Embarrassment for Keir Starmer as Andy Burnham calls for rape gangs inquiry
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LABOUR'S Andy Burnham has demanded a national inquiry into child rape gangs in open defiance of Sir Keir Starmer. The Manchester mayor tonight broke with his party to call for a new probe into the grooming scandal. His intervention piled more pressure on the PM after he blocked a Conservative attempt to force an investigation.
![[Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester, at a Labour Party Conference event.]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/2024-andy-burnham-mayor-greater-935152932.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
Despite ordering his MPs to vote down the Tory bid, Sir Keir, his deputy Angela Rayner, Chancellor Rachel Reeves, Foreign Secretary David Lammy and Health Secretary Wes Streeting were all absent. Downing Street blamed diary clashes and insisted the Cabinet Ministers had not ducked the vote to avoid the public backlash.
Mr Burnham attacked Tory “opportunism” but called on the Government to launch a probe for the sake of victims. He told the BBC: “I will add my voice into this and say I do think there is the case for a limited national inquiry that draws on reviews like the one that I commissioned, and the one we have seen in Rotherham, the one we have seen in Telford, to draw out some of these national issues and compel people to give evidence who then may have charges to answer and be held to account.".
Mr Burnham said the flaw with local inquiries - which Sir Keir has proposed - is the inability to force witnesses to appear. He admitted: “That is something I couldn't do at my level.”. Tory Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said politicians and officials who hushed up child rape gangs for years must face their “day of reckoning”.
