Jess Phillips MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I really hope so, but I am not going to do what other people seem to want to do in this circumstance and pretend that there is a guarantee and that I have some sort of magic weapon. That is the process that I am undertaking: I am trying to get the very best chair, who is supported alongside the victims who have been taking part in the process.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Gentleman cannot have listened to my remarks at all if he is suggesting that the Government have silenced anybody. The Government have not handled the process; it has been handled by a grooming gang charity. He cited and named a victim of crime. If the right hon. Gentleman had done anywhere near the level of work that I have done, he would know that not all victims and survivors are of the same opinion. They are not one homogeneous group of people who all think the same thing, who all want the same exposure and who all want their identities known. I have spoken to Fiona Goddard many times, and I will continue that relationship with her, should that be what she wishes. Every single survivor who has been engaged with—there have been many—will have different feelings on the subject. With regard to the right hon. Gentleman requiring a judge, Baroness Casey said to the House in the Home Affairs Committee that she did not want a traditional judicial-led inquiry. She was explicit about that. Can anyone in the House find me an institution that did not fail these girls over the years? That includes our courts, which took children away from the grooming gang victims and which criminalised some of them. There is no institution in our country that has not failed. Today, I will meet many of the victims and get their feedback, and I will continue to progress with that in mind. I will engage with all the victims, regardless of their opinions, and I will listen to those who have been put in the media and are put in panels. I will always listen, and I will speak to all of them.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  While the inquiry is ongoing, that will be a matter for the chair. However, I know from the inquiries that I have been involved in that were successful and victim-centric that there always has to be a system for supporting the victims, both with taking part in the inquiry and with the trauma that might be brought up. Usually, those two things are separate, but I will say this once again: I will not be the chair of this committee. Undoubtedly, it is about ensuring that victims are protected throughout the process. Should they want to go out and speak publicly both negatively and positively about that process, I would absolutely welcome that. People should never be prevented from speaking. We have to ensure that support is available, regardless of how they wish to gain it.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  First and foremost, I absolutely confirm that that will not happen. Not only that, but I confirm that the Home Office has asked police forces across the country to collect data on ethnicity. That was not done before. I will not be drawn into his point about the chair; it is not up to me. However, I will say that the gentleman my hon. Friend mentions resigned from a previous role in this field because he thought that the then Government were not invested enough in tackling child sexual exploitation.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I will chair an interministerial cross-Government group next week to push through the other recommendations. Baroness Casey made 12 recommendations, but people rarely speak about any of the others. This was not her most pressing one; instead, she gave primacy to the policing-related recommendation around Operation Beaconport. As I said in my previous statement on 2 September, the work on the 216 cases that moved forward is ongoing and runs alongside this. That is where justice will be served: in our courts—if only they had not been horrendously degraded so that rape victims wait for years and years.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend, who I know has some experience of inquiries from her previous life, is exactly right. People do not remember it now, but there were victims going out in the press complaining about what was going on with IICSA. It went through numerous chairs. There is already much worse faith in this instance, both rightly and wrongly. For me to allow the same to happen during this inquiry would just make people shout “Cover-up!”, so we are trying to do everything possible to ensure that the mistakes made by the previous Government are not made again.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  Can I be completely clear? I am suggesting that I will listen completely and utterly to the feedback from the victims who were on the panel and those who still are. They are not spreading misinformation at all, but the hon. Member’s interpretation is a brilliant case in point. I will be completely honest. The conversation with Oldham is: do we not think it might be better for Oldham just to take part in a statutory inquiry? It has absolutely nothing to do with the idea that Oldham is telling me what to do. The more people on the Conservative Benches— [ Interruption. ] Oh, the hon. Member can hold up his letter and have a smug face all he likes, but the fact of the matter is that there is no council in this country that will tell the inquiry where it can and cannot go. I have said that 1 million times from the Dispatch Box, yet the same thing gets peddled again and again.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend. I think she mischaracterises me as the fiercest of advocates because she, as a grooming victim, with a child born of rape, is the fiercest and bravest. I could cry, I feel so proud that the Government sought to get her elected. I have been campaigning for the thing she has fought for with grooming gang victims for nearly a decade. I met with Ministers of the then Government and nothing was done. [ Interruption. ] The exact thing that she has campaigned for was asked for repeatedly and nothing was done. I am incredibly proud of her, as it is because of her and this Government that today I can say that that will change.