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UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has decided to initiate a comprehensive statutory investigation into the prevalence and severity of child sexual exploitation. This decision comes after he faced months of pressure to take such action.

On Saturday, Starmer announced his agreement to establish a national inquiry into grooming gangs, following the recommendation from Baroness Louise Casey. Her detailed report, almost 200 pages long, addressing this issue is set to be released on Monday.

Baroness Casey has been examining the scale and characteristics of gang-related exploitation nationwide, a topic that has sparked intense political debate since the revelations of scandals in northern England back in 2013.

The report is expected to deliver searing criticism of public authorities, which have been accused of failing to act decisively against “grooming gangs” of men of predominantly Pakistani origin over fears of racism.

The Conservatives and Reform UK have demanded a national inquiry for months and Yvette Cooper, home secretary, will be accused by opponents of dragging her feet when she makes a statement to MPs on Monday.

Starmer, speaking en route to a G7 summit in Alberta, Canada, said of Casey’s review: “Her position when she started the audit was that there was not a real need for a national inquiry.

“She has looked at the material and she has come to the view that there should be a national inquiry on the basis of what she has seen.”

The scandals — in which gangs of men groomed and raped girls who were largely white — have already led to several inquiries.

The issue re-emerged earlier this year after billionaire Elon Musk posted on his social media platform X about the issue and called for a national inquiry, a demand that was echoed by the Tories and Reform.

In January, Downing Street said that victims “do not want to see a national inquiry, they want action taken to deliver justice”.

But on Saturday Starmer said: “I have never said we should not look again at any issue. I have wanted to be assured that on the question of any inquiry . . . that’s why I asked Louise Casey, whom I hugely respect, to do an audit.”

The prime minister added that he had read “every word” of Casey’s report and that he was “going to accept her recommendation”.

“That is the right thing to do on the basis of what she has put in her audit,” Starmer said. “I asked her to do that job to double-check on this. She has done that job for me and having read her report — I respect her in any event — I shall now implement her recommendations.”

Starmer said the report would be “statutory under the Inquiries Act” but would take some time to set up “in an orderly way”.

Kemi Badenoch, Conservative party leader, said: “Keir Starmer doesn’t know what he thinks unless an official report has told him so. Just like he dismissed concerns about the winter fuel payment and then had to U-turn, just like he needed the Supreme Court to tell him what a woman is, he had to be led by the nose to make this correct decision here.”

Badenoch said the inquiry should be done “properly and quickly”.

Earlier this year Cooper announced government-backed local inquiries into grooming gangs, offering £5mn in funding for up to five locally led probes into historic cases, including one in Oldham.

They are expected to follow the model of a judge-led inquiry that took place into grooming gangs in Telford.