During an election campaign, it is important to raise burning issues with candidates. But it is equally important to ask the right questions.
A video posted to X shows a man confronting Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham on a street during campaigning for the Makerfield by-election. ‘Andy, can I ask you why you didn’t support the rape gang inquiry?’ the man says.
“Andy Burnham corrects a man who wrongly claimed he didn't support a rape gang inquiry”
The Labour candidate immediately replies: ‘I did, I ordered one.’ When the man accuses him of a cover-up, Burnham continues: ‘I ordered one in 2017.’
Still unsatisfied, the man asks: ‘Why hasn’t it happened, then?’ Burnham replies: ‘It has, go and read the reports online. One into Manchester, one into Oldham, one into Rochdale, new charges.’
Responding to a social media post featuring the video, the Greater Manchester Mayor claimed the person filming was ‘a Restore supporter from Sheffield’.
Baroness Beverley Hughes was tasked with compiling an initial review of child sexual exploitation in July 2017, less than two months after Burnham was first elected Mayor. Her findings led him to commission an independent review into CSE in Greater Manchester, led by Malcolm Newsam CBE and Gary Ridgway. The first report, detailing how victims were let down by police and local authorities, was published in January 2020, the second in June 2022, and the third in January 2024.
Campaigner Maggie Oliver, a former detective constable at Greater Manchester Police who resigned over the force’s handling of the case, has praised two of the reports as ‘quite thorough’. However, she has been heavily critical of the Oldham inquiry published in 2022, and resigned over the handling of a fourth report tackling the police’s current approach.
In January last year, Burnham was one of the earliest high-profile Labour figures to back a ‘limited’ national inquiry into CSE. He said: ‘There will always be limitations with what you can do with a local review. The review team could not compel someone to speak to them. That is something I couldn’t do at my level.’
Sir Keir Starmer announced a national inquiry in June 2025, following an audit carried out by Baroness Louise Casey.