The Government’s national grooming gang inquiry has suffered another blow with the last remaining contender to lead it pulling out of the process.
Jim Gamble, a former senior police officer, was one of two prospective candidates to lead the probe but is no longer seeking the position, according to Sky News and LBC.
It comes after several survivors of abuse quit the probe and called for the safeguarding minister to be sacked.
Speaking earlier on Wednesday at Prime Minister’s Questions, Sir Keir Starmer defended the Government’s grooming inquiry amid the resignations.
He said "injustice will have no place to hide" and told MPs that Baroness Louise Casey, who has led investigations into group-based child sexual abuse, will support its work.
During a grilling at Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday over the resignation of four women from the inquiry's victims and survivors panel, Sir Keir said the "door will always be open" should they wish to return.
"The inquiry is not and will never be watered down,” he said. “Its scope will not change.
"It will examine the ethnicity and religion of the offenders, and we will find the right person to chair the inquiry.
"I can tell the house today, that Dame Louise Casey will now support the work of the inquiry, and it will get to the truth. Injustice will have no place to hide."
His comments came in response to a question from Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, who asked on behalf of Fiona Goddard, one of the women who quit the panel: "Being dismissed and contradicted by a minister when you're telling the truth takes you right back to that feeling of not being believed all over again.
"Fiona's question is simple: 'What's the point in speaking up if we're just going to be called liars?"'
Ms Badenoch accused the Government of wanting to cover up grooming gangs, as she said victims believed the inquiry would not take proper account of racial and religious motivations.
The Tory leader said: "(Labour) voted against the national inquiry three times, so the victims don't believe them. They can't say 'no' as much as they like, it is on the record. They don't like it, but it's true.
"Now, one of the victims has quit, contrary to what the Prime Minister has just said and what the Home Secretary wrote this morning, they believe that the inquiry will downplay the racial and religious motivations behind their abuse. Aren't the victims right when they call it a cover up?"
Sir Keir replied: "Let me reassure the victims and the House that the scope of the inquiry will not be diluted, and we don't shy away from cultural or religious issues."
The PM said the Government had reopened 1,200 historic closed cases and separately introduced mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse, despite the Conservatives voting against it.
He added: "I happen to think that is a vital safeguard. I've been campaigning for that for over a decade, I asked the last government to introduce it and that fell on deaf ears."
Earlier on Wednesday, Cabinet minister Emma Reynolds had apologised to the survivors for the Government's handling of the inquiry, saying she was "sorry if they felt let down by the process".
In her resignation letter on Monday, Ms Goddard said the process of the inquiry so far had involved "secretive conduct" with instances of "condescending and controlling language" used towards survivors.
She later accused safeguarding minister Jess Phillips of lying for disputing allegations that the probe was being watered down and called on her to stand down from her position.
"It is a blatant lie for Jess Phillips to suggest, as she has done... that it is untrue that there has been possibility or conversation around 'expanding the (inquiry's) scope beyond grooming gangs'," Ms Goddard said.
She also expressed deep reservations about the candidates under consideration to chair the inquiry, one of whom was reportedly a former police chief and the other a social worker.
Annie Hudson, a former director of children's services for Lambeth, has now reportedly withdrawn her candidacy following recent media coverage.
Speaking in the Commons on Tuesday, Ms Phillips said opinions varied among victims as to who would be best suited to the role as she faced questions from MPs about the process.
"I will engage with all the victims, regardless of their opinions, and I will listen to those that have been put in the media, that are put in panels, I will always listen and I will speak to all of them," she said.
Ms Goddard reiterated her call for Ms Phillips to resign on Wednesday.
She said: "It's reassuring to know that this inquiry will now have a specific focus on grooming gangs and will operate in the way Baroness Casey recommended.
"My problem is there is little to no recognition of what Jess Phillips did by nationally calling me a liar when she knew I was telling the truth. I think that there needs to be an apology swiftly followed by Jess Phillips' resignation.
"I do not think a woman that can call a survivor of the grooming gangs a liar publicly to save her own skin should be in a position of protecting and safeguarding women and children.”
