controlling her exploitation continued to expect her to attend “jobs” throughout this period. The lockdown did not reduce the level of contact or demand placed on her. Following this period, the trafficking began to reduce gradually. Kate received a positive ‘Conclusive Grounds’ decision through the National Referral Mechanism, confirming that she was a victim of trafficking and exploitation. The grooming behaviours to which Kate was subjected did not follow the “boyfriend model” or grooming tactics that are often associated with child sexual exploitation. Instead, the abuse she experienced was based primarily on blackmail, coercion, and threats. From the outset, the individuals involved used fear, intimidation, and control rather than affection or persuasion to entrap and exploit her. The demographics of the men abusing Kate were mixed. The first group who trafficked and exploited her were primarily White British or from Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller backgrounds. As she got older and was trafficked more widely, the primary abuser demographics were Pakistani, Bangladeshi, and Bengali Muslims. The other victims she encountered were almost exclusively White British. Kate was repeatedly subject to racially and religiously motivated, and “being white was repeatedly used as a justification for the abuse or to minimise or dismiss the harm being inflicted.” Kate was verbally attacked and demeaned because of her religion, including being mocked for wearing a cross and being told that “her Christian faith offered her no protection.” The abusers regularly suggested that “her God had abandoned her.” Comments were constantly made suggesting that white girls and Christian girls were viewed as having degraded moral character or lower value, whereas Muslim girls were described by some of the men as having dignity and higher moral standing. Kate has participated in this Inquiry because she feels “a personal responsibility to speak up for the many girls across the country who are unable to do so” and to “help ensure that the realities of this form of exploitation are understood, and that meaningful change can be achieved.” The systems that should have protected Kate did not recognise the risks she was facing, did not respond 98

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effectively when concerns were raised, and in some cases, she feels, “contributed to the harm by dismissing or disbelieving what was happening.” For powerful testimony sourced from beyond our hearings, see Appendix I. 99

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Whistleblo w er Testimon y Whistleblowers who tried to expose the rape gangs were systematically silenced, discredited, and punished. On occasion, their careers and reputations were also tarnished. Social care professionals, campaigners, and public activists who raised evidence of still ongoing grooming, trafficking, financial abuse of children in care, and institutional cover-ups faced suspension, defamation proceedings, dawn raids, asset freezes, fabricated charges, gagging bail conditions, and career-ending isolation. Authorities assured them that full investigations had taken place when none had occurred and records were destroyed. Senior officers and elected members acknowledged concerns as credible yet took no remedial action. The state did not merely ignore whistleblowers; it punished them to protect the gangs and its own reputation. We wished to correct for that, so we invited these whistleblowers to our Inquiry. Below are some of their testimonies. ‘ A social w orker ’ Our whistleblower social worker is an experienced children’s social care professional with nearly four decades of service. Her specialist work focused on leaving care services and safeguarding highly vulnerable young people. In February 2018, she raised extensive whistleblowing disclosures concerning financial abuse of young people, misuse of public funds, unlawful sanctions, illegal evictions, racism towards children in care, and systemic failures to safeguard against sexual and criminal exploitation. She was assured that a comprehensive investigation would occur. In the event, responses were delayed, fragmented, and opaque. Senior officers later acknowledged that financial abuse was likely but claimed proof was impossible due to missing records. She was informed that shredders had been purchased at units and that records may have been destroyed. Despite this, the disclosure was deemed “reviewed” without her ever having been interviewed. 101

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She describes repeated safeguarding failures witnessed while she was Interim Co‑Manager of semi‑independent units, including children with severe mental health needs placed unsafely, repeated missing episodes, untreated exploitation risks, and delayed police or mental health intervention. Her evidence illustrates escalating harm, including self‑harm, sexual exploitation, criminal exploitation, and unlawful housing practices. After raising these concerns, she experienced retaliation, including removal of payments, suspension based on unfounded allegations, and professional isolation. Senior leadership and elected members repeatedly failed to engage meaningfully with her concerns. She concludes that the local council prioritised reputational and financial considerations over child safety, leaving ongoing risks unaddressed. Ca v en Vines ( Rotherham campaigner ) Caven compiled multi-agency records from 2003 onwards. These showed that police, councils, and MPs knew about organised grooming by Pakistani Muslim gangs years before any public admission. Vines engaged with national media and provided evidence to senior officials. He states that one of the interviews in which he partook – namely, with Sky News – was misrepresented, which led to defamation proceedings that rendered him bankrupt and ruined much of his life. He alleges perjury by MPs and a failure by police to investigate it. The pattern demonstrates that early whistleblowing on institutional awareness produced retaliation rather than protection for victims. Tomm y Robinson ( National Acti v ist ) Tommy Robinson documented grooming patterns after the exploitation of a close female relative at age 14. He heard hundreds of similar accounts from families across England. When he formed the English Defence League and spoke publicly, South Yorkshire Police allegedly subjected him to repeated arrests and dawn raids on his family homes. He reportedly also faced fabricated charges, asset freezes, and threats that forced repeated relocations. The state treated public whistleblowing on the ethnic and religious patterns of the gangs as more 102

