Rotherham victims 'left without answers' as staff and councillors stay silent

It came after dozens of former council employees and councillors refused to participate in investigations that attempted to further expose what had happened in the authority between 1997 and 2013, when an estimated 1,400 children were the victims of sexual exploitation – largely at the hands of men with a Pakistani-heritage background.

Around £440,000 of public money was spent commissioning the independent inquiries in the wake of the damning reports into the council’s response to the issue by Professor Alexis Jay and Dame Louise Casey.

One abuse victim told a heated council meeting at Rotherham Town Hall: “We have not got answers, we deserve answers, that is what we want.

“All we have got is that we have spent lots of public money for this report for people to tell us no answers. We are not going to stop, we deserve it.”

Speaking after the meeting, Sammy Woodhouse, an abuse victim who waived her anonymity earlier this year, said little has been uncovered that was not already know.

“I want people held accountable and it just feels like it’s never going to happen,” she said.

“I think it’s been a waste of time and a waste of money.

“We’ve got the same answers over and over again like we did in all the other reports.

“I feel they’ve just looked at the Jay Report and rewritten it all again.”

She said she was particularly angry that some former senior council leaders had failed to contribute to the investigations. “I think that some professionals haven’t spoke speaks volumes. They’re getting on with their lives now and we’re picking up the pieces,” she said.

“We want people to be held accountable. There just seem so many obstacles and it’s never going to happen.”

Jayne Senior, a former youth worker who helped expose the scandal and is now a Labour councillor, said it was “disgraceful” some former council professionals had failed to co-operate.

“For some of the victims and survivors and families in Rotherham, they’ve waited 15 or 20 years to get some answers to what went wrong and why they were failed. More importantly – who failed them and who was responsible for that? One of the more shocking things for me today is that nobody’s going to be held accountable.

“Those reports need to be looked at from a criminal angle as well now. We know how badly, from every report, that people were failed. Somebody has got to take responsibility for that.”

Rotherham MP Sarah Champion said: “I had hoped that today’s publication of the reports would draw a line under the catalogue of errors that led to our children being let down so badly by those supposed to protect them.

"However, despite these huge failures, leading to at least 1,400 victims being let down, it appears that no individual at RMBC has yet been held to account for their role.

“How is Rotherham meant to have confidence that this will never happen again unless we know exactly what went wrong?”

Council 'can't stop pensions of former employees'

Rotherham Council has no power to take action against former staff thought to have let down abuse victims.

Lawyer Mark Greenburgh, author of one of the reports, said “there’s simply little or anything that Rotherham Council can do” to take action against former senior staff.

He said there was no realistic prospect of affecting pension payments to former employees as such action could only be taken following a criminal conviction.

Mr Greenburgh said: “The prospect of being able to take any action in relation to pensions is too remote to warrant any consideration.”

He added that he had no powers to compel former members of staff or councillors to be interviewed.