‘Cover-up culture’ still rife at Labour-run council where hundreds of children abused

Angela Rayner grilled on ‘departure’ of Labour members

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Tim Briggs is Lambeth Borough Council’s sole Conservative member and spoke after a damning report by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) was released yesterday. It said that paedophiles felt “untouchable” at the Labour-run council where hundreds of vulnerable children were sexually and physically abused over decades.

The hard-left council was dominated by a “culture of cover-up” and a “lack of concern for the day-to-day lives of children in its care”, the report found.

Much of the abuse happened while the council was dominated by one-time communist “Red” Ted Knight – a supporter of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.

And during the 1980s it tried to “take on” Margaret Thatcher’s Tory government to the detriment of local services, it said.

Mr Briggs claims he believed that thankfully children in the council’s care were no longer being sexually or physically abused.

However he claimed that a “one-party state mentality” still exists in the council.

And despite it running Lambeth for the past 50 years – it continually “tries to spin a narrative that central government is to blame for everything”.

He told Express.co.uk: “The whole culture at Lambeth is ‘it’s all the Government’s fault’.

“They present this narrative because they claim that the Government hasn’t given them enough money.

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“It’s been going on for 50 years. But they never talk about the figures because they’ve got enough money.

“But they put out this narrative because it divides people from the mainstream. It keeps them poor and keeps them voting Labour.

“My point is that apart from children not being abused sexually and physically, the council has never in the best part of 50 years had a discussion about how this was allowed to happen and how things have moved on.

“In my view, the culture of cover-up hasn’t moved on.

“The money spent on PR and getting the message right and spending money on propaganda is still there.

“That culture hasn’t really changed in 50 years.”

The damning report laid into the actions of the Labour Party during its decades-long rule of Lambeth.

It said: “During that time, children in care became pawns in a toxic power game within Lambeth Council and between the council and central government.

“This turmoil and failure to act to improve children’s social care continued into the 1990s and beyond.”

“Bullying, intimidation, racism and sexism thrived” within the council, all of which was set within a context of corruption and financial mismanagement which permeated much of its operations, it said.

The damning report revealed that employees in the south London borough treated vulnerable children “as if they were worthless”.

It added: “As a consequence, individuals who posed a risk to children were able to infiltrate children’s homes and foster care, with devastating, life-long consequences for their victims.

“For several decades, senior staff and councillors at Lambeth Council failed to effect change, despite overwhelming evidence that children in its care did not have the quality of life and protection to which they were entitled, and were being put at serious risk of sexual abuse.

“When systemic failures were identified, time and again they were minimised and levels of risk ignored.”

It heard evidence of children being raped, indecently assaulted and sexually abused.

Following 705 complaints from former residents across three facilities, only one member of senior staff was ever disciplined.

It estimated the number of those abused was likely much higher, while the Metropolitan Police was advised to consider an investigation into one boy who died in a care home in 1977, having previously complained of being abused by a senior member of staff.

Claire Holland, Lambeth council leader, said the council was “deeply sorry” for its failings.

She added: “Lambeth Council fully accepts the recommendations from this inquiry and will continue to strive to improve the care we provide to children and young people.”

Commander Alex Murray, from the Met Police, said: “We are sorry for when we let children in the care of Lambeth down.”

He added: “We have received the recommendation by IICSA namely ‘the death of LA‑A2 whether the Met should consider whether there are grounds for a criminal investigation into Lambeth Council’s actions when providing information to the coroner about the circumstances surrounding LA‑A2’s death’, which we will now assess.”

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