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dangerous than the gangs themselves. After Robinson repeatedly detailed the scale of Muslim grooming gangs across Britain, the state responded with targeted legal action that in effect silenced him. In May 2018, he livestreamed outside Leeds Crown Court while defendants in a major grooming gang trial were entering the building. He was immediately arrested for breaching the peace and charged with contempt of court for violating reporting restrictions that protected the defendants. He was sentenced to 13 months in prison on the same day. Although released after two months on appeal, the case was reheard and in July 2019 he was resentenced to nine months imprisonment. This sentence combined six months for the Leeds offence with three months for breaking an earlier suspended contempt order related to a similar incident at Canterbury Crown Court in 2017. The timing and nature of these prosecutions to many suggest clear retaliation. Robinson had been one of the most high profile voices highlighting the grooming gang scandal at a time when authorities in Rotherham, Rochdale, and elsewhere were still denying its existence or suppressing evidence. Instead of investigating the gangs he identified, the state focused its resources on imprisoning the man who had drawn public attention to them. The contempt charges ensured that his reporting on ongoing trials was criminalised while the grooming networks continued to operate. There is a prima facie case that the repeated use of the courts against Robinson was not about fair justice, but about punishing one of the individuals who forced the grooming gang scandal into the open long before official institutions were willing to act. ‘ Fred ’ ‘Fred’ is a father and information technology specialist with approximately six years’ experience in child protection work. His involvement began after his own daughters were groomed offline by a former partner of their mother. His eldest daughter recognised the risk and disclosed the situation, enabling Fred to intervene promptly and protect his children. This experience prompted him to join an online child protection team. For around two years, Fred worked as a decoy, posing as a child online to 103

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identify adults seeking to groom and sexually exploit children. He was exposed to highly disturbing sexual communications, which had a severe psychological impact and eventually led him to step back from decoy duties. Leveraging his professional background, Fred shifted his focus to developing tools for digital tracking, perpetrator identification, and forensic evidence gathering. His work is designed to produce court-ready evidence. He has collaborated with multiple British child protection teams and interfaced with various police forces, including specialist online child protection units. To date, Fred has assisted in the identification, tracking, and reporting of nearly 1,300 suspected child sexual predators. These cases have resulted in arrests, prosecutions, and convictions. At least four cases involved attempted child trafficking. He has also identified and provided technical data leading to the shutdown of approximately 30 deep web servers hosting large volumes of child sexual abuse material. Fred has observed that many offenders are repeat perpetrators, with some convicted multiple times. In his view, rehabilitation is ineffective for this category of offender, and current sentencing practices frequently fail to act as a deterrent, with some individuals receiving only community orders despite strong evidence. Fred believes that online grooming could be substantially reduced or eliminated through existing technology and artificial intelligence. Such systems could detect grooming behaviours in real time based on established models. A recurring pattern in the cases Fred has supported is that the vast majority of suspects initiate contact with decoys, suggesting they are actively targeting multiple children. He highlighted one specific case on one platform involving an individual who presented publicly as a Quran and Arabic tutor linked to a mosque and teaching centre at two universities. Extensive digital evidence, including chat logs, IP data, and location information, was submitted to the Police. Despite this, the individual appeared to leave Britain shortly after, later resurfacing in the 104

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country and abroad while the investigation remained open. Fred expressed concern about the lack of apparent action in this case despite strong evidence, and noted subsequent cyberattacks on his systems originating from the Middle East. Fred has faced direct personal threats, including a life threat from a serious repeat offender with prior convictions for abduction, torture, and rape. Fred provided this testimony to highlight the scale of online grooming, technological opportunities for prevention, and systemic gaps that allow perpetrators to continue offending. 105

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Demographics and Culture Perpetrators from Pakistani Muslim and other Muslim backgrounds formed the core of the rape gangs nationwide. They operated under an honour and shame clan code that treated non-Muslim girls, especially white working-class girls, as property available for sexual use because these girls had no male protectors who could retaliate. The men began by showering the girls with attention, gifts, alcohol, and drugs. This then escalated to coercion, gang rape, and trafficking. They transported victims across towns, shared them with friends and family, and sometimes forced conversions to Islam followed by religious marriages. The Muslim men justified the abuse by describing White British girls as “easy,” “trash” or morally inferior. The same networks targeted Sikh girls until Sikh communities mobilised collective male protection and forced the gangs to withdraw. British girls were not permitted such a defence. This religiously framed exploitation was repeated in every major town and city and beyond. Britain has seen a series of high-profile convictions for organised group-based child sexual exploitation, commonly referred to as “grooming gangs.” However, the number of convictions amount only to a small proportion of the men who carried out the crimes. In cases where perpetrators of Pakistani heritage were named publicly in court records or reports, their names have consistently been Muslim in character. According to the 2021 Census for England and Wales, around 93% of individuals identifying as Pakistani by ethnicity also identified as Muslim, with only about 1% following another religion (the remainder having no faith recorded). Researcher Peter McLoughlin in Easy Meat (2016) compiled a comprehensive list of grooming gang convictions from 1997 to 2018 (with updates in subsequent analyses), drawing from published court outcomes. His examination of names indicated that approximately 87% of those convicted bore distinctively Muslim names, which was a figure echoed in related analyses far exceeding the Muslim 106

