Grooming gang survivor threatens to sue minister in row over inquiry’s focus

One of the women who quit their role on the national grooming gangs inquiry has threatened to sue a Home Office minister for libel.

Solicitors for Fiona Goddard wrote to minister Jess Phillips on Friday demanding an apology after she said claims the Government was trying to water down the inquiry were “untrue”.

Ms Goddard was one of four women who quit the inquiry’s victims and survivors panel this week citing concerns the Government was trying to widen the scope of the probe.

The group has already called for Ms Phillips to resign, claiming she had accused them of lying in a letter to Commons Home Affairs Committee chairwoman Dame Karen Bradley in which she denied the Government was “seeking to dilute the focus of the inquiry”.

Ms Goddard’s solicitors, Switalskis, said the suggestion of watering down was “patently not untrue” and Ms Phillips’s letter had been “defamatory” as it suggested their client had been untruthful.

They also referred to a text message conversation in which Ms Goddard raised concerns with Ms Phillips about an item on an agenda for a meeting with survivors that asked whether the inquiry should take a “broader approach” than an “explicit focus on ‘grooming gangs’”.

They said Ms Phillips had replied: “I know it’s hard to trust but I can promise you no-one is trying to manipulate the response and it is my view it is only a grooming gang’s (sic) specific inquiry but it is not right for me to make that decision without it being formally consulted on.”

Ms Goddard said she had been “abused and smeared online” as a result of Ms Phillips’s statement.

The solicitors concluded: “Ms Goddard will accept a written apology from Ms Phillips to put an end to this matter.”

Ms Phillips, the safeguarding minister, has found herself at the centre of a row over the grooming gangs inquiry that has also seen the two candidates to chair the probe withdraw from contention.

While Ms Goddard and some other survivors have called for her to quit, a separate group of five survivors said earlier this week that they would only continue to work with the inquiry if Ms Phillips remained in post.

They wrote that the minister has “remained impartial” and “we want her to remain in position for the duration of the process for consistency”.

They said they had asked for the scope to be larger than grooming gangs because some survivors would be excluded for not fitting the “generalised stereotype” of what that includes.

Sir Keir Starmer has said he “of course” has faith in Ms Phillips, as other ministers also rallied around her.