Abuse Inquiry: Officials Keen to Push on

By Anushka Asthana
Sky News
December 5, 2014

http://news.sky.com/story/1386409/abuse-inquiry-officials-keen-to-push-on


Will the refusal of 28 survivors and campaigners to co-operate kill the Home Office inquiry into historical child abuse?

From what I am hearing, officials are determined to push ahead.

They believe they have tried hard to include victim groups in their thinking since Fiona Woolf became the inquiry's second chair to step down.

While this news will come as a blow, they will focus on the fact that not all survivor groups have signed up.

Others also have similar misgivings but they want the inquiry to get going.

One key figure is Peter Saunders of the National Association for People Abused in Childhood (NAPAC).

He was a leading member of the group that refused to work with Mrs Woolf.

And yet now he has told Sky News that his group had not withdrawn its support from the inquiry, although they do share some of the misgivings.

He said he believed that the Home Secretary Theresa May had "listened" and was "committed to getting it right".

Still, this is a big headache for Mrs May given her own promise that this inquiry will be victim-centred.

In a statement to the House of Commons she made a direct appeal to survivors and their representatives.

She said: "I know some of you have questioned the legitimacy of this process… I am listening, and to you, I say this: I am as determined as you are to get to the truth. That is why I set up this inquiry."

Yet this letter - with its rising number of signatories - gives the feel of an inquiry in trouble. Their concerns are threefold.

They would like it to stretch back to 1945, instead of just 1970, and they are unhappy with some of the panel members.

But perhaps key are worries about the scope of the inquiry - which takes in not just the scandal that has engulfed Westminster but also the BBC and councils that failed to act on grooming rings.

They would prefer it to be focused on an establishment cover-up - with allegations of boys taken to guest houses and abused.

We know that police warnings about the actions of the late Lib Dem MP Cyril Smith were not acted upon, and nor were warnings from Tory MP Geoffrey Dickens.

And that highlights one of the problems that has turned this inquiry into such a complex and controversial beast.

There is growing evidence of an establishment conspiracy in the past - and yet survivors are having to place their trust in today’s establishment to get to the truth.

It is - understandably - a big ask.