Public inquiries make for great spectacles these days – televised grillings of politicians, officials and experts being called to account for the sins of the past. The modern day equivalent of the stocks.
Everything is broadcast online for the world to see, a top barrister leads the questioning, and Prime Ministers, cabinet ministers, and chief executives cannot avoid their moment under the spotlight.
It’s difficult to forget the spectacle of disgraced Post Office CEO Paula Vennells breaking down and sobbing as she was quizzed on the shameful prosecutions of innocent subpostmasters.
Similarly, newspaper editors and owners stepped out of the shadows for the Leveson Inquiry and faced uncomfortable questions about the rampant abuses of the tabloid press.
At times, inquiries are undoubtedly box office TV. This weekend Elon Musk has been calling for a full national inquiry into the British grooming gang scandal.
But national inquiries are too important, and frankly too expensive, to be launched for the wrong reasons.
Once, the public inquiry was the tool of the cynical politician looking to take the heat out of a political firestorm. They would be safe in the knowledge that evidence sessions would not start for months, it would take years to conclude, and the delays might be long enough for people forget about the scandal.
Now, the hearings are televised and it’s become more of a gamble to call for an inquiry. Senior politicians may end up on the receiving end of a grilling themselves, the ensuing PR disaster could go viral online, and clips would live on through TikTok, YouTube, and X forever, or at least until their career is over.
It might make for interesting TV, but it does not necessarily translate into real progress
No doubt the chance of public embarrassment – for Keir Starmer in particular – is part of the motivation for those now agitating for a public inquiry into grooming gangs and the sexual abuse of children.
Clamour for an inquiry – led by Elon Musk and enthusiastically pursued by some factions online – has focused attention on Starmer’s past job as Director of Public Prosecutions.
Seeing Starmer under pressure and perhaps sensing an easy win, opposition leader Kemi Badenoch joined the calls for an inquiry.
But there are inconvenient truths lurking in the background of this particular firestorm.
Televised embarrassment at the hands of an inquiry might make for a headline or two, a moment of interest, but it does not necessarily translate into real progress.
Badenoch herself, along with Lib Dem leader Ed Davey and Labour fixer Pat McFadden, have all had a turn at the Post Office Inquiry. Yet subpostmasters continue to wait for compensation, years after they were first wronged.
The Grenfell Tower Inquiry ran for seven years, public officials, developers, and cladding companies passed the blame around among themselves, and – despite brutal findings from the chairman last year – the families of the victims are still waiting for criminal charges to be brought.
Inquiries certainly have their place. The Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War delivered answers in a way that no other process could. The Post Office Inquiry, with ample help from an ITV drama, finally brought the scandal to the masses and delivered a reckoning of sorts.
For those wanting something similar for grooming gangs, there is another inconvenient truth: a public inquiry into child sexual abuse in the UK has already taken place.
The scope was wide-ranging, from children’s homes to the church and Westminster. Victims bravely gave evidence, the process was long and gruelling, part of the inquiry was specifically focused on organised networks of abusers, and the chair delivered her findings in 2022.
And then, not much happened. Professor Alexis Jay’s recommendations have not been acted on. Perhaps we need an inquiry into that abysmal failure?
She suggested the creation of a national child protection authority, tighter controls on who can work with vulnerable children, new laws to tackle online sexual abuse, and attempted to tackle cover-ups by making not reporting sexual abuse a crime in itself.
But those recommendations remained on the shelf during the dying embers of the Conservative government. There is nothing to suggest a new inquiry would get any further forward.
Here’s another hard truth: in the last year, more than 380 criminal trials involving sexual offences were abandoned at the last moment when either a barrister, a judge or a magistrate could not be found to do the case.
Snaresbrook crown court in London, where many allegations of child sex abuse are dealt with, has a backlog bigger than the whole of Wales.
Delays in the courts have reached record levels, impacting on the willingness of victims to keep going all the way to trial, and morale in criminal justice circles is on the floor.
All of this is not to say that this country does not need to do far better in tackling the scourge of sexual abuse, grooming, and online predatory behaviour towards children.
I have sat through grooming gang trials. They are among the most vile cases I have covered
I have sat through grooming gang trials. They are among the most vile cases I have covered, detailing behaviour which is scarcely believable. I also sat through parts of Professor Jay’s Inquiry, and came away with the same feeling.
There have been systemic failures, victims have shamefully not been believed, and signs of abuse have either been missed or willfully ignored.
But if there might be money for a long and costly inquiry, that should go towards investment in police forces who investigate grooming gangs, implementation of Professor Jay recommendations in full, and funds for a court system which can deliver swift justice.
In the last decade, we have seen managed decline in the criminal justice system – budgets cut to the bone, buildings sold off, prisons filled to bursting, and lawyers leaving the arena in droves. When the justice system fails, criminals are given more space to operate.
Call for an inquiry and you may grab a headline. Call for significant and long-term investment in criminal justice and you may find the audience stifling a yawn.
But if we are going to seriously tackle grooming gangs, child sexual abuse, and the root causes for these vile crimes, there is no doubt where the money should go – no matter what a US-based billionaire tells you on his social media feed.
Tristan Kirk is courts correspondent for The Standard
