Local Police helped protect Rotherham abusers

[Buce]

So another thread gone the same way being used as a vehicle to blame or associate the Labour Party with everything that's wrong in the world.

I've just come to the inevitable conclusion that perhaps certain posters on here don't have an agenda - maybe it's just that they really are that daft. Every thread is the same rubbish and the same rhetoric.

If posters really are interested in what happened and what's been done and changed - try going to the NSPCC website and reading the Serious Case Review. Its a good starting point to learn about how to address safeguarding issues in a changing world. Alternatively, just arbitrarily blame whatever movement/agency/culture you fancy pinning the label on.

One day, someone will write a piece of software called Idiot Checker. It will be like a spell-checker but instead of scanning the text for spelling mistakes, it will scan for, then correct, text written by a moron.

Until then, we'll have to put up with reading bvllshit.

[Rincewind]

I wonder how many of the police involved are Tory voters? I doubt they are all Labour supporters.

[Guest MattP]

A victim in the Rotherham grooming trial told police she was raped by an influential politician linked to three brothers who were jailed yesterday for a campaign of child abuse in the town.

Arshid, Basharat and Bannaras Hussain were sentenced to a total of 79 years in prison. They were said to have ruled Rotherham for a decade until their grooming, pimping and trafficking of girls was exposed by The Times.

Jahangir Akhtar, a relative of the trio, is the former Labour deputy leader of Rotherham council and the former vice-chairman of South Yorkshire police and crime panel. He resigned in 2013 after The Times revealed his role in a deal under which Arshid Hussain agreed to return a missing child to police at a petrol station after receiving an assurance that he would not be prosecuted.

The petrol station handover, and Mr Akhtar’s involvement, featured in an account by one of the 15 child victims who gave evidence in the two-month trial at Sheffield crown court.

It can now be reported that a reference was made to an elected Rotherham politician during the evidence of two more grooming victims.

The court heard that one young woman told police that she was raped by “Mr Akhtar, now councillor” when she was working at a taxi office in the town but “refused to discuss the allegation further with the police until this trial was over”.

Another witness described being taken to a house in Rotherham where many men came to have sex with her. Michelle Colborne, QC, for the prosecution, said that the girl recognised one of the men “as an MP or councillor from Rotherham”. The teenager believed he was related to the Hussain brothers.

Mr Akhtar, 55, was not a defendant in the trial and was not represented in court. Yesterday, he denied any involvement in sexual offending against children. He said he had “never, ever raped” and “never, ever engaged in the activities” described in court.

A report last year by Louise Casey, who led an inspection of the local authority, said that Mr Akhtar was an intimidating and powerful figure in Rotherham. The former taxi driver was thought to have “influence that extended to the police”. His taxi licence was later suspended by the council for reasons that have not been made public.

Passing sentence yesterday, Judge Sarah Wright told the brothers that their crimes caused harm of unimaginable proportions to young girls who showed immeasurable courage by reliving their abuse in court.

“The impact of your offending on the victims, their families and the wider community has been devastating,” she said. “Their childhood and adolescence can never be reclaimed.”

For more than a decade police and social services in Rotherham held, but failed to act upon, intelligence about the brothers’ roles in the targeting and exploitation of teenagers, many of whom became pregnant. A criminal inquiry was finally launched in 2013 after The Times told the story of a girl we called Jessica, naming Arshid Hussain, 40, as her suspected abuser.

He received a 35-year sentence for 23 offences against nine girls including Jessica. Basharat Hussain, 39, convicted of 15 sex offences against four girls, was jailed for 25 years and Bannaras Hussain, 36, who admitted ten offences against seven girls, received a 19-year sentence.

The brothers’ uncle, Qurban Ali, 53, was jailed for ten years. Karen MacGregor, 59, who befriended girls and pimped them to Pakistani men, got 13 years. Shelley Davies, 40, received an 18-month suspended sentence

[MC Prussian]

!

Why not blame the party? Political parties should take a lot more care about the people they appoint. Either that or disband the party for all they're worth - and start again with a more worthy organisation that will stand up for our people and some basic values.

 

Do you blame Tories as well for the misguided behaviour of a part of their representatives the same way as you do with Labour? I read in another thread that you consider yourself apolitical (allegedly), but your input in politically-related threads points to the opposite and a clear preference of a particular side of the spectrum.

 

An example: If two or three employees of a larger corporation commit criminal acts, is the whole corporation at fault? Do you blame all other employees as well? Are they all to be considered "criminals"?

 

For someone who obviously tends to the Right, you make some pretty hilarious assumptions about self-control and responsibility of self, values that the Conservatives always seem to hold in high esteem (and don't you tell me that only applies to economics or commerce). A handful of politicians work against the law, so they ought to be punished as individuals. No matter where they come from. So, be at least consequential.

Your mass rhetoric has a tendency of being more miss than hit. I consider that the first step of an attempt at dividing political conscience. Some would call it having an agenda.

 

Politics isn't perfect because politicians aren't, no matter how much voters or the population take offence at it. They're humans and not machines, for Christ's sake! I do agree that as an elected representative of the people, you are required to have high ethical standards and the urge to work for a good cause.  But if you're not happy about the current status quo, start your own party or get involved yourself. It's a democracy, after all. But isn't it nice to criticize the system from the outside? How soothing and comfortable!

The issue with misrepresentation will hardly ever go away, because as human beings, we all have different points of views, sometimes agree and sometimes don't. Not even a thorough background check will eliminate concerns. We all have a somewhat different outlook on life. And as long as we ourselves don't become criminals, that's a healthy and necessary mix of opinions that should be reflected in political debates, as well.

[Thracian]

Talk about washing your hands of what you don't want to acknowledge while stirring a smokescreen by deliberately pretending I've said or suggested something I haven't.

Most insulting is the very suggestion that I'd somehow accept other politicians turning a blind eye to the systematic abuse of kids while only condemning Labour people.

Just try me. The last party I belonged to was UKIP. I quit over their failure to vet election candidates soundly enough to avoid idiocy like this and more I could mention: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2963721/I-m-not-racist-insists-councillor-kicked-Ukip-saying-problem-people-negroid-features.html

That's hardly in the same league as the failings in Rotherham (and elsewhere) so you need never doubt my willingness to defend a principle against any philosophical shade of politician...and I'm quite sure the sincerity of that comment will be firmly tested in time, whether in relation to Rotherham or something quite different.

To MC Prussian:

I've never been "apolitical". Quite the contrary. I've a considerable interest in politics and have openly referred to my party connections or voting at different times. My problem is agreeing with some aspects of various party's policies, not agreeing with others and never being comfortable with accepting anything I don't agree with, in other words, the principle of democracy.

Party's are and should accept responsibility for the kind of people they allow to stand under their flag in elections and, in making their judgements, should be answerable for the integrity of those people, along with a good many other qualities, perhaps reasonably outlined here (for all that this link refers specifically to council employees rather than councillors and to Scotland rather than the rest of the UK.)

http://www.saa.gov.uk/resources/278618/National_code_of_conduct_for_employees.pdf