Keir Starmer IGNORED Rotherham grooming gangs whistleblower as she battled bullying ordeal - 'He didn't even bother!'

Starmer was told that Senior "consistently faced hostility from within the Labour Party and the local authority which is Labour-controlled" over her attempts to make public the scale of the abuse.

But after his office's failure to reply came to light, the whistleblower has lamented how the now-Prime Minister "didn't even bother to respond to my concerns".

Senior, who was made an MBE by the late Queen in 2016, was elected as a Labour councillor after she worked to uncover the rape gangs atrocity in the town - and has worked with grooming victims in South Yorkshire since 1999.

But despite her efforts in uncovering the abuse, the Labour council was forced to apologise to her after it misled her in an investigation into her conduct at her charity.

The Local Government Ombudsman found that Rotherham Council had misled Senior about the investigation and delayed its response, keeping the whistleblower in limbo for years.

Allies of Senior maintain that the investigation was a politically-motivated witch hunt launched against her after she worked to reveal the extent of the abuse in the town - and how council officials had covered it up.

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At the time, a council spokeswoman said: "The council received complaints from survivors of child sexual exploitation about the practice at Swinton Lock Activity Centre, which at that time was commissioned by the council to provide post-child sexual exploitation support to survivors and their families.

"Given the history of child sexual exploitation in Rotherham and the previous failure of agencies to properly support survivors, the council commissioned an independent investigation into complaints about Swinton Lock Activity Centre."

The spokeswoman added that the council had sent written apologies to the trustees of the charity.

A series of Government reports revealed that at least 1,400 children - predominantly white girls - had been sexually exploited by predominantly Pakistani gangs from 1997 to 2013.

This led to the resignations or removal of Rotherham Council's entire cabinet, its leader, and the South Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner between 2014 and 2015.

But GB News can reveal that a letter was sent to Sir Keir Starmer's office in 2020 reporting the bullying that Senior continued to face.

The letter, from WhistleblowersUK CEO Georgina Halford-Hall, warned that Senior has "consistently faced hostility from within the Labour Party and the local authority which is Labour-controlled".

She said that they had "conducted a campaign to undermine her achievements and damage her reputation in order to deflect from their failure to protect children".

Halford-Hall added: "She remains the target of retaliation which regrettably emanates from the Labour Party."

The letter urged the Labour leader to meet with Senior to resolve matters and restore her confidence - both in her role as a proud Labour councillor, and in the party itself.

But The People's Channel can also reveal that Starmer's office replied a day later to say: "Unfortunately, we will be unable to facilitate a meeting with Keir Starmer," with an online form for reporting concerns attached.

Senior eventually quit as a councillor in March 2021.

She told GB News: "I felt sidelined by Labour. I wasn't even worthy of a call, a letter or a meeting. Nothing.

"Starmer has never taken notice of my concerns - we've been ignored for years. It's so telling that he didn't even bother to respond to my concerns and experience at the time.

"There were a couple of Labour councillors who were supportive and thought the way the council was behaving was despicable."

The revelation comes as the Labour Party faces severe scrutiny after GB News exposed how safeguarding minister Jess Phillips rejected repeated calls for an full-scale Public Inquiry into grooming gangs in Oldham.

The Home Office had stressed the need to "learn from past mistakes and do everything possible to prevent future failures".

But the row exploded when X owner and Donald Trump ally Elon Musk made the incendiary claim that the Birmingham Yardley MP should be imprisoned.

Musk has continued to post regularly about the scandal - taking repeated swipes at Starmer himself, and sharing posts calling on King Charles to dissolve Parliament altogether.

A Labour Party spokesman said: “All complaints are treated seriously and thoroughly assessed in line with our rules and procedures.

“Complaints are assessed via a specific process, independent of the Leader’s Office, and this was clearly signposted in response to this correspondence at the time.”

Reform UK MP Rupert Lowe said: “This is a failure of leadership by the Prime Minister on one of the biggest cover-ups and failures by the British state.

“Senior was recognised by the Queen, who in 2016 invested upon her an MBE. For the Prime Minister to fail to even ask for more information, let alone have a meeting, is quite frankly horrifying.

“Reform UK are clear, we need a swift and proper public inquiry and anybody found to be involved should either be behind bars in the UK, or sent back to where they came from if a foreign national.”

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said: “Listening to victims is critical to getting justice.

“It’s what I had to do when pushing through bureaucratic indifference to suffering. When I heard about the victims of the Tavistock Clinic, I worked with colleagues to create the Cass Review.

“When the victims of the Post Office scandal appealed to my department, I worked with Kevin Hollinrake to increase compensation payments. If the Prime Minister ignored pleas for help from a rape gang whistleblower, then he has very serious questions to answer.

“We should be protecting those who had the courage to expose this scandal, not casting them aside. All of this would be revealed with a proper independent review, and it speaks volumes that the Government continues to ignore the calls for this.”