You can almost smell the panic. Every Left-wing activist and pundit is frantically trying to defend Labour’s refusal to hold a full national inquiry into the grooming gangs scandal.

The British are renowned for their class system, their tea-drinking, and, now that Elon Musk has told the world about it, the grooming, rape, trafficking, and torture of underage girls by gangs of mostly Pakistani Muslim origin.

Safeguarding minister Jess Phillips’ decision to block a public inquiry into the Oldham grooming gangs seems, from the outside, to be almost inexplicable. Children were raped and abused by gangs of men while the authorities failed to protect them.

MPs voted down the Tories' proposal to launch a fresh inquiry last night - but the issue is not likely to go away.

MPs in Berkshire have voted on a push to launch a new public inquiry into grooming gangs and the sexual exploitation of vulnerable women and girls.