Rotherham: Scale of abuse shocked even man who reported it

Looking back on the impact of Professor Alexis Jay’s findings in 2014, Mr Norfolk said the outcome of his investigative work proved the value of “mainstream media” in exposing criminality and government failures.

He admitted he had to balance his instinct to expose the abuse with the fear that publishing the story would stir up a far-right backlash and lead to accusations of racism.

“If you had asked me the day before this press conference how many young teenage girls had been groomed and exploited in Rotherham during the period covered by the report, I would have said 150,” he said.

He was “stunned” to hear Professor Jay reveal how 1,400 girls had been abused, trafficked to other towns or doused with petrol.

“They were treated like sub-humans for the pleasure of these men,” he added.

Mr Norfolk first identified a “pattern” of Pakistani-origin paedophile gangs exploiting white girls in the north of England and the Midlands in 2010, but was met with a “conspiracy of silence” when he tried to get answers from police forces and councils.

He said hearing Professor Jay explicitly refer to the perpetrators’ ethnicity was an “extraordinary” moment.

“It was so impactful, she didn’t mince her words. The reaction was seismic around the world.”

He added: “When the leader of Rotherham Borough Council was asked by the Home Affairs Committee why this investigation had been launched, he replied: ‘Because The Times wouldn’t leave us alone’. That in itself, after 35 years in journalism, is a vindication of the profession of journalism.”