The cover-up of child abuse by the whole system

Talking about the David Steel suspension and referring to a previous photograph of him with Cyril Smith, Brian Gerrish says: "I chose one of their photographs there as the backdrop because this sums up British politics, doesn`t it? It`s all jovial old boy network where they`re all upstanding right honourable people. And on the left we have the seasoned campaigner. On the right we have the new boy on the block, who`s been brought in. Obviously, that`s a very young Steel in the picture."

With reference to Lord Steel`s remarks at the child abuse inquiry in connection with what he knew about Cyril Smith, Brian Gerrish continues: "And the point that you`ve just made is this: It is effectively what Lord Steel had to say `It had nothing to do with me`. This is utterly incredible... Somebody said a few minutes ago in our chat box: `It`s all coming to the surface` and I think a certain amount is."

"Let`s see what he really said. Lord Steel said he had assumed that Smith had committed the offences, but ... he took no further action because: `It was before he was an MP, before he was even a member of my party. It had nothing to do with me`."

"So it`s almost as though if you get selected to be in a party you`re immediately in the boys` club and you`re protected from anything you`ve been involved in, prior to that. These are amazingly deceptive words that are coming out from this man."

"And, of course, everywhere we probe into politics in UK we`re coming up with the abuse of children. So let`s go on through. He said: `I had already told the inquiry in writing that in my opinion he had been abusing his position in Rochdale Council [that is to gain access to council-run children`s homes], but that had been properly a matter for the police and the council, and not for me as he was neither an MP nor even a member of the Liberal Party at the time`."

"But the statement we`re constantly getting from MPs when you take issues of child abuse to them is: `Oh it`s not in my constituency, you`ll need to go and see the MP [in] whose constituency this crime has taken place`. We`ve experienced this from many many MPs across all the parties. They attempt to hide from doing something about criminality by saying it isn`t in their constituency or `Oh well it`s not in my party`..."

"Lord Steel also described recommending Smith for a knighthood in 1988 and said he did not pass on any allegations about the sexual abuse of children because `I was not aware of any such allegations other than the matter referred to... which appeared to have been fully investigated`."

"David are we to believe that our MPs and senior politicians are so naïve? I can`t accept that. I believe that these people knew. They knew full well. They probably didn`t want to get dirty and touch the tarbaby..."

David Scott responds by asking: "Who were his colleagues at this time? We had Clement Freud; we had Jeremy Thorpe; we had the fat man. It was a very strange company, the Liberals, at this time. Very odd indeed. The nature of the excuses - Yes, it`s partly: `It`s not my concern; I don`t want to know;` partly political cowardice. But also there`s a strange legalising mindset `Oh this has been properly investigated by the authorities therefore I couldn`t possibly comment; it wouldn`t be appropriate`... Very good reasons to do nothing."

Brian Gerrish: "Well we`re going to have a look at some of the ways in which child abuse and the investigation of child abuse is shut down, but let`s carry on with what this good man had to say..."

Lord Steel is reported to have said:  "`I was reinforced in my view by reading the previous report of the inquiry sent to me today, which says inter alia `the Crown Prosecution Service found that the advice which had previously been given could not be faulted (given the law and guidance in place at the time) and that the Honours Scrutiny Committee had seriously considered his nomination for a knighthood and sent a `warning of risk letter` to Margaret Thatcher as PM and that clearly she took a similar view as he was granted the knighthood`."

"So now the smear starts to track around. I knew, or I thought he`d been doing something; certainly I understood enough ... that he was trying to get access to children - but not really my responsibility - but I did point it out to Margaret Thatcher, but she didn`t do anything either. Therefore it must be alright. So we now see the trail leading back into the Conservative party and Margaret Thatcher, as we`ll see in a minute, when we come on to Ted Heath.  But David, this is becoming child`s play, to watch a political system absolutely squirming as more and more evidence comes to the surface, that senior politicians had not only been abusing children, that their whole political system has been covering up that abuse."

David Scott: "Yes. It seems to me that the only thing you need is someone to blame it on. There`s no other requirement. `I have a minimum degree of plausible deniability. I will not actually be criminally convicted over hiding this information. Therefore I hide it. Is that where the bar is ? It seems to be. And I come back to: HE NOMINATED THE MAN FOR A KNIGHTHOOD."

