UNITED KINGDOM
Independent
Dina Rickman @dinarickman
A central London council has been warned it risks “another Rotherham” sexual abuse scandal if it does not deal with the thousands of children thought to be taught at illegal schools.
Hackney Council is at the centre of a child protection scandal after an investigation by The Independent found more than 1,000 boys in the borough are currently missing from registered schools and are instead thought to be educated in illegal ultra-Orthodox Jewish yeshivas.
At a meeting of Hackney Council’s Children and Young People Scrutiny Board, which is holding an inquiry into unregistered Jewish schools, Chair Councillor Christopher Kennedy said: “We worried there might be another Rotherham situation in Hackney if we didn’t take action when we were told there were all these missing children on the school register.”
His comments came as religious leaders told Hackney council they felt being pressured to teach a particular agenda by Ofsted. Jospeh Stauber, headteacher of the registered Talmud Torah Yetev Lev primary school for children in Hackney, warned councillors: “Don’t try to tell us what to learn with the children when it’s against our religion. That’s why we keep on hiding.”
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