Grooming gang survivor accuses Starmer’s Labour of ‘gaslighting’ victims | UK | News
A grooming gang survivor has accused Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor government of “lightening up” victims after he left the national inquiry panel in anger. Ellie Reynolds said she was manipulated by Home Office officials who tried to ban her from even speaking to her own family members, fearing she would be branded a “racist”.
He described the investigation as a “whitewash” and claimed it was designed to fail, otherwise senior officials and people in authority would be exposed and lose their jobs. Ms Reynolds and fellow survivor Fiona Goddard accused Labor of “sabotaging” the national inquiry on Monday, claiming “political interference” and mismanagement by the Home Office led to her decision to leave the inquiry’s victims and survivors liaison panel on Monday.
In her resignation letter, Ms Goddard described “secretive behaviour” and “condescending and controlling language” used towards survivors. He also warned of a “toxic, fearful environment” and a “high risk of people feeling silenced again”.
Ms Reynolds accused the Home Office of excluding survivors from important discussions and holding meetings without telling them, and said officials were making “decisions we cannot question”.
And he further criticized Labor, claiming he was not allowed to “seek external support”.
She said: “If I was at all overwhelmed or struggling, I wasn’t allowed to seek support from my family or other survivors on the panel. We were discouraged from talking to anyone outside the panel. To me it felt like a divide. Then it felt like it was done to divide us and weaken us again. You know most survivors don’t go to the authorities for support, they go to their families and they go to other survivors because the authorities have failed them so many times before.”
When asked by LBC radio presenter Nick Ferrari who put forward the circumstances of Ms Reynolds, who was subjected to grooming and abuse as a teenager in Barrow, she said: “From within the panel. This came from the organization that ran it in conjunction with the Home Office.”
He added: “We weren’t allowed to discuss anything. I think looking back on it now, it was more of a manipulation tactic, you know, they seemed really nice but equally controlling. So they were saying, ‘We understand that you’re so sensitive, so if you want to talk to anyone, don’t talk to the survivors, come to us.’ And when you read the emails again now, you can see that it was nothing more than a highlight of how they ran the whole investigation – They are afraid of being labeled racist. And it shouldn’t be like this. It is as if we have put into action a tactic where we are afraid to say the ethnic origin of our violations and this should not be the case.
“And I think if the investigation was really successful and it came to light, a lot of police officers, social workers, etc. would lose their jobs.
“So I think it was a cover-up from the beginning and I think it just gives the public false hope so they stay quiet about it.
Ms Reynolds said in the interview that the abusers were Bangladeshi, adding: “They were a mostly Muslim grooming gang.”
He added: “I’m disappointed, I’m heartbroken. But at the same time, I’m not surprised. This is just another way of silencing everyone to make it look like the government and the authorities are doing the job, but they are. They’re not. It is what it is. This is basically a cover-up.”
Mrs Reynolds was speaking LBC’s Nick Ferrari on Breakfast