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proportion (around 6%) of the general population of Britain. 13 The majority of these convicted groups consisted entirely of men from Muslim backgrounds. These groups are predominantly of Pakistani heritage, especially when the group exceeds ten or more members. The larger group size dynamic of Pakistani perpetrators is on display in major prosecutions and official reviews from locations such as Rochdale, Rotherham, Huddersfield, Oxford, Telford, and others. Other convictions have involved groups primarily composed of Muslims from non-Pakistani origins, demonstrating that the issue is not necessarily confined to one ethnic group: ● Two Somali-origin gangs in Bristol. ● A mainly African-heritage gang in Banbury. ● Three Iranians in Chelmsford. ● Three Syrians and one Kuwaiti in Newcastle. ● Two Turkish men in Somerset. ● A Romanian rape gang in Rotherham. ● The large Newcastle “Operation Sanctuary” case, involving 17 men and one woman from diverse Muslim backgrounds: Albanian, Kurdish, Bangladeshi, Indian, Turkish, Iranian, Iraqi, Pakistani, and Eastern European heritage. Nearly all published names were Islamic. These patterns are drawn from judicial proceedings, sentencing records, official inquiries (such as those into Rotherham, Rochdale, and others), and public reporting on concluded cases. Recent developments, including ongoing reviews and data audits (e.g., national audits and reopened historic cases), continue to examine the scale, characteristics, and patterns of such offending. With regard to the scale of the crimes, this is reflected in conviction records, police data from relevant force areas, and audits – all of which note overrepresentation of South Asian/Pakistani-heritage men in certain group-based cases while acknowledging data limitations on ethnicity 13 See Peter McLoughlin, Easy Meat: Inside Britain’s Grooming Gang Scandal (Nashville, TN: New English Review Press, 2016). 107

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nationwide. Smaller non-Muslim groups often feature different dynamics or victim profiles compared with the classic multi-offender “grooming” model in larger operations. The term “Asian” has frequently been applied in media, official statements, and public discourse to describe the perpetrators in grooming gang cases across Britain. This broad labelling can be misleading, however, because Britain hosts a substantial number of non-Muslim Asian populations, such as Hindus and Sikhs from India, Buddhists from Japan, and Christians from the Philippines and Vietnam. These populations have, with only very rare exceptions, had no involvement in these offences. In fact, members of these communities have more often appeared as victims than as perpetrators in the grooming gang cases that have come to light. Dr. Ella Hill, a survivor of the Rotherham grooming gangs and now a qualified doctor, has courageously shared her experiences and reflections in multiple public forums, including testimony to the 2022 Jay Inquiry, a July 2020 podcast interview, and a 2018 article in The Independent . Her report is entirely consistent with the evidence that was heard at The Rape Gang Inquiry. Following years of repeated sexual violence, severe beatings, and attempted murder by her abusers, her family members were forced to change their surnames and relocate to another part of the country so that she could complete her schooling and later pursue and obtain a medical degree. In her accounts, Dr. Hill has consistently described the abuse as being both racially and religiously aggravated. She was explicitly told during the rapes that the attacks were happening because she was white and because she was Christian. She explained that she was initially groomed and then trafficked by a Pakistani Muslim boyfriend to groups of Muslim men. She was repeatedly taken to various houses and flats where she was raped, physically assaulted, and tortured. Even after she tried to escape and hide, her main perpetrator tracked her down, broke into her home, and attempted to kill her on five separate occasions. She survived 108

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these attacks but was left with extensive lacerations and bruising. On at least five occasions she approached the police, presenting medical evidence of her injuries, yet each time she was told there was nothing they could do and her evidence was not accepted. Dr. Hill has emphasised that the verbal abuse she endured was saturated with both racial and religious slurs. While being beaten she was repeatedly called “a white slag,” “a white whore,” “a white cunt,” and simultaneously condemned as a non-Muslim who deserved punishment for failing to follow Islamic rules. Her abusers, she said, operated according to what she termed “Grooming Gang Ideology” under which they believed their crimes were religiously justified. In fuller detail, in her submission incorporated into Associate Professor Lisa Oakley’s evidence to the 2022 Jay Inquiry, Dr. Hill stated: “ I was told that I must respect their religion. This was the fi rst of many confusing lies that I was forced to believe. I was told that to show them (Muslims) respect, I mustn’t eat pork. I was told that Muslim girls are good and pure, and stay virgins until marriage, but all white girls are slags, and they all sleep with hundreds of people. I was told white girls are trash. They are all whores. They are lower than shit under your shoe. They don’t obey Allah, so they deserve to be punished. They don’t dress modestly. Muslim women are pure because they cover down to their ankles, and down to their wrists, and the hem of their top comes down below their knees. White girls show the curves of their body, so they are asking for it. They should be raped as punishment for not obeying Allah. Kaffir [non-Muslim] girls are worthless. Sex with a kaffir girl doesn’t count as adultery (only sex with a Muslim woman counts as adultery). If you’re not a virgin before marriage you should be beaten. Many times I was told that the Quran says, “If one of your wives disobeys you, beat her.” This was often quoted to me before they beat me with their hands. They believed they had a position of religious moral superiority over “nonbelievers.” They believed it was their duty to punish us, as they believed that doing so made them good Muslims. This is what they were taught by their mothers. They were taught that witches in Pakistan are blonde, so blondes are more evil, and they deserve worse punishment. I was told that in Islam, if a girl or woman looks at a man who isn’t her brother, father or her husband, then that means she wants to have sex with him. So I 109

