Speeches by Cooper.

“We do believe that better, more comprehensive data needs to be collected. That is why I have said that the overall data on child sexual abuse needs to be overhauled, with immediate changes to the gathering of data on ethnicity of both perpetrators and victims, because the system we inherited from the previous Governmen…”

“Work is under way on drawing up the Hillsborough law, which was part of the King’s Speech to be taken forward as a priority in this Session. That work is being done across the Cabinet Office, with Ministry of Justice support, and it is part of the wider work on making sure there can be proper accountability where thing…”

“I welcome my hon. Friend’s important point. Part of our wider work on tackling violence against women and girls is to ensure that children and young people have the confidence to be able to recognise abuse and exploitation. I know the Education Secretary takes this immensely seriously and is looking at how to take it f…”

“My hon. Friend is right to point out that there were many further inquiries as part of the overarching national inquiry into child abuse, including on Church and faith organisations. Some of the recommendations were for those organisations to take forward. They need to ensure that they do, that they are responding and …”

“My hon. Friend is right. Some of this is about giving victims and survivors the confidence to come forward and report abuse, some of it is about getting agencies and organisations to take seriously the risk factors so that they identify potential crimes and pursue them, and some of it is about making sure that we have …”

“My hon. Friend is right to raise this point. In fact, it was one of the issues raised as part of the independent inquiry’s two-year review of child exploitation. The review identified that teenage or young boys are being exploited and that there are often patterns of that starting with online exploitation. What started…”

“My hon. Friend is right. The inquiry identified that half a million children are victims of sexual abuse every year. The majority of cases are, sadly, within the family—a betrayal by those from whom children should be able to expect protection. However, as he said, there have also been huge betrayals in residential hom…”

“On the funding to support the various measures we are taking forward, we have identified up to £10 million for additional investment to support further action. However, I cannot stress enough that this has to be part of the mainstream work that agencies, police forces and local councils do, because tackling child sexua…”

“My hon. Friend is right. We will need a process to keep the House up to date on the next steps and actions that are taken forward. We will do that through the victims and survivors panel that will be established by the Safeguarding Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Yardley (Jess Phillips), and through …”

“I am happy to follow up with the hon. Lady about the very serious issues she raised. She is right that this cannot be about institutions just marking their own homework. That is one of the reasons why we have made the right to review an independent one. For child sexual abuse cases, where victims feel that they have be…”

“I agree. These terrible crimes have been ignored for too long. There are currently 127 major police operations under way on child sexual exploitation and gang grooming, across 29 different police forces. The independent inquiry identified that child sexual exploitation happens across all police force areas and all comm…”

“As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the importance of any independent inquiry is the independence of the decisions made by the chair about how it should be pursued. The inquiry led by Baroness Jay into child sexual abuse took seven years—that was a decision made independently by Baroness Jay and the panel. They took evi…”

“My hon. Friend is right that we need to ensure proper follow-up where there are recommendations. There have been over 500 different recommendations, predominantly around child sexual exploitation, with many more around child sexual abuse much more widely. There is currently not a proper process to be able to follow the…”

“The strongest protection for victims continues to be through police investigations, and of course the police have full powers to pursue investigations wheresoever they may be found. A series of local inquiries have been held in different ways. The inspector investigation into Rotherham, where Baroness Casey was the lea…”

“I thank my hon. Friend for that incredibly important point, and also for the shocking and disturbing story she has told of victims continuing to be silenced, having already been through the most traumatic experiences. They are then continuing to be silenced to protect the children, even though what actually needs to ha…”

“What we need to do is to ensure that the crimes are investigated and that there is proper follow-up in those areas where things have gone badly wrong—and we know that there are some areas where things have gone badly wrong. The first stage has to be for the police to have full powers to pursue these crimes and to follo…”

“I can assure the hon. Member that we are already taking forward some of the recommendations. Some will be in legislation and will take time to pass through Parliament, because legislation also needs to change. We are also taking immediate action to change the victims’ right to review so that if victims have been to the…”

“I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I know this is an area on which he does a lot of work. He is right that the purpose of a national audit by Baroness Casey is to identify the scale and look properly at the characteristics of these appalling crimes right across the country, and then to make further recommendation…”

“It is obviously really important to ensure that there is independent scrutiny. The hon. Member will be aware that the inquiry in Rotherham led by Baroness Louise Casey used inspectorate powers, but it was clearly independent and it managed to uncover serious problems that had gone wrong in Rotherham at that time, so th…”

“The right hon. Member will know that the Minister has referred herself to the ministerial standards adviser, and that is the appropriate way for this to be addressed. More broadly, we take seriously the full range of crimes that our country faces and will continue to work closely with the police always to take action a…”