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Grooming Gang Hypocrisy
— 3 mins read
Ringleader Shabir Ahmed walks free in Britain
The final review into Greater Manchester's grooming gang scandal declared the system had improved without speaking to a single victim or survivor. The two experts who led the earlier reports resigned rather than put their names to it.
The review that asked no victims
The Assurance Review was published on 3 July 2025 by His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMICFRS), a publicly funded statutory inspectorate. It was the fourth and final report in a series commissioned by Andy Burnham during his time as Mayor of Greater Manchester. It found 'significant improvements' in how Greater Manchester Police and other agencies now handle child sexual exploitation. No victim or survivor was interviewed for it.
Safeguarding experts Gary Ridgway and Malcolm Newsam, who led the first three reviews over six years, resigned in 2025 rather than endorse the final stage. Both cited the exclusion of survivors and concerns about the process. The final report was instead completed by HMICFRS, meaning one publicly funded body assessed the performance of another.
Anyone suggesting they've actually been solved is either mendacious or delusional.
Maggie Oliver, the former GMP detective whose foundation supports abuse survivors, called the exclusion of victims 'indefensible'. She said problems have been tackled in some respects, but 'anyone suggesting they've actually been solved is either mendacious or delusional'. The Maggie Oliver Foundation is a registered charity funded by public donations, with income of around £955,000 in its latest accounts. It receives no government core funding.
Burnham, now Prime Minister, has spoken publicly about stopping serious sexual offenders leaving prison early. He commissioned the review series as Greater Manchester's Police and Crime Commissioner.
The ringleader Britain cannot remove
Shabir Ahmed, ringleader of the Rochdale grooming gang, was released from prison this summer after serving part of a 22-year sentence handed down in 2012. His victims were repeatedly told he would be deported to Pakistan. Sky News reported that he cannot be removed, despite being stripped of his British citizenship.
The block comes from the Immigration Act 1971, which protects people who arrived in Britain before 1973 and lived here for at least five years before deportation was considered. The Guardian reported that victims were only told this shortly before his release. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has announced plans to change the law to allow deportation of 'the vilest foreign criminals', Dawn reported.
A separate gap affects early release. Government promises that serious child sex offenders will not leave prison early do not cover crimes committed before 2003, when the Criminal Justice Act changed the rules.
A decade of ignored warnings
Between 2003 and 2014, Rochdale NHS sexual health worker Sara Rowbotham alerted police and social services more than 100 times about grooming gang activity. She was told the witnesses were not reliable. Official reviews confirm hundreds of children across Greater Manchester were abused during that period while GMP dismissed victims and closed investigations.
Nine men were convicted in the 2012 Rochdale case, with Ahmed receiving the longest sentence. The defendants were mostly of Pakistani heritage, a matter of court record. Baroness Casey's 2025 national audit found men of Pakistani heritage over-represented among group-based child sexual exploitation suspects in Greater Manchester and other areas.
GMP now runs a dedicated child sexual exploitation investigation team of around 100 staff, which was investigating more than 1,000 suspects as of mid-2025.
Similar criticism over the exclusion of victims has been made about post-inquiry assurance processes in Rotherham and Telford. The original account of the Ahmed case did not name the specific legal provision blocking his deportation: the Immigration Act 1971's protection for pre-1973 arrivals.
No new review with full survivor participation has been announced. The legislation intended to allow Ahmed's deportation has not yet passed, and he remains in Britain.