"Correct.."

"This is just disgusting."

"It`s disgusting. It`s as disgusting as Boris Johnson and to me his comments ... mm ... yeah.... So follow it through because we`ve got more to come. Let`s go on: `It`s unfortunate that some sections of the media have chosen to extract certain passages of evidence and present them without the full context. The inquiry has a serious and sensitive job to undertake and spinning evidence to generate sensationalist headlines only serves to distract from the panel`s search of the truth`."

Mike Robinson reminds listeners and viewers: "But the panel isn`t searching for the truth."

There`s a slight laugh from Gerrish: "I`m coming there Mike. But here, what is he doing? He`s using the key bit of now trying to turn the whole .... thing on its head. It`s the nasty media who are spinning the truth by actually telling the truth. But as you`ve said, quite rightly, if we take that last comment there, he said er `spinning evidence to generate sensationalist headlines only serves to distract from the panel`s search of ... the truth`. But the panel is not searching for the truth because the panel has said so. So we`ve got Ms Jay herself saying: `This investigation is not examining the truth or otherwise of the individual allegations`."

"So I don`t know why Lord Steel should have his knickers in quite such a big twist because the panel is not investigating anything ... What`s he so frightened of ? I DON`T KNOW."

"Well let`s bring in the leader of the Lib Dems because Vince Cable has been remarkably silent. I could not find anything that had been reported in the media - maybe I missed it - but I couldn`t find anything where the leader of this illustrious Lib Dem party has commented on the matter. And David I think it`s very interesting that at least the party north of the border have the courage to actually say: `Well you know we`re going to deal with this matter`."

"So follow on through... We better bring in Nick Clegg and remember that back in 2010 Nick Clegg was leading the tributes to [quote] `larger-than-life ex-MP Sir Cyril Smith`. He said he was deeply saddened to hear of his death. He praised the veteran figure who was famous for his distinctive appearance and frequent television appearances - there`s a nice link into the BBC - But a little bit later, 2013, we got the Guardian reporting that Nick Clegg ignored letters from lawyers where victims were coming forward and talking about what Cyril Smith had been up to. And then here we`ve got the [Evening] Standard ... April 2014 where Clegg is trying to claim that he had no inkling of Cyril Smith`s `repugnant actions`. We are to believe that Nick Clegg led this very small party where I`m sure nobody could sneeze without the rest of the party knowing about it, but he didn`t know."

"And what now happens to Nick Clegg?  Well let`s remind ourselves that he`s now earning a million pounds a year working in Facebook and supposedly Facebook is now working hard to protect children. But Nick Clegg couldn`t do that when he was ... leader of the party, so is he going to do it within Facebook? Well I don`t know."

"I had a little look at Facebook`s commitment to child safety - and it`s only child safety online - it`s not actually protecting children - but it said at the bottom of the block of text: `For more information visit Facebook`s Family Safety Centre` which I did, but unfortunately that page was not available..."

Mike Robinson interjects with: "They`re not taking it seriously..."

"Well here he is: Nick Clegg, July 2014: `Allegations of Westminster paedophile ring are a `police matter` - Now we know what happens when people report it to the police, such as Jon Wedger, a policeman himself - the whole thing is shut down. So basically he`s saying he wants the truth to come out and justice to be done. `We`re dealing with allegations of such a serious criminal nature`. But a year before he was saying he didn`t know anything about it."

"Then there`s comment from Lord Brittan: `Initially stated yesterday that he had asked officials to look into the issue, and did not recall being contacted further about these matters by Home Office officials or by Mr Dickens (MP Geoffrey Dickens who prepared a vast document on abuses of children by politicians.) Brittan went on to say: `The Home Office independent review is entirely consistent with the action I set out in my earlier statement. Whilst I could not recall what further action was taken 30 years ago, the information contained in this report shows that appropriate action and follow-up happened`."
 

 

"Well if you consider cover-up appropriate action they did a very good job. Here he is, the Tory who discovered Nick Clegg. So Nick Clegg was one of Leon Brittan`s European boys. He was trained up in politics in the European system by Lord Brittan. This is a very very close little relationship. David, just a brief comment because I`ve got a little video clip that I want to show and then we can discuss it further."
 
