Andrew Norfolk – Bullying rife at council that ignored child abuse

Bullying rife at council that ignored child abuse

Andrew Norfolk Chief Investigative Reporter

The Times, October 14 2014

The former leader of Rotherham council was at the centre of a bullying and sexist culture in which it was difficult for female staff to raise concerns about the exploitation of young teenage girls, MPs have been told.

Roger Stone resigned as the local authority’s long-standing Labour leader after an independent inquiry found that 1,400 girls in the town were subjected to “appalling levels of crime and abuse” during 16 years from 1997, almost all at the hands of men of Pakistani heritage.

The council and police were accused in the inquiry report of failing in their duty to protect vulnerable children. Mr Stone was singled out for criticism when its author, Alexis Jay, gave evidence yesterday to a parliamentary inquiry. Professor Jay, a former chief inspector of social work in Scotland, said that “sexist bullying” designed to put down and undermine women was a feature of the council’s “extremely traditional, male-dominated administration” during a number of years.

“The behaviour of senior people is absolutely critical in determining the ethos and the culture of an organisation. Staff will take their cue from that,” she said. “I don’t think this was an appropriate climate in which to be discussing an issue of such social sensitivity as child sexual exploitation.”

The Labour MP Simon Danczuk asked Professor Jay whether she knew the identity of an individual whose conduct was described in a letter sent to the Commons communities and local government committee by Martin Kimber, the authority’s chief executive.

Mr Kimber was said to have written: “There were challenges largely associated with the dominance of a particular personality within the council, who at times could be very direct.”

Professor Jay said she assumed that Mr Kimber “was referring to the then leader of the council”. Mr Stone led the authority for 11 years until his resignation in August.

Rotherham’s new council leader, Paul Lakin, told MPs that he agreed with Professor Jay’s comments, acknowledging that a “bullying culture did exist” at a senior level. Under his “remote” predecessor, he said, Labour councillors had no access to Mr Stone’s office because “you couldn’t even get through the door to see his secretary”.

Mr Lakin said that Mr Stone initially resisted his request to commission an independent inquiry after reports in The Times revealed the widespread grooming of girls in the town.

Professor Jay told MPs that councillors of Pakistani origin bore some responsibility for the council’s failure to tackle the crime pattern.

 

“It seemed to me that, at a point when they could have facilitated engagement in a very direct way. . . they failed to do so and acted more as a barrier to communication.” It was possible that such councillors “saw themselves as a gateway to the [Pakistani] community and felt they needed to protect its reputation”.