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was told to look at the fl oor when I was around Muslim men. So when I did look at a waiter in a restaurant, I was then taken away to be gang raped as “punishment.” I was told that according to their faith community, girls are old enough for sex when they start their periods (at age eleven). Many of us had to endure the sexual act of ‘thighing’ [Arabic mufākhadhah ] which I’m now told is a religiously-sanctioned way of molesting children according to some Islamic scriptures. (You have to lie down on your back with your legs straight together, and they straddle you and fuck between your thighs). I was beaten, strangled, su ff ocated, and my head held under water, tortured, kicked, and raped over 100 times. I was told that if you don’t scream when you’re raped, then you’re consenting to the rape, so you should be stoned to death. I was told that Muslim girls know this (because the Quran says that Aisha’s silence was her consent to the marriage to Mohammed). So Muslim girls know to scream, but white girls don’t, so that’s their fault then, because they’re not Muslim. When I did wear a headscarf to try to protect myself from being raped, I was told to get it o ff , and they raped me again. (I now know that all these so-called “ways to protect yourself from being raped” are “rape-myths” used to excuse perpetrator’s criminal behaviour.) They threatened to kill my parents if my parents tried to stop me seeing them. I was intimidated with guns, and threatened with body parts being cut o ff with knives. When I tried to escape I was told that I had o ff ended their honour, so they had to spill my blood. They did this in an honour attack. All of the sexual abuse that I experienced was linked to spiritual abuse or religious abuse. Religious scriptures were used as tools of control to force me to conform to their will. I was not allowed to question these religious beliefs. They used their religious “moral authority” and self-proclaimed elitism to control me through use of scripture, forced confessions, censorship of decision making, requirement of secrecy and silence, isolation, excessive shaming and punishment around sexuality, and requiring unquestioning obedience. I experienced this as a deeply personal, terrifying physical, emotional and spiritual attack. Every time they quoted scripture it was very hard to argue with; to them it was like I was arguing with God. To me it was actually like I was arguing with the devil. They used their so-called “religious moral authority” to do the most horri fi c, immoral acts imaginable. ” 14 The entirely typical experiences of survivors known as ‘Sarah’ and ‘Anna’ – both 14 The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, Witness Statement of Professor Lisa Ruth Oakley, pp. 4-5. 110

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of whom were helped by the Christian Legal Centre – provide further illustration of the religious elements reported in some grooming gang cases. Sarah endured a 12-year ordeal after being kidnapped from the street at the age of 15. During this period she was repeatedly drugged with Valium, beaten, and raped. At one point, her abuser presented her with a certificate from the mosque and declared that they were married according to Islamic rites. Later, he divorced her under sharia procedure simply by stating “I divorce you” three times. She was then immediately married in a ceremony conducted by an imam to a man she did not know. Within minutes of the ceremony ending, while the wedding party continued downstairs, she was raped by her new ‘husband.’ Over the years Sarah was subjected to eight forced abortions, one of them five months into pregnancy. When she accompanied her abuser to medical appointments, he required her to wear a hijab and walk five feet behind him. She was compelled to learn the Quran in Arabic and permitted to speak only Urdu and Punjabi. She was also made to cook and clean for the gang members who abused her. Sarah made several unsuccessful attempts to escape. On one occasion, after she reported her kidnapping to the police, she was interviewed by a Muslim officer who switched off the tape recorder and instructed her to drop her allegations because of “lack of evidence.” She later learned that this officer was imprisoned for child sex offences. In a separate case, Anna was living in a children’s home in Bradford in 2002. From the age of 13 she was raped and abused while in the home and at 15 she was forced into a sharia marriage. Her social worker attended the marriage ceremony and permitted her husband’s parents to foster her after she became pregnant; the parents received a fostering allowance from the state. Anna described her situation as one of “domestic slavery” in which she was treated “like a maid” and repeatedly sexually abused by dozens of men. 15 In Britain, reports from the Metropolitan Police in London alone have indicated an average of 1,125 sexual assaults per year involving unlicensed taxi drivers. A significant 15 James Tozer, Social worker ‘attended wedding of terrified girl, 15, to her abuser’: Carers turned a blind eye when teenage grooming victim was forced into Islamic marriage, damning report reveals , Daily Mail , 27 July, 2021. 111

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proportion of the offenders in these cases have been identified as Muslim. 16 A further form of sexual exploitation associated with certain Muslim communities across Britain is marriage trafficking. The Forced Marriage Unit (FMU) handled 801 cases in 2024 concerning girls and women resident in the country who were forced into marriage with men, providing direct support in 229 of those instances. Among the 280 cases where the focus country was recorded in 2023, the six countries accounting for the highest numbers were Pakistan (45%), Bangladesh (13%), Afghanistan (7%), India (3%), Somalia (3%), and Nigeria (2%). Of these six, all except India and Nigeria have overwhelmingly Muslim populations. Earlier Home Office figures from 2009 showed that 90% of forced marriage victims in Britain were Muslim. In more recent years, however, the FMU has ceased collecting or publishing data on the religion of those involved – a shift that echoes patterns of avoidance seen during the grooming gang investigations. An FMU report stated: “ Forced marriage is not a problem speci fi c to one country, religion or culture. … The FMU does not record data on religion; no major faith in the UK advocates forced marriage. Freely given consent is a prerequisite of Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh marriages. ” 17 Although forced marriage occurs in various communities and is not unique to Muslims, statistics show a clear overrepresentation of Muslims among those involved in forced marriage cases. It is also inaccurate to claim that Islam mandates a woman’s consent for marriage. Similar patterns of sexual offences disproportionately involving Muslim men have been reported in other Western countries with significant Muslim immigrant populations. 17 See Home Office & Foreign Office Statistics, Forced Marriage Unit statistics 2023, 9 May, 2024. 16 Dr. Mark Durie, UK grooming gangs and Islam, Christian Concern , 13 November, 2025, p. 15. 112

