Grooming gang inquiry: fears records could have been destroyed after 'delays' in document preservation order
The Home Office waited seven months to issue formal instructions to police forces and other agencies to preserve grooming gang records for the statutory inquiry, it has been revealed.
In a letter to the Home Secretary, the Home Affairs Select Committee has warned that the “failure to issue timely direction” has meant “some records which may be relevant to the Independent Inquiry into Grooming Gangs might have been destroyed”.
In June 2025, Baroness Louise Casey published her audit into child sexual exploitation which called for a national inquiry into the scandal.
At the time, the peer’s report stated that “local authorities, police forces and other relevant agencies should in the meantime be required not to destroy any relevant records”
Through a series of freedom of information requests by Keighley and Ilkley MP Robbie Moore, who is also a member of the select committee, it has emerged that directions were not given to West Yorkshire Police and other local agencies until January this year.
This came after a further warning in December from the newly-appointed inquiry chair Baroness Anne Longfield.
In the Home Affairs Select Committee’s letter to Shabana Mahmood, MPs asked if her department has “asked local authorities, police forces and other relevant agencies whether they have destroyed any records that may be relevant to the Independent Inquiry into Grooming Gangs?”
Mr Moore said: “This is a staggering failure at the heart of Government which once again undermines trust ahead of the national grooming gangs inquiry.
“The department has serious questions to answer about what data may have been lost during that period, the potential legal ramifications of that, and whether the Home Office have been fully transparent with Parliament.
“Trust in this inquiry depends on historic evidence being protected and the Home Office acting with speed and clarity.
“Yet once again, they have acted in a way that undermines public confidence in this process and, most importantly, undermines justice for victims across the country.”
The Home Office said it told other Government departments in September that records should be retained, as set out by Baroness Casey.
After Baroness Longfield’s appointment in December, departmental officials had worked with the peer to pass on requests for retention of documents across the public sector.
A spokesperson said: “We have established the Independent Inquiry into Grooming Gangs to get the answers that victims and survivors of these horrendous crimes deserve.
“Since Baroness Casey’s National Audit, we have worked across Government to ensure records relevant to the draft Terms of Reference are appropriately retained by public sector organisations.
“The Inquiry has the power to order the production of documents and failure to comply with such an order without reasonable excuse is an offence punishable by imprisonment.”
They added that within the Home Office there has been a moratorium on the destruction of material relevant to the former Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), which remains in place.