All The Times They Let Daddy Go

SHABIR AHMED worked for Oldham Council between 1988 and 2006. He was employed as a welfare rights officer in the welfare rights unit of the council seconded to the Oldham Pakistani Community Centre. In May 2012 he was found guilty of two rapes, aiding and abetting rape, sexual assault and trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation, and sentenced to 19 years’ imprisonment. In June 2012 he was found guilty of a further 30 rape charges and was jailed for an additional 22 years. SHABIR ‘Daddy’ AHMED, the ringleader of the Rochdale Grooming Gang lived in Oldham. As well as being a Director of the local Citizens Advice Bureau, he was also a member of the Oldham Labour Party. I consider him to have been a member of the town’s establishment and a heavyweight figure in Oldham’s Pakistani community.

Though ANDY BURNHAM’s review into AHMED was severely limited by the confinements of his team’s terms of reference set by Oldham Council, their reliance on only being able to see evidence presented to them, and their inability to compel witnesses to give evidence (all 3 of these limitations would be overcome through a Public Inquiry), the review identified multiple failings in how both Oldham Council and Greater Manchester Police investigated concerns in respect of Shabir Ahmed.

Here are the nine times Oldham Council and Greater Manchester Police let Daddy go.