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In the Netherlands, considerable media coverage has focused on so-called “lover boys” who are predominantly Moroccan Muslim men. These individuals first seduce Dutch girls, often teenagers, and then coerce them into prostitution in order to profit from their earnings. According to a 2001 report by the Amsterdam based Child Right organisation, approximately 5,000 “ordinary” Dutch schoolgirls aged 13 or 14 from typical family backgrounds had been lured into prostitution by “lover boys.” The documentary film Lover Boys , directed by Julia Rooke, follows the work of Ibrahim, a Dutch Moroccan social worker supporting both the perpetrators and their victims. 18 In Sweden, a 2021 academic study examining “Swedish rape offenders” concluded that nearly half of the convicted individuals were born outside Sweden, with immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa being markedly overrepresented among them. 19 In Australia, nine Lebanese Muslim men were convicted in 2002 of gang-raping white girls. Contemporary media reports at the time indicated that police were aware of over 60 female victims linked to the group, though the convictions related to the rapes of seven girls. Police seized a mobile phone message from one of the perpetrators that read: “ When you are feeling down … bash a Christian or Catholic and lift up. ” 20 Statistics Offender data from the 2017 Quilliam Foundation analysis, together with recent independent investigations, reveal a consistent, disproportionate involvement of Muslim men – overwhelmingly of Pakistani heritage – in group-based CSE. The 250,000 figure is not a precise count. No such count exists because the British state has failed to record it. But we may regard it as a conservative estimate that accounts for the organised, repeated nature of the abuse (many 20 See Kate Warner, Gang Rape in Sydney: Crime, the Media, Politics, Race and Sentencing, Journal of Criminology , Volume 37, Issue 3, December 2004. 19 Ardavan Khoshnood, Henrik Ohlsson, Jan Sundquist & Kristina Sundquist, Swedish rape offenders – a latent class analysis , Forensic Sciences Research , 22 February, 2021. 18 See Julia Rooke & Caroline Pare, Lover Boys, Al Jazeera , 15 May, 2012. 113

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girls raped hundreds of times by multiple perpetrators) and decades of institutional concealment. Analysis of 264 convictions for group-based child sexual exploitation from 2005–2017 found that 84% (222 offenders) were South Asian, with the vast majority Pakistani Muslim. Only 7% were white and 8% black. 21 Additional context from expert commentary includes statements by Dr. Taj Hargey, an imam at the Oxford Islamic Congregation, who observed that virtually every individual in these grooming gangs appears to be Muslim, estimating that 95% of those involved are of Muslim faith. 22 As previously stated, Peter McLoughlin’s research indicates that approximately 87% of rape gang convictions were of people with distinctively Muslim names. These figures stand in marked contrast to the much smaller proportion of Pakistani or Muslim communities within the overall population of modern Britain (Muslims approximately 6.5% and Pakistanis around 2.1%, according to the most recent census data). Multiple examinations, including police data from various forces, national audits and independent reviews, have documented this overrepresentation in group-based offending of this nature, even as some earlier official narratives emphasized no single community profile or sought to downplay ethnic patterns. 23 The number of reported rapes in the United Kingdom has risen substantially since 1997, when the era of large-scale mass immigration into the country commenced under Blair. Official police recorded crime data for England and Wales indicate that rape offences stood at approximately 8,593 in the year 2000 – a figure closely aligned with levels observed in the late 1990s prior to major changes in recording practices. 24 By the year ending March 2025, police recorded that rape offences had increased to over 70,000 according to figures published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), reflecting a rise exceeding 800% even 24 See Office for National Statistics, Sexual offences in England and Wales overview: year ending March 2025, 4 November, 2025. 23 See Connor Tomlinson, Grooming Gang Denial Is Dead, Courage Media , 18 June, 2025. 22 See Fundamentalist ‘Muslims believe if the Prophet’ slept with a nine-year-old ‘what’s wrong with a 12-year-old?,’ claims Muslim leader , London Loves Business , 9 January, 2025. 21 See Haras Rafiq & Muna Adil, Group-Based Child Sexual Exploitation: Dissecting “Grooming Gangs”, Quilliam , December 2017. 114

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after accounting for population growth of around 15% during the intervening years. 25 In stark contrast, Poland, which maintained relatively low levels of immigration throughout the same period, has experienced a decline in reported rapes. Polish national police data show 2,399 recorded rape offences in 2000 falling to 1,127 by 2023 – a reduction of more than 50%. With a stable population of approximately 38 million, this equates to a per capita rate of around three rapes per 100,000 residents in recent years, compared with over 100 per 100,000 in the United Kingdom. 26 These comparative patterns drawn from official sources highlight divergent trends between the two nations. References include the ONS bulletin on sexual offences in England and Wales for the year ending March 2025, the Home Office historical police recorded crime tables, and Eurostat police recorded offences data alongside Polish national statistics compiled via Statista for the period covering 2000 to 2023. Per capita calculations further underscore the scale of the disparity when relative population sizes are considered. These figures indicate that the rape gangs are a specific ethnoreligious phenomenon, with Muslims – especially Pakistani Muslims – significantly overrepresented. 26 See Statista, Number of rapes in Poland from 1999 to 2023. 25 See Office for National Statistics, Sexual offences in England and Wales overview: year ending March 2025, 4 November, 2025. 115

