The former children’s minister Tim Loughton is considering using parliamentary privilege – immunity from legal action for a politician speaking in parliament – to “name and shame” high-profile past members of parliament suspected to be paedophiles.
Loughton, writing in the Daily Mail, is responding to the government’s decision not to implement an over-arching inquiry into the historical allegations of a paedophile ring operating in Westminster in the Eighties. A dossier containing the details of the allegations passed on to the then home secretary Leon Brittan has been lost – a revelation about which Loughton says he’s “gravely concerned”.
Both No 10 and the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg have voiced their belief that it’s best for the police to pursue these fresh inquiries, rather than launching a full inquiry into the alleged past ring of MP paedophiles. Clegg has said the police are in the “best position” to deal with the allegations, rather than the government calling an inquiry.
He added:
My view is, given the very serious criminal nature of these allegations, namely that there was a circle of people who hid what they were doing… abusing vulnerable children in children’s homes, the only way to deliver justice, even in the years afterwards, is allow the police to get to the bottom of these things.
A spokesperson for the PM said: “If there are allegations or evidence then people should bring them forward to the appropriate authorities… We are saying very clearly that where there is wrong-doing it is absolutely right it should be the police who look into these matters.”
But Loughton, the Labour MP Simon Danczuk who has been at the forefront of fighting for these investigations, and 130 MPs who have been backing Danczuk’s call for a “Hillsborough-style” inquiry, will be disappointed by this response.
The Home Office has until Monday to account for the missing dossier under the instruction of home affairs select committee chair Keith Vaz MP. With this development in sight, and Loughton’s threat to name names, it looks like this story – which has so far remained relatively under the radar – will be significantly bigger next week.
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