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I absolutely regret that they have resigned from the process. Funnily enough, in the particular instance of one of the people, I have had no involvement in that process. I do not know who are on the panels of victims; it is entirely independently managed by a grooming gang charity. One of my only interventions was to ensure that the names of some of the voices that I thought deserved to be heard were included. I have done that on a number of occasions. I will, of course, listen to them. Actually, I am meant to be with those panels of victims, hearing their response, right now. As I have said, I will take the feedback of anyone, both publicly and should they want to speak to me, as I have approached them. I am always sad when victims feel that they cannot take part in a process—of course I am. There are many different victims and they have many different views. There are ones that we hear publicly. But I want to make it clear that there are many different victims and we have to ensure that all their voices are heard equally, whether they are part of the process or not.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Gentleman for both his tone and his approach. As per the Inquiries Act 2005, the terms of reference have to be set and consulted on with the chair. The chair is being decided on. I have to say, it is not taking any longer than the covid inquiry or the infected blood inquiry, which I think each took seven months from their announcement to the appointment of the chair. I do not remember huge amounts of criticism or bellyaching about that, because we wanted to get those things right. Actually, getting this right means dealing with lots of different stakeholders and victims with different views. The process has to be followed that the terms of reference go through the chair. We have already done some of the work on the terms of reference with victims’ groups, but we cannot publish those—we will do that publicly, as I said—until a chair is appointed. I will not rush that, because I will take note of all the feedback I receive.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I refer the hon. Member to my previous answer. As I have said a number of times, I am going to speak to those involved and look into the process. It is not a process that I have personally been part of, and I can only speak to the victims who I happen to have known before, if they tell me that they are part of it—not the other way around. I cannot ask who is involved. That is confidential by its very nature. Of course I am going to listen to that feedback and, like I have said, I will speak to those victims involved.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  The simple answer is yes. My hon. Friend is absolutely right on his first point. What we should all seek to be doing throughout this is to try to grease the wheels so that we can have the best possible inquiry. We should all be seeking to do that while holding people to account with as much scrutiny as is needed. I will absolutely do that, and obviously I have met my hon. Friend a number of times. Getting mandatory reporting right is vital and, much like in the survivor group, there are different views on either side.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  As stated in my previous statement to the House on 2 September and in my letter to the Home Affairs Committee yesterday, the Government remain resolute in delivering Baroness Casey’s recommendations following her national audit of group-based child sexual exploitation and abuse. These crimes committed by grooming gangs are among the most horrific imaginable. Baroness Casey’s report exposed more than a decade of institutional inaction, and we are determined to ensure that such failures are never repeated. Central to our response is a statutory national inquiry under the Inquiries Act 2005. It will oversee local investigations and will have full powers to compel evidence. It will also be time-limited to three years to ensure that victims and survivors receive answers swiftly. The inquiry will examine safeguarding systems, accountability and intersections with ethnicity, race and culture, identifying failures and good practice. The inquiry will work alongside Operation Beaconport, a national police operation. The appointment of the chair is at a critical stage, and we hope to confirm its conclusion soon. Victims and survivors have been at the heart of the process, with trauma-informed opportunities to share their views. We have engaged with them on the chair appointment and the terms of reference, which will be shaped by the chair in public consultation with stakeholders. As has been widely reported in the media, victims and survivors are meeting prospective chairs this week—today, in fact. This process, contrary to the reporting, was managed not by the Home Office but by the independent child exploitation charity NWG Network. We are gathering views to ensure that the perspective of victims and survivors remains central. We must avoid delays, as were seen in the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse, and we are progressing as swiftly as thoroughness allows. Misinformation undermines this process. Allegations of intentional delay, lack of interest and a widening or dilution of the inquiry’s scope are false. The inquiry will remain laser-focused on grooming gangs, as Baroness Casey recommended.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  Yes, that is because of you lot.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  All I can say is that there is a reason that I cannot stand in front of the victims, who I am meant to be getting feedback from right now, and definitely say when the chair will come. I could have just put my finger in the air and picked out some random judge—we could have done that—but I am listening to victims’ feedback. Again, I have to stress that that process is not easy. There are difficult dynamics within groups of people and the people who we have asked to engage are dealing with difficult things, so undoubtedly, that is not uncomplex. As anyone who has worked with groups of people who have been wronged, shamed and treated badly will know, it would be a lie to stand here and tell them that there is a straight line and a simple answer—and I am not willing to do that.