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The Influence of Islam Muslim Treatment of Non - Muslims World w ide Britain is not a unique case. This sort of thing goes on anywhere that either welcomes mass migration from Muslim countries or contains long-established Muslim populations. There is a consistent pattern of sexual violence directed against non-Muslim minorities in settings where Muslims form the majority. 27 Across Britain, as we have noted, girls from Sikh and Hindu backgrounds have also been targeted by Muslim gangs. Unlike the White British majority, these non-Muslim immigrant populations were never prevented from organising as a collective to protect their own. In doing so, as was their duty, the Network of Sikh Organisations drew attention to the “appalling treatment” of non-Muslims in Pakistan: “ We need only look at the appalling treatment of girls from minority faiths in Pakistan – where Christian, Hindu and Sikh girls are kidnapped, forced to convert to Islam and married, to get an understanding of the underlying motivations. In 2018, around 1,000 girls in Pakistan’s Sindh province alone su ff ered this fate. In many cases, perpetrators are granted impunity due to corruption and connivance with local o ffi cials. ” 28 In April 2024, UN human rights experts expressed serious alarm regarding the vulnerability of minority girls in Pakistan to forced religious conversions and forced marriages. Their press release highlighted that Christian and Hindu girls in particular face heightened risks of abduction, trafficking, child forced marriage, domestic servitude, and sexual violence. 29 Human rights groups and media reports, including a 2021 BBC investigation, have estimated that thousands of non-Muslim girls – primarily Christians, 29 The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Press Release, Pakistan: UN experts alarmed by lack of protection for minority girls from forced religious conversions and forced marriage , 11 April, 2024. 28 Network of Sikh Organisations, Our letter to the Home Secretary on grooming gangs, 20 January, 2025. 27 Needless to say, as our experience in Britain demonstrates, this same track record applies even when they are one among many minorities. 116

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Hindus, and Sikhs – are abducted annually in Pakistan, compelled to convert to Islam, and forced into marriage with their abductors. One documented case involved Farah, a 12-year-old Christian girl abducted from her home in June 2020 by three Muslim men, raped, and forced to perform household labour as a slave. 30 A common sequence in these cases sees a girl abducted, coerced into signing a conversion certificate, and swiftly married to a Muslim man. Police in Pakistan frequently side with the abductors over the girl’s family. When parents pursue legal action, courts tend to uphold the legitimacy of the conversion. Birth certificates may be falsified to indicate that the girl is not a minor. Contact with her family is typically blocked. Following conversion to Islam, non-Muslim parents lose all authority over their child, as Islamic law prohibits non-Muslims from exercising guardianship over Muslims, including their own offspring. The evidence from grooming gang convictions across Britain repeatedly shows a Muslim background among many of the perpetrators. When this is viewed alongside similar patterns of sex crimes observed both in countries of origin for immigrants and in Muslim-majority societies, it offers compelling grounds to consider that elements of Islam are contributing to the grooming gang scourge in our country. While it is unsurprising that a religion can shape and regulate sexual behaviour, the suggestion that Islam might play a role in driving sex crimes remains deeply uncomfortable for some in the liberal West. Even so, the possibility of an Islamic influence on these crimes cannot be dismissed. The available data strongly points toward it as a hypothesis that merits serious examination. The impact of any religion on individual behaviour is rarely direct and unmediated; it is heavily filtered through culture, which a religion can gradually reshape over generations. Not all Muslim communities or societies are influenced by Islam to the same degree or in the same manner. Minority Muslim populations may behave differently from majority ones. For instance, convictions of Indian-origin Muslim men in grooming gang cases across Britain 30 Mike Thomson, Abducted, shackled and forced to marry at 12, BBC News , 10 March, 2021. 117

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are notably rare compared with those of Pakistani heritage. This disparity may relate to a demographic context: Muslims form only about 14% of India’s population (with Hindus comprising around 80%), placing them in a minority position where social and legal constraints differ markedly from Pakistan, where Muslims dominate overwhelmingly and non-Muslims constitute a small, often marginalised minority. In such a setting, exploiting non-Muslim neighbours becomes far easier. At least eight theological aspects of Islam may contribute to cultural patterns that enable or normalise the sexual abuse of non-Muslim girls. These include (1) the doctrine of Muslim superiority, (2) the principle of loyalty and disavowal ( al-walā' wa-l-barā' ), (3) male dominance over women, (4) enforced seclusion and veiling of women, (5) forced marriage combined with the absence of a fixed minimum age of consent, (6) the perception of female sexuality as inherently dangerous or fi tna , (7) the historical sharia institution of slavery, (8) and the system of dhimmitude . These are all rooted in classical Islamic theology, up to and including Islamic jurisprudence. But even in sharia-governed nations, adaptations are common, such as setting a minimum marriage age or restricting unilateral divorce by men in order to lessen the harsher effects on women. Muslim Supremacism Islam holds that those who are righteous and truly fear God, meaning Muslims, are inherently superior to those who reject God’s commands, namely non-Muslims. This idea is captured in Quran 3:110: “ You [Muslims] are the best nation, raised up for humankind, commanding what is good and forbidding what is wrong, and believing in Allah. If only the people of the book [i.e. Christians and Jews] believed, it would be better for them; some among them are believers, but most are perverted. ” (Sura 3:110) The verse positions Muslims as the finest community, entrusted by God with the duty to enjoin good and prohibit evil. This responsibility can be understood as authorising Muslims to correct, compel, or, if needed, punish non-Muslims, 118

