Is Sunak’s grooming gangs crackdown just ‘dog whistle’ politics?

Nobody likes grooming gangs. Few things evoke revulsion on the same scale as groups of men intent on child sexual exploitation. So Rishi Sunak and his home secretary Suella Braverman would seem to be on very safe ground when they vowed to “stamp out” an obvious evil.

However, the Tory government has been accused of seizing on the issue as an entirely cynical vote chaser, with opposition parties and experts questioning the sincerity of the latest get-tough plans and rhetoric ahead of local elections.

Braverman was charged with “dog whistle” politics over grooming gangs after she repeatedly singled out British-Pakistani men on Sunday – and claimed Labour councils had “turned a blind eye” to signs of abuse over fears of being racist.

The home secretary revealed at the weekend that the government will consult over a plan to make sure people working with children in England have a legal duty to report “signs or suspicions” of any form of sexual abuse.

But the announcement was quickly overshadowed by the plan to create a new grooming gang taskforce, led by police and supported by the National Crime Agency, made up of officers with “extensive experience” of undertaking investigations into grooming gangs.

In an article on grooming gangs for the Mail on Sunday, Ms Braverman claimed: “The perpetrators are groups of men, almost all British Pakistani.”

Repeatedly alluding to the high-profile grooming gang cases of Rotherham and Rochdale that involved men of mainly Pakistani ethnicity, she also told the BBC that “politicians in Labour-run areas ... absolutely failed to take action because of cultural sensitivities”.

Downing Street is all too happy to play up the attack on “political correctness”. No 10 said the grooming gang taskforce will use ethnicity data – arguing it is necessary to look at which groups perpetrate such crimes to ensure “cultural sensitivities” are not used to prevent criminals being caught.

But it is not clear how the data would be used. Or why exactly ethnicity would be so important. Nazir Afzal, former chief crown prosecutor in the northwest, has previously warned of the danger in focusing “entirely on the ethnicity of the offender” rather than how best to protect victims.

A 2020 Home Office report found that group-based sex offenders are “most commonly white” – concluding that there was no evidence that any one ethnic group is over-represented in cases of child sexual exploitation.

Legislation will be introduced to make being a gang member a statutory aggravating factor during sentencing. The government also insisted it would bolster support for the NSPCC’s whistleblowing helpline, but the charity said a radical change in understanding who is at risk of sexual abuse – and a complete overhaul of support – is needed.

The suspicion remains that the Tories have latched upon the grooming gangs issue again in order to create controversy, rile up voters in the Midlands and north of England and demonstrate they are the party willing to say the “unsayable”. It is a strategy of “deflection and fear”, according to human rights lawyer Jessica Simor.

Is it fair to use the issue to stoke the culture war clashes and identify Labour as the home of politically correct “woke” politics? Keir Starmer’s party certainly doesn’t think so.

Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper will do her best to say the plan isn’t tough enough. She has called the government’s response to grooming gangs “hopelessly inadequate, belated and narrow” – pointing to Labour’s call for mandatory reporting of suspected sexual abuse a decade ago.

Cooper has also pointed out that only 11 per cent of child sexual abuse cases ends with a charge – down from 32 per cent seven years ago. But will voters follow such detail? If the Tories continue to sound like the nasty, least politically correct party about a group the public hates, they will consider their pre-Easter push against grooming gangs a success.