Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether it is expected that the inclusion in Operation Hydrant of cases relating to historical abuse in youth football will have an effect on the date on which the inquiry plans to report on abuse at Aston Hall.

The Home Office provided £1.8m in 2016/17 to fund Operation Hydrant, which was established to coordinate the national police response to allegations of non-recent child sexual abuse involving persons of prominence or within institutions. Operation Hydrant is providing the same coordinating function for the allegations relating to football that have recently come to light. Resources are being prioritised appropriately to meet this emerging demand while continuing to deliver the national coordination function.

As the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Community Health and Care advised in response to PQ 55902 on 6 December 2016, timescales for any system-wide Serious Case Review or Learning Review about abuse in Aston Hall will depend on the outcome of the police investigation which is the responsibility of Derbyshire Police.