Child Abuse Inquiry

Debate between Baroness May of Maidenhead and Michael Meacher

Monday 3rd November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

Is not an important dimension of this scandal—the Home Secretary signed off on all this—the fact that her Department made two utterly inappropriate, establishment-ridden appointments and then, to cap it all, drafted and redrafted a letter seven times in order to play down and disguise the relationship between Fiona Woolf and Lord Brittan, who was Home Secretary when all the Home Office files on this alleged Westminster and Whitehall child sex abuse mysteriously disappeared? Can she not understand that because of that background and despite her words today, which I welcome, she has already lost the confidence of much of the public about her capacity to conduct a highly sensitive inquiry of this kind in a properly objective and impartial manner?

[Mrs May]

I am afraid that I do not accept the premise of much of what the right hon. Gentleman said. For example, he said that all the Home Office files relating to these matters have gone missing, but that is not the case; and he made a number of other references. All I will say in answer to his question is that I am not conducting this inquiry; I have established the inquiry, and I have done so because of my concern both about the historical cases and about the continuing cases of child abuse and child sexual exploitation in this country. We should be ashamed of what has happened in the past and, sadly, what we see happening on our streets today. The panel will be conducting what I believe is a once-in-a-generation inquiry that will give us the opportunity to recognise the problems and failings of the past and ensure that we address them so that in future fewer children will become victims of this appalling crime.

Metropolitan Police Service

Debate between Baroness May of Maidenhead and Michael Meacher

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

Indeed. When Tim Godwin takes over as acting commissioner, he will obviously want to consider the steps that the Met can take, as he already has been doing, such as being more transparent about relationships with the press. Crucially, Elizabeth Filkin is being brought in to advise the Met on such matters, so that it can show the public that it has changed the way it deals with these things and increase the public’s confidence. It is also important to have the additional resilience that is brought by somebody coming in from the outside, so Bernard Hogan-Howe will take on the responsibilities of a deputy commissioner to enhance that work.

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

The Guardian produced abundant evidence several months ago that in handling phone hacking at the News of the World, the police had cut short their original inquiry, suppressed evidence, misled the public and the press, concealed information and broken the law. Why did the Home Secretary not take action then, when it was already perfectly clear that something was going terribly wrong at Scotland Yard?

[Mrs May]

The initial Guardian story that required investigation actually came in July 2009 under the last Government. That was looked at to see whether there was fresh evidence and a decision was taken that there was not. In September 2010, a question was raised about stories that had appeared in the American press. Again, that was looked at to see whether there was fresh evidence. At the time—[Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Mr Meacher) asks what I did. I will tell him what I did. At that time, I came to this House and said that it was up to the police to investigate the matter and that it was not for politicians to tell police officers who or what to investigate. I said that the police should investigate any evidence, wherever it took them, and ensure that anybody who was guilty of criminal offences was properly brought to justice.