Open Letter to Jess Phillips MP, Minister for Safeguarding Girls

On the 2nd of September, you told Parliament that the new National Inquiry into the grooming gang scandals was in its "final stages", that it would be "completely victim-centred," and that "no stone will be left unturned."

Now in October, just over a month later, in your written reply to Rupert Lowe, every one of those promises had changed.

• You now speak of an independent commission, not a straightforward inquiry.
• You say institutions, not individuals, will be held to account.
• You promise areas for review, not investigation.
• You describe targeted local inquiries, not a national reckoning.
• And you commit only to reporting findings, not recommending prosecutions.

That final phrase exposes everything.

Because "reporting findings" is the language of bureaucracy. It is not the language of justice.

A genuine National Inquiry exists to uncover wrongdoing and ensure that wrongdoing faces consequence. It does not simply collate lessons; it compels accountability.

A true national inquiry would:

• Possess statutory powers to compel testimony, disclosure of evidence, and production of documents.
• Place senior officials, councillors, and police officers under oath. Questioning them directly on how and why victims were abandoned.
• Trace institutional complicity across multiple towns, police forces, and government departments, establishing the national pattern of failure rather than treating each case in isolation.
• Examine the role of central government, including ministers and senior civil servants, who ignored repeated warnings over decades.
• Name those responsible and refer cases for criminal investigation and disciplinary action.
• Deliver concrete recommendations with enforcement mechanisms, not another pile of "lessons learned."

That is the scale and seriousness a National Inquiry demands. It is the kind of process a moral government would lead, one capable of restoring public trust after years of betrayal.

By contrast, your October letter promises only that the inquiry will "report findings at both local and national level."

That phrasing strips the process of its teeth. It transforms what should be an instrument of justice into a bureaucratic reporting exercise — a document factory designed to produce the appearance of scrutiny while ensuring that nobody faces consequence.

Reports do not indict. Findings do not prosecute. Paperwork produced in partnership with the accused does not deliver justice.

This is the same formula that failed victims in Rotherham, Rochdale, Oldham, Telford, and every town where grooming gangs were ignored. It is a cover up choreography we’ve seen too many times: empathy on camera, paperwork in Whitehall, paralysis on the ground. It is deceitful. You replace investigation with review, evidence with engagement, justice with lessons learned.

Each report observes instead of exposes, summarises instead of prosecutes, soothes the institutions instead of confronting them. Protects those involved instead of another step towards prosecuting them.

It is not a National Inquiry.

It is a national management exercise. Nothing more than a mechanism to contain public anger, not confront institutional guilt.

Each of these linguistic shifts; from inquiry to commission, from investigation to review, from prosecutions to findings, marks a deliberate retreat from accountability.

The British public deserves to know whether this inquiry has already been compromised before it begins. So, as Minister for Safeguarding, I am asking you directly and publicly:

1. In September you told MPs that appointing a chair was in its "final stages." Yet interviews took place back in August, and no appointment has been made. What has caused the delay? Has political interference stalled the process?
2. Your October letter describes an independent commission overseeing the inquiry. When and by whom was this structure created — and was it agreed before the chair was appointed to limit their authority?
3. Why did the government change the model from a single statutory inquiry to a multi-member commission? What problem was this new bureaucracy designed to solve, other than accountability?
4. You state the inquiry will hold institutions to account. Why have you chosen to focus on institutions rather than the individual councillors, police officers, and officials who made the decisions that allowed these crimes to continue?
5. Your October letter replaced the word investigate with review. Does this mean the inquiry will not have the power to recommend prosecutions or name perpetrators?
6. If this is truly a victim-centred inquiry, why are survivors once again being promised "trauma-informed processes" rather than justice? Will survivors be given any power to veto or amend the Terms of Reference?
7. You now speak of "targeted local investigations." Why fragment a national scandal into local reviews, when evidence shows a coordinated pattern of failure across councils and police forces nationwide?
8. Where are the draft Terms of Reference? Who authored them? And will you publish all versions so the public can see how the scope has been changed behind closed doors?
9. You claim the inquiry will be "independent of government." Who appoints the secretariat, controls the budget, and determines what evidence can be disclosed? Independence declared by government is not independence.
10. And finally — if, after all this, the inquiry ends up producing reports instead of prosecutions, will you accept personal responsibility for what will rightly be seen as another state-managed cover-up?

Minister, these are not academic questions. They concern children who were betrayed by councils, police forces, and politicians and a country that has been misled too many times.

Your September words might have been intended to inspire hope. Your October letter extinguished it.

You now owe the public clarity, honesty, and a credible plan for justice. Until then, every delay, every euphemism, every substitution of review for investigation will be seen for what it is. Nothing more than another attempt to protect institutions at the expense of victims.

The British people are watching.

We expect answers, not process. Accountability, not another review.

Sincerely,

Raja Miah MBE

My name is Raja Miah. I am equally hated by Labour Party politicians, Pakistani gangsters and their Islamist bed fellows. I leave it to you to decide if I am worth standing alongside.

It is now seven years since I first started to expose how politicians protected the rape gangs. During this time, the police have attempted and failed to prosecute me, politicians have tried and failed to sue me, the mainstream media has smeared and then blacklisted me and Pakistani gangsters and Islamists have openly encouraged my murder.

If my words have ever helped you make sense of a broken system, if they’ve ever made you feel seen, heard, or hopeful, please don’t scroll past.

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