Whistleblower says government failures 'allowed sex abuse'

The government has "effectively allowed the abuse" of thousands of children to take place because it has failed to implement some recommendations following an inquiry into child sexual exploitation, the High Court has been told.

The Maggie Oliver Foundation is seeking to take legal action against the Home Office over its alleged failure to adopt all of the 20 major reforms suggested after the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA).

To proceed, the foundation must prove to a High Court judge that its claim is "arguable". The Home Office argued ministers were not obliged to implement IICSA's recommendations.

The hearing, before Mr Justice Kimblin, is due to conclude later.

Concluding in 2022, IICSA lasted seven years and cost £200m.

It was launched to examine how public and private institutions failed to protect children from sexual abuse.

Oliver, who attended the High Court hearing, set up her foundation after leaving Greater Manchester Police, where she was a whistleblower about the force's inaction over grooming gangs.

Christopher Jacobs, representing the foundation, told the court 17 of the 20 IICSA recommendations had not been implemented as of 8 July 2025.

The three at the centre of the claim relate to recording the age, ethnicity, religion and occupation of perpetrators of child sexual abuse, ending the use of pain-inducing restraint on children in custody, and ensuring those in care have greater access to justice.

Jacobs said about 500,000 children are sexually abused every year and that the government has "effectively allowed the abuse to continue" by taking an "inconsistent and arbitrary approach" to IICSA's recommendations.

In written submissions, he said: "The claimant maintains that the obfuscations, denials and delays by successive governments in implementing the thorough and extensively reasoned recommendations of the seven-year inquiry must have contributed to thousands of otherwise preventable cases of sexual abuse and exploitation of children over the last three-and-a-half years."

Jacobs also said the government was failing to set a timetable for when these recommendations will be implemented.

He added: "The failure by successive governments to respond to the ongoing threat of child sexual abuse and child sexual exploitation is a matter of national importance and urgency."

Jack Anderson, for the Home Office, said in written submissions that the claim was "not arguable".

He said: "The government is not obliged to implement the recommendations of IICSA - they are recommendations, but no more than that."

The barrister also said Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood had "accepted in full" the four recommendations that related to her department, while the statement from the previous home secretary was "not a clear, precise and unambiguous representation that the recommendations of the IICSA will be implemented".

In relation to setting a timetable, Anderson said the government "wants to get policy right and that takes time".

He added: "The government has indicated the steps it is taking, but not all of them can be assigned a definite end-date having regard to the desirability of consulting stakeholders, the policy work required and the myriad pressures on public business."