Overview
- The Statutory Independent Inquiry into Grooming Gangs announced on June 24 that its first local investigations will focus on London, Bradford and Keighley, and Oldham.
- Baroness Anne Longfield is chairing the multi‑year, funded inquiry and has legal powers to require witness testimony and force organisations to hand over documents.
- The inquiry plans national three‑part accountability hearings to probe central government, police forces, councils, the NHS and schools and will review more than 800 recommendations from past reports.
- Any evidence suggesting criminality will be passed to Operation Beaconport for police action while the Metropolitan Police is separately reviewing roughly 9,000 historic group‑based child sexual exploitation cases.
- Survivors and campaigners have welcomed the move but warn the initial local scope is narrow and that delays in instructing agencies to preserve records risk leaving gaps in the evidence that the inquiry will need to address.