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potentially through coercion or force. Other Quranic passages affirm Islam’s ultimate supremacy over all religions, as in Sura 48:28: “ It is He [Allah] who has sent His Messenger with the guidance and the religion of truth [Islam], to make it triumph over every religion. ” Non-Muslims who refuse Islam are described in harsh terms, such as in Sura 8:55: “ Surely the worst of animals in Allah’s sight are rejectors [of Islam]; they do not believe. ” The concept of Muslim superiority is closely linked to derogatory views of non-Muslims. For instance, Sura 9:28 labels “associators” (a pejorative term encompassing Christians, Jews, and other non-Muslims) as “unclean” (najis). These teachings can provide a religious justification that bolsters an abuser’s conviction of their own superiority and facilitates the dehumanisation of non-Muslim victims. In her July 2020 podcast interview, Rotherham survivor Dr. Ella Hill described abusive language and acts that embodied this sense of superiority. She recounted being made to bend down and kiss her perpetrator’s feet as a deliberate act to underscore her inferiority. She also spoke of another Rotherham victim who, during gang rapes by dozens of men, was forced to lick their feet clean because “they believed they were morally superior to her.” Hill observed: “ It’s a Muslim superiority thing: they believe they have maximum moral authority to command the people beneath them to lick their feet. ” She further noted that her rapists viewed non-Muslim habits as inherently impure: “ If you’re eating pork you’re unclean, you’re dirty. If you use a knife and fork 119

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you’re dirty; if you don’t eat your food with your hands. ” 31 ‘ Us and Them ’ Mindset The Islamic principle known as al-walā' wa-l-barā' (loyalty and disavowal) commands Muslims to direct their love and allegiance towards what pleases God while hating, avoiding, and distancing themselves from what displeases Him. In essence, it calls for loving and supporting fellow believers and rejecting non-believers. This teaching draws on several Quranic verses, including: “ Let not the believers take the disbelievers as allies, rather than of believers – whoever does that has nothing from God – unless you guard yourselves as a precaution. ” (Sura 3:28) “ You who believe! Do not take the Jews and the Christians as allies. They are allies of each other. Whoever of you takes them as allies is already one of them. Surely God does not guide the people who are evil doers [i.e. non-Muslims] . Yet you see those in whose hearts is a sickness – they are quick [to turn] to them. … Whoever takes God as an ally, and His Messenger [Muhammad] , and those who believe [Muslims] – surely the party of God, they are the victors. ” (Sura 5:51–52, 56) “ There was a good example for you in Abraham, and those who were with him, when they said to their people, “Surely we are quit of you and what you serve instead of God. We repudiate you, and between us and you enmity has appeared, and hatred forever, until you believe in God alone. ” (Sura 60:4) These passages emphasise that Muslims should maintain strong bonds within the Muslim community while keeping non-Muslims at a distance and harbouring enmity toward them. The Quran warns that God views non-Muslims with contempt and that Muslims who befriend, ally with, or associate closely with them risk being regarded by God as disbelievers themselves. While some Muslims downplay this doctrine, revivalist movements, which have gained 31 See I Am a Grooming Gang Survivor: My Story | Triggernometry 120

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considerable influence in Western countries, have actively promoted it, presenting strict adherence to loyalty and disavowal as vital for the Muslim community’s success in carrying out its divine mission. Beyond its theological role, al-walā' wa-l-barā' has profoundly shaped certain Islamic cultures. In such environments, many Muslims feel strong pressure not to say or do anything that could damage the image of the Muslim community or bring discredit to Islam. Within an honour- and shame-based framework reinforced by these values, speaking out to outsiders about wrongdoing committed by fellow Muslims is often seen as an act of betrayal. This dynamic can have serious real-world consequences. For example, in her book The Imam’s Daughter (2009), Hannan – later known as Hannah – described her experience as a 14- or 15-year-old Pakistani teenager in Britain. After confiding in a female teacher that her father, an imam, was beating her, the teacher informed the deputy head, who arranged for a male Pakistani Muslim social worker to meet with her at school. Initially terrified because of his background, Hannan eventually opened up to him about being treated as a domestic servant, fearing a forced marriage, and enduring physical abuse. That same afternoon, she returned home to find the social worker speaking with her father and relaying everything she had said. While the social worker was present, her father acted kindly, but once he left, her father subjected her to a severe beating and rape, threatened to kill her if she ever spoke again, and imprisoned her in the cellar for days. When Hannan later encountered the social worker at school and refused further contact, he reportedly told her: “ Hey, I was just doing what I thought was right, you know that. It’s not right to betray your community. ” 32 Similar patterns have appeared in accounts from grooming gang survivors. Some have described approaching the police only to be interviewed by Muslim officers who switched off the recording device and urged her to abandon her complaint due to supposed “lack of evidence.” 32 Hannah Shah, The Imam’s Daughter: My Desperate Flight to Freedom (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2009). 121

