conservatives press for alternative, judge‑led or tighter two‑year terms.