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Police snobbery 'helped grooming gang flourish'
Police officers poor 'attitudes to victims' part of catalogue of failings

Rochdale's Labour MP accused police yesterday of allowing a local sex-grooming gang to flourish because of officers' class snobbery against young girls from council estates.

MP Simon Danczuk said officers' attitudes to victims' backgrounds was one of a catalogue of failings by Greater Manchester Police (GMP) and other agencies in their handling of the scandal, highlighted in the Serious Case Review published yesterday.

The publication of the review comes more than 18 months after nine men were convicted of the systematic grooming and sexual abuse of six girls in Heywood and Rochdale in 2008 and 2009.

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