"Do I not recall the Dickens dossier which exposed a good deal of this ended up in the hands of a north England local newspaper editor who was then incriminated by people including Cyril Smith."

"That is absolutely correct. But in fact the worst intimidation came from security services and senior police who told him that if he didn`t get rid of his information he was likely to have a very bad life. And of course that journalist was happy to talk about this openly a couple of years ago. He was silenced by the state from exposing the abuse of children by British politicians."

David Scott. "That`s the critical point... it`s the apparatus of the state that is being deployed by the likes of Cyril Smith for their own ends."

"Correct. So let`s just have a look at this little video clip..."

"This is Sonia Poulton and Bill Maloney who confronts Nick Clegg... Just watch what Nick Clegg does. You`ll see that very quickly..... he`s off."

 

i

"What did Bill Maloney say? `Nick ... four years ago I asked you what you were going to do about institutional paedophile rings operating in this country. Now... your reply to me was I don`t know what you mean by institutional paedophile rings ..."

"So I`ll leave our audience to think about that and Nick Clegg`s reactions."

"But I was slightly, I think, upset by some of the Lib Dem material where they were reporting Lord Steel`s membership suspension here. They closed the web page to comments. So clearly the public is not to comment on this issue. But when I looked at the Lib Deb party itself they are using this little image of a little girl to advertise the party. David, I saw this, and I thought: is it me being a little bit over-sensitive because of what`s happened? Why would you need an image of a little girl in order to advertise the Lib Dem party ?" 

 

"I don`t know. It`s a very strange choice..."

"Now we`re very short of time but let`s bring this in because going back to 2013, the UK Column produced: `Who nominated Jimmy Savile for his Knighthood?`"

"Let`s have a look at what we established..."

"Following a request for information on Jimmy Savile by Freedom of Information the Commission responded:" 

"Information request for `who nominated Jimmy Savile for a knighthood and the identities of those who offered letters of support`."

"Thank you for your correspondence dated `7 January 2012 in which you state you wish to have disclosure of who nominated Jimmy Savile for a knighthood and the identities of those who offered letters of support. You have stated that The Honours Committee is unable to provide this information, which you believe to be in the public interest."

"The Cabinet Office administers the honours system and details of that process are published at https://www.gov.uk/honours. However Honours Committees are not directly subject to the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FoIA) as the UK honours system is overseen by the Cabinet Office Honours and Appointments Secretariat."

"And finally we were told this:"

"Additionally there is a specific exemption under Section 37 of the FoIA in regard to information relating to the conferring by the Crown of any honour or dignity and further guidance can be found on our website at the `Freedom of Information Act Awareness Guidance No 26: Communications with Her Majesty and the Awarding of Honours and Nature of the honours nomination process and the public interest`."

"So we have got a secret system there running right to the monarchy itself which is prepared to protect people who abuse children and are given awards. This is a little bit obvious in my opinion, David, that we have the full collusion of the state here."

==================== 

The programme ends with a discussion of the Times article: `Shamed politician`s daughter has job looking after Rotherham abuse victims`.

 

"The daughter of a disgraced politician who was implicated in the Rotherham sex-grooming scandal has been placed in charge of a support service for the town`s abuse victims. Norsheen Akhtar runs child sexual exploitation (CSE) programs for Rotherham Rise, a charity that receives most of its funding from the council. Her father Jahangir Akhtar, resigned as the council`s deputy leader in 2013 after he was implicated in the scandal."

 
"And I think it comments on her brothers there but I can`t remember exactly what was said. Now to me this is the circling of wagons. This is people desperately trying to protect themselves."

Mike Robinson: "Now just as a final comment While we`re talking about Rotherham and Rochdale - these are two areas where in recent years Asian paedophile rings have been in operation and there`s been a lot of scandal about that, but what Cyril Smith demonstrates because he was Rochdale counsellor and Rochdale MP is that the issue of child abuse in Rochdale has been one that`s gone back decades before any Asians were there. So, you know, the Asian paedophile rings could only have operated - and this has been a point that we`ve been trying to make for a very long time - could only have operated with the support of people within the councils and the police in those towns and so Cyril Smith demonstrates that, doesn`t he?"

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZrf1tMP2xA