Former New Labour Home Secretary Jack Straw has said grooming gangs are a “cultural problem” and some Pakistani-heritage men view young white girls as “easy meat”, whilst insisting that Islam is not a factor.
Mr. Straw was Home Secretary from 1997 to 2001 – a time of activity for many of the grooming gangs so far discovered – overseeing an unprecedented increase in mass immigration and a continued shift towards politically correct culture within government.
“Jack Straw’s former advisor said Ministers intended to ‘rub the Right’s nose in diversity’,” commented former UKIP leader Nigel Farage in response to Mr. Straw’s remarks Thursday, referring to the infamous admission of New Labour adviser Andrew Neather reported in 2009.
Mr. Neather revealed that Labour “deliberately” plotted to “open up the UK to mass migration” to help socially engineer a “truly multicultural” country.
Yet despite his long record in office, Mr. Straw appeared to echo the arguments of some of the political right, using words that could easily have him accused of a “hate crime” as he spoke on the BBC Daily Politics show.
He said: “It goes back some of the nature of Pakistani society in the villages where these people come from. It’s very complicated. Some people attribute it to Islam; that’s not the case at all.
“It’s a cultural problem about the way in which this particular segment of Pakistani men in this country happen to regard white girls… they see them as easy meat.”
Speaking of other scandals across the country, he added: “In Rotherham, you’ve had these terrible examples where social services and police really covered their eyes to what was going on with disastrous consequences.”
Also on the programme, Telford MP Lucy Allan said: “The grooming gangs are without doubt of Pakistani heritage in Telford.
“There have been 2 cases prosecuted where gangs of Pakistani men were sentenced for long periods of time for abuse of white working class girls.”
Mr. Straw made similar comments about grooming gangs in 2011, shortly after he left the Cabinet, sparking outrage in Westminster, after sparking protests (pictured, above) by Muslims in the North of England for criticising the full-face veil.
He argued that there was a “specific problem” in some areas of the country where men from the Pakistani community “target vulnerable young white girls”.
Mr. Straw was attacked by other Labour politicians, including Khalid Mahmood, Labour MP for Birmingham Perry Barr, and Keith Vaz, then-chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee.
Since 2011, dozens of grooming gangs have been exposed, including in Newcastle, Rochdale, Oxford, and Bristol. A study by Muslim think tank the Quilliam Foundation found that 84 per cent of those convicted are “Asian”.