Kemi Badenoch challenges Jess Phillips over grooming gangs claims

In the UK, Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, recently engaged in a discussion with GB News' Charlie Peters regarding the ongoing controversy surrounding grooming gangs. This conversation arose following Baroness Casey's review, which has highlighted serious issues regarding ethnicity and the representation of grooming gang members. During the dialogue, Badenoch was queried about a 2020 report from Priti Patel, the then-Home Secretary, which claimed there was no disproportionate representation of British Pakistanis in grooming gang activities. Badenoch's response suggested she was not fully aware of this report yet focused instead on past Conservative efforts to address these issues. Kemi Badenoch took the opportunity to launch a scathing attack on Jess Phillips, a Labour politician, labeling her the "worst Safeguarding Minister" the UK has ever had. In a fiery interview, she pushed back against Phillips’ accusations that the Conservative Party had neglected the issue of grooming gangs. Badenoch insisted that, unlike Phillips, she had been proactive on the issue since taking up her role and noted past efforts to create a grooming gangs task force while she was in cabinet. Badenoch highlighted that the scale of grooming gang activities has only recently come to the forefront, indicating that it is a widespread issue affecting multiple towns across the country. By her accounts, critical pressure from conservative members, including herself, led to demands for a national inquiry into the matter. She stressed that much of the groundwork was laid out by previous Home Secretaries, which included Sajid Javid, Suella Braverman, and Theresa May, implying that the attempts to investigate these criminal activities should focus not only on governmental reports but also on addressing cover-ups that may have occurred. Finally, Badenoch emphasized the essential role that public discussions, media scrutiny, and contributions from survivors have played in exposing the realities of grooming gangs in Britain. As the inquiries intensify, she is keen to remind the public of Conservatives’ efforts to hold the government accountable, challenging the Labour's portrayal of these issues in the media. These developments have further intensified the debate about the responsibility of political leaders in addressing sensitive racial and ethnic dynamics surrounding grooming gang incidents.