Child Sexual Exploitation: Casey Report

Anna Dixon Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

We have already provided some additional resources for policing, so that officers will be able to undertake the assessment and identification of cases that were closed but need to be reopened, or where other lines of inquiry need to be followed up. The hon. Gentleman will know that the National Crime Agency already does immensely important work through Operation Stovewood around South Yorkshire, and through its work on online child abuse. We need to bring all the different programmes of work closer together, involving both the National Crime Agency and the new centre for public protection that we are setting up, which will be about setting new standards across the country and rolling out the national operating model that all forces can then follow.

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

I commend the Home Secretary for the dignified way in which she gave her statement. I associate myself with her apology to the victims and survivors of sexual exploitation and grooming gangs for past failures. I welcome the Government having accepted the recommendations of Baroness Casey’s rapid audit and the announcement of a national criminal operation to pursue and convict perpetrators. Justice for victims of these horrific crimes must always be our top priority. West Yorkshire police have taken a proactive approach to securing justice for victims. As recently as January this year, eight men were given jail sentences of nearly 58 years for multiple sexual offences against two children in Keighley in the 1990s. Will she join me in commending the work of West Yorkshire police in bringing the perpetrators of those vile crimes to justice?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the work of West Yorkshire police. They have done pioneering work to find new ways to identify victims who may be at risk and to summon evidence where there are repeat missing cases, and they have been forensic and determined in pursuit of action. I commend the work of the assistant chief constable. Learning from the work that the police have done, we want to make Baroness Casey’s recommendation a central part of the national criminal operation.