Yvette Cooper, Shadow Home Secretary, speaking about the failures in the child abuse inquiry, said:

“The child abuse inquiry is too important to be mired in this kind of chaos and incompetence from the Home Secretary - Theresa May needs to get a grip fast.

"She should set up a survivors forum to work with the panel and rebuild the credibility of the inquiry. It was a very serious error for the Home Secretary not to meet survivors and victims of abuse to discuss the inquiry, its terms of reference, and a new chair. To fail once was unfortunate, to fail twice was unacceptable, to fail again would be appalling. 

” As well as appointing a credible chair, she also needs to review the inquiry making sure it has the necessary powers to get to the truth and, if needed, putting it on a statutory footing.  It must be able to look seriously at institutional failure to protect children and make recommendations to strengthen child protection in future.

“The Home Secretary also needs to demonstrate complete transparency to restore confidence in the Government’s approach. She must publish the Wanless review which she has had for several weeks and provide some answers. Why didn’t she meet survivors? Why, once Baroness Butler Sloss stood down over concerns about conflicts of interest, did the Home Office still fail to carry out basic background checks on Fiona Woolf? Why did the Home Office amend the letter from Fiona Woolf?

"Too many times in the past child victims of abuse have been ignored and discounted by major institutions and organisations. This inquiry is the chance to make sure that failure is addressed - it cannot go wrong again.”

Ends.