Grooming Gang Survivor Tells Her Story

Summary

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TRIGGERnometry - Grooming Gang Survivor Tells Her Story

Date: July 27, 2025
Hosts: Konstantin Kisin, Francis Foster
Guests: Jade (Grooming Gang Survivor), Maggie Oliver (Police Whistleblower & Activist)

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Overview

This harrowing episode features Jade, a survivor of grooming gang abuse, and Maggie Oliver, a police whistleblower and founder of the Maggie Oliver Foundation. Jade courageously recounts her experience of being systematically abused from the age of 14 by a grooming gang in High Wycombe—a story sadly representative of many others. The conversation is raw, emotional, and deeply critical of institutional failures: police, social services, the justice system, and British state agencies. Maggie provides expert insight into the systemic neglect that allowed such abuse to continue, and both guests call for urgent societal and legislative change.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Jade’s Early Vulnerability & Abuse

• Vulnerable Background: Jade describes a turbulent childhood—her father was a heroin addict, her mother in a violent relationship. At age 14, Jade put herself into care (05:13–05:16).

• Grooming Dynamics: Initial attention, gifts, parties, and affection by her abuser(s) quickly turned to coercion, threats, violence, and repeated sexual assaults—as well as psychological manipulation and isolation from support systems (01:43–04:13).

• Quote:

  “It'll be fun until they get you into this state where you trust them...and then they'll make you believe it's okay to then sleep with their brother. If you love me, if you trust me, sleep with them.” (02:28, Jade)

2. Institutional Neglect and Secondary Victimization

• Failure of Safeguarding: Despite being on the child protection register, Jade's disclosures were dismissed by adults in care homes, police, and teachers. Physical evidence and repeated abuse were ignored (08:29–12:07).

• Victim Blaming: Social workers suggested she was “prostituting herself” at age 14; police arrested her after she retracted an allegation due to intimidation (06:32; 09:59).

• Quote:

  “They never took any of us serious. I went into my care home with love bites all over my neck and...said I got pinned down by a group of men...They didn’t call the police or anything.” (08:29, Jade)

3. Criminalization of Victims

• Shock of Prosecution: At 16, Jade was arrested and ultimately jailed for "inciting sexual activity"—accused of bringing another girl to a so-called “house party” where both were abused (15:57–18:41).

• Consequences: Jade spent 14 months in prison, including her 18th birthday, on the sex offenders register—her life and future aspirations (such as working with vulnerable kids) permanently tainted by official criminalization (20:04; 22:02).

• Quote:

  “I actually went to jail and put on a sex offenders register. I spent my 18th birthday in jail. I missed my auntie’s funeral in jail. Lost a lot of my life.” (20:25, Jade)

4. Community and Systemic Complicity

• Widespread Silence: Maggie explains complicity extends beyond gangs—school, community members, and even wives of perpetrators. Victims were racially abused and dismissed to shield offenders (12:14–12:26; 25:28–26:26).

• Official Coverup: Maggie asserts that government and police were purposefully dissuaded from investigating these crimes, citing unimplemented parliamentary recommendations and attempts to silence whistleblowers (30:44–34:06; 42:27–45:25).

• Quote:

  “I believe fully that from the top level of government, they were telling police forces not to do anything about these gangs...This is decades of neglect.” (30:44, Maggie Oliver)

5. Racial, Cultural, and Political Sensitivities

• Complex Dynamics: The guests highlight how fear of being labeled racist led authorities to avoid action, and that offenders targeted vulnerable white girls—race was frequently invoked during abuse (25:28–26:26).

• Maggie’s Position: While most grooming gang offenders in these cases are British Pakistani Muslims from specific backgrounds, the conversation stresses it's not a blanket indictment of any ethnicity but a call for honesty about patterns (72:01–75:08).

• Quote:

  “They have sacrificed children like Jade on the altar of political correctness.” (39:39, Maggie Oliver)

6. Current State and Ongoing Failure

• Still Happening: Jade reaffirms this is not just history; similar abuse continues today, with girls currently missing and at risk (40:01–40:33).

• Support Networks: Recovery only began when Jade connected with Maggie’s foundation; the NHS and state offered almost no effective help (37:14–37:45).

• Call for Systemic Change: The episode ends with urgent demands for cross-party political collaboration, independent inquiries, personal accountability for failed officials, and above all, honesty about the scale and nature of the problem (67:29–80:36).