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A deeply ingrained culture of enforced loyalty and community protection can discourage individuals from reporting abuses or providing evidence against members of their own group. Had the social worker in Hannan’s case reported her disclosures to the police, leading to her father facing criminal charges, he would have exposed himself, and by extension those associated with him, to the serious risk of being labelled a traitor within the community. The prominent Indian-Pakistani Muslim thinker and revivalist Abul A‘la Maududi, in his influential work Let Us Be Muslims (2016), maintained that Muslims cannot achieve true success until their highest allegiance is given to God and to the Muslim ummah (community). The doctrine of loyalty and disavowal exerts particularly strong pressure when Muslims live as a minority in non-Muslim host societies. In such settings, as they seek to preserve and assert a powerful collective identity, Muslims may place even greater emphasis on internal solidarity and separation from non-believers than they would in their countries of origin. 33 Superiorit y and Dominance of Men O v er Women Islam establishes that men hold the position of managers or maintainers ( qawwāmūn ) over women, as stated in Sura 4:34, where the role involves ensuring women remain in their proper state. Under Islamic law, every woman remains under the guardianship ( walī ) of a male relative. Normally, this is her father. Should the father be unable to serve due to death, loss of mental capacity, or apostasy from Islam, a specified order of male relatives from the paternal line steps in, starting with the paternal grandfather, then sons, brothers, nephews, and uncles. Sura 4:34 further authorises men to discipline their wives, including through physical violence. Numerous authoritative sources and sharia regulations reinforce the notion of women’s inferiority to men. Sura 2:228 declares that men hold a rank above women. The Prophet Muhammad stated that women are deficient in both religion and intelligence relative to men, and in the same hadith he noted that women form the majority of those in hell. He also taught that if a woman or a 33 See Sayyid Abul A'la Mawdudi, Let Us Be Muslims (Leicester: Kube Publishing, 2018). 122

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dog passes in front of a praying man, the prayer is invalidated (a reason mosques position men with their backs to women during prayer). Sharia obliges a wife to engage in sexual intercourse with her husband whenever he desires it; if she refuses, Muhammad said the angels will curse her until morning. Divorce under sharia strongly favours men. A husband may unilaterally divorce his wife without stating a reason simply by pronouncing “I divorce you” three times. For a wife, obtaining a divorce is far more difficult, typically involving a formal legal process and often a financial cost. Following divorce, the mother may retain physical custody of young children up to a particular age, but the father retains legal guardianship. Moreover, if the mother remarries, she loses the right to have children from her previous marriage reside with her. Sharia rules on evidence further diminish women’s status, valuing a woman’s testimony at half that of a man’s. Inheritance laws under sharia generally allocate women half the share given to men (for example, a son receives twice the portion of a daughter). A wife or wives together inherit one-quarter of a husband’s estate if he leaves no children, or one-eighth if he does leave children. In contrast, a husband inherits half of his wife’s estate if she has no children, or one-quarter if she does. Sharia’s approach to rape also disadvantages women. Rape is categorised as a form of zinā (illicit sexual intercourse), the same offence that covers adultery and fornication. Zinā is defined as sexual intercourse between a man and a woman who is neither his wife nor his slave. There is no distinct offence of rape; it is treated as coerced zinā (and marital rape is not recognised). The penalty for the rapist mirrors that for consensual extramarital sex: 100 lashes for an unmarried person or stoning to death for one who is or has been married. When a woman accuses a man of rape, her consent is presumed unless both the act of penetration and her lack of consent are proven by four male eyewitnesses who each directly observed the man’s penis entering the woman’s vagina. (Naturally, the presence of four men witnessing a rape without intervening makes it highly improbable they would testify in the victim’s favour). Should a woman allege rape but fail to produce the four required male witnesses, she risks being convicted of zinā on the basis of her own accusation. In 2003, Pakistan’s National 123

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Commission on the Status of Women reported that up to 88% of women imprisoned in Pakistan were rape or gang-rape victims who, unable to meet the four witness requirement, were instead convicted of illicit sex. 34 Taken together, these sharia provisions that institutionalise male dominance over women exert a profound influence. In cultures shaped by Islam, boys can be raised to grow into men who assume rightful control over the women in their lives, confident in their inherent superiority. The Seclusion of Women Islamic law contains multiple provisions that mandate the covering and seclusion of women. It is widely recognised that a Muslim woman must cover most of her body when appearing in public. Additionally, sharia grants a male guardian the authority to restrict a girl’s or a woman’s movements, allowing him to confine a wife or daughter to the home and permit her to leave only when accompanied by a male relative and for a valid reason. This is reflected in Sura 33:33, which instructs women: “Stay in your houses and do not flaunt yourselves.” One consequence of the sharia-derived culture of covering and seclusion is that a woman who appears in public without covering or remains outside the protected space of the home may be culturally perceived as unguarded and therefore sexually available or promiscuous. This notion, that an uncovered woman invites molestation, is suggested in Sura 33:59 of the Quran, where Muhammad is instructed that his wives and daughters should cover themselves so they are “not abused.” Certain Islamic preachers have explicitly endorsed this view. Following the high-profile convictions of Muslim men of Lebanese background for rape in Sydney, Australia, the country’s Grand Mufti, Sheik Taj Aldin al-Hilali, controversially placed blame on the victims for not being covered and not remaining in their homes. He stated: “ If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside … without cover, and the cats come to eat it … whose fault is it, the cats’ or the uncovered meat’s? The 34 See Pakistan: Majority of Jailed Women are Rape Victims, Feminist Majority Foundation Blog , 23 October, 2003. 124

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