Kemi Badenoch demands grooming gang inquiry backed by Elon Musk

Kemi Badenoch has called for an inquiry into “the rape gangs scandal” after Elon Musk accused Sir Keir Starmer of failing to prosecute them when he led the Crown Prosecution Service.

“The time is long overdue for a full national inquiry into the rape gangs scandal. Trials have taken place all over the country in recent years but no one in authority has joined the dots. 2025 must be the year that the victims start to get justice,” Badenoch wrote on X.

Earlier, Musk called for Tommy Robinson to be freed from prison as he shared the hard-right criminal’s videos in a series of tweets overnight.

The billionaire owner of X and Tesla said a “new election should be called in Britain” due to Starmer’s unpopularity.

He described a YouTube “documentary” produced by Robinson, 41, in which he claims that the courts have been politicised against those on the right, as “worth watching”.

Musk also took aim at Labour’s Jess Phillips, the minister for safeguarding, and said she “deserves to be in prison” after it was reported by GB News that she had rejected calls for a public inquiry into Oldham grooming gangs. “They oppose an inquiry, because it will show that those in power were complicit in the cover-up”, Musk said.

In another tweet, Musk wrote: “In the UK, serious crimes such as rape require the Crown Prosecution Service’s approval for the police to charge suspects. Who was the head of the CPS when rape gangs were allowed to exploit young girls without facing justice? Keir Starmer, 2008-2013. Who is the boss of Jess Phillips right now? Keir Starmer. The real reason she’s refusing to investigate the rape gangs is that it would obviously lead to the blaming of Keir Stamer (head of the CPS at the time).”

Phillips told Oldham council the government’s position was that the Home Office should not intervene and that an inquiry could be held at council level.

As director of public prosecutions, Starmer initiated legal action in 2013 against the Rochdale gangs and launched reforms to how the CPS handles child sex abuse cases.

He has blamed the previous Conservative government for not bringing in a duty to report safeguarding issues and said that ethnicity of “political correctness” should not get in the way of prosecutions.

Robinson, whose real name is Stephan Yaxley-Lennon, was jailed for 18 months in October after admitting to breaching an injunction. A High Court order had barred Robinson, who founded the English Defence League, from repeating libellous allegations against Jamal Hijazi who had successfully sued him.

The solicitor-general issued two contempt claims against Robinson earlier this year, claiming he “knowingly” breached the order on multiple occasions.