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Memorable Quotes

• On Systemic Neglect:

  “This was not a mistake. This is systemic neglect of vulnerable children who have nobody fighting their corner.”
  — Maggie Oliver (13:04)

• On Institutional Betrayal:

  “Because I was in their eyes, the naughty child that kept running away from my care home...they didn’t take me seriously. It’s easier to blame a child like me than to prosecute 100 men.”
  — Jade (08:29; 33:15)

• On Impact:

  “I can’t even take my kids on a school trip because I’m classed as a sex offender.”
  — Jade (22:02)

• On Accountability:

  “If a Chief Constable finds themselves in a criminal court charged with misconduct in a public office...That’s how I think we will see change.”
  — Maggie Oliver (43:21)

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Timestamps of Major Segments

• Jade’s Early Abuse and Care Experience: 01:43–07:43
• Institutional Failure, Victim Blaming: 08:29–14:19
• Arrest & Criminalization of Victims: 15:56–20:25
• Life in Prison and Aftermath: 21:17–23:14
• Pattern of Abuse—Who Were the Perpetrators: 23:14–24:02
• Race, Culture, and Complicity Factors: 25:28–26:26; 71:05–75:08
• Ongoing Neglect, Current Reality: 33:53–42:27; 40:01–42:27
• Policy Failings & Activist Pushback: 43:21–45:25, 67:29–75:25
• Essence of Needed Solutions & Final Thoughts: 67:29–81:26

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Notable Moments

• Jade’s Reluctant “Escape” via Prison: Her path out of abuse was being incarcerated—“the only thing that actually helped me...was going to jail because it got me away from it all.” (28:01)

• Maggie on Political Avoidance: “They have sacrificed children like Jade on the altar of political correctness.” (39:39)

• Jade’s Directness on Race: “It’s not a race thing at all. It’s a factual thing...how can I be racist when I’ve got Pakistani children?” (71:05–71:12)

• Unimplemented Recommendations: Maggie discusses 20 recommendations from the major child sexual abuse inquiry—none implemented despite years and hundreds of millions spent (45:25–47:11).

• Jade’s Ongoing Stigma: Still on the sex offenders register, she is blocked from children’s activities, unable to pursue meaningful work with young people (22:02; 34:44).

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Calls for Action

• Honest Data Collection: Mandatory recording of ethnicity and nature of sexual abuse cases (74:41).
• Independent Oversight: Support for private prosecutions and judicial reviews to force institutional accountability (45:25–47:11).
• Cross-party & Survivor-Informed Reform: Politics aside, prioritizing the protection of children with survivor voices front and center (67:29–68:42).
• Breaking the Silence: Outreach, reporting, and supporting organizations like the Maggie Oliver Foundation for survivors (36:49–39:22).

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For more support or to donate, visit:
The Maggie Oliver Foundation

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Transcript

[Jade]

I was 14.

[Maggie Oliver]

How many abusers did you have?

[Jade]

Over 100. They get you that drunk like you pass out. I remember them seven men taking it on turns on me. The ones that I'm scared of are the ones that I don't remember.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You got arrested for inciting sexual activity?

[Jade]

Yeah, I stood trial with both the adults and. Yeah, and I got sentenced with them and everything. I actually went to jail and put on a sex offenders register. I spent my 18th birthday in jail. I missed my auntie's funeral in jail. Lost a lot of my life. I lost my childhood, obviously, due to the abuse.

[Maggie Oliver]

They have sacrificed children like Jade on the altar of political correctness.

[Jade]

It's not just the perpetrators that have done this to me. It's the police, it's social services, it's the court people that sent me to jail. It's all of them.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Maggie.

[Jade]

Hi. I'm here to pick up my son, Milo.

[Maggie Oliver]

There's no Milo here.

[Jade]

Who picked up my son from school?

[Maggie Oliver]

Streaming only on Peacock.

[Jade]

I'm gonna need the name of everyone.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

That could have a connection.

[Maggie Oliver]

You don't understand.

[Jade]

It was just the five of us. So this was all planned.

[Maggie Oliver]

What are you gonna do?

[Jade]

I will do whatever it takes to get my son back.

[Co-Interviewer]

I honestly didn't see this coming. These nice people killing each other.

[Maggie Oliver]

All her fault. A new series, streaming now only on Peacock.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Clever. And Jade, welcome to the show. Maggie, welcome back. You're, of course, the police whistleblower who's done excellent work exposing the grooming gangs. And Jade, you're someone who's a survivor. We want to talk to both of you about different aspects of this, but let's start with you. J. Just tell us your story and what happened to you. How it happened.

[Jade]

Oh, I was 14. Yeah, it started when I was 14. My dad took me on a drug deal with him. That's where I met my main perpetrator. And then it just went from there. He would pick me up, take me to his house. It'll be all fun and games at first. It'll be, I'll buy cigarettes. I'll take you to school. I'll pick you up from school. I will buy you alcohol. Let's come to a house party. It'll be absolutely the most. When you're in a care home and you've got no one, that was like the best thing ever. House parties, attention, alcohol, fags, music. It was all fun. And then.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Thanks. For our American viewers.

[Jade]

Yeah. So it'll be. It'll be fun until they get you into this State where you trust them and then they'll make you believe that it's okay to then sleep with their brother. If you love me, if you trust me, sleep with them. Oh, I bought you a bottle of alcohol, you've got to sleep with them. And it will just get worse and worse through that. Like, yeah, it'll just get, it'll just get worse. But it's not just with me. It weren't just that one group. Like we'll walk down the road and it'll be, it would be their EID celebration and they'll be driving around