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I absolutely share the hon. Gentleman’s upset and frustration on the matter. He knows that when I say that I will do whatever I can to ensure that these problems are sorted out, where they can be, that is what we will seek to do, and we will continue to try to do that. What we have to do with this inquiry is not just look at what went wrong and hold people to account; we have to ensure that it cannot happen again.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I do not disagree with the right hon. Gentleman. Most of what I see reported on anything in this space is largely inaccurate and often comes with an agenda, more so than in the case of the infected blood scheme, although I absolutely take my hat off to the job that he had to do. There is a balance between wanting to give a complete and utter running commentary on a very complicated thing and making sure that people feel like something is going on, because nature abhors a vacuum and so does misinformation.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  I say again and again that it will not shy away from findings where they are present. Anybody who has done the work in this space will know that that is going to be found, as the case in my hon. Friend’s constituency highlights. There is absolutely no sense that ethnicity will be buried away. Every single time that there is an apparently needless delay—even though it took seven months to put in place chairs for both the covid inquiry and the blood inquiry, and nobody moaned about that—it gets used to say that we want to cover something up. That is the misinformation I am talking about. It will not cover things up. We are taking time to ensure that that can never happen.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  Absolutely. I absolutely pay tribute to the community response in my hon. Friend’s local area to recent incidences of very hideous sexual violence, and I put on record my love to the families and victims involved. I absolutely agree: this is a grooming gangs inquiry, and it will follow what Baroness Casey stated. As I said in my statement, it will be three years long, it will not shy away and it will be a grooming gangs inquiry.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  It is quite impressive that the hon. Member says that after a grooming victim has stood up and spoken from these Benches, but I have learned to expect it. He talks about a cover-up—maybe he is doing it for clicks; I do not know—and I understand that he thinks he is doing God’s work in fighting this issue, but the idea that it is easy to find a chair or to find people who want to step forward and take part in this process, given the level of bad faith and when the issue is mired in political point scoring of the type he has just done! He should really question his own morality.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  That opportunity has already been presented to them and I would be more than happy. I know one of them but not the other. That opportunity is always available, and one of them has my phone number. On the idea that I do not listen and have not been making myself available, I have tried to keep the process fiercely independent of Government intervention so that it can happen and victims can feel safe in that, but of course I feel sad that this is how it has ended. Actually, I hope that this is not how it has ended and I will commit to making sure that this is not the end. My door is always open to them.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Points of Order · Hansard source

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  Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I am not sure what the hon. Member is confused about. A victims panel was set up to look at both the terms of reference and the appointment of a chair. There is a variety of different groups of people. Some of them have done both; some of them have taken part in just one or the other, usually depending on time and logistics, as she might imagine. That has been managed by an organisation called NWG. I have not taken part in those sessions, other than to feedback on chairs. The feedback on the chair’s appointment comes to me. I do not have to go to that, but I go and sit and listen. Usually, that is the first time I know who has been on the panel, when they have been interviewing chairs. The process is entirely managed. Because of my years of experience, I happen to know quite a lot of the people, and so I do speak to some of the people who are on the panel because I have personal relationships with them and have supported them over the years. I hope that clears that up.

• 3 Sept 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely right; a strategy on violence against women and girls that did not include the online elements that she highlights, as well as others, would not be worth its salt. I commit to continue to work with DSIT colleagues on those issues.

• 3 Sept 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  We are committed to halving violence against women and girls within the next decade. We are working tirelessly to deliver that ambitious plan to tackle these heinous acts through our violence against women and girls strategy. Ministers across Government meet regularly to drive progress through the violence against women and girls ministerial group.

• 3 Sept 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  I am sure that the whole House has sympathy for the case that the hon. Gentleman has outlined. I understand that the inquest is ongoing, but to answer the substantive point of his question, children’s and adult social care have historically not always been what victims felt they could rely on, with many cases to demonstrate that over the years. Without doubt—as I sit next to the Secretary of State for Education—the work with my office, with the Ministry of Justice and with her office to ensure that that is handled in the violence against women and girls strategy, and more broadly, is at the top of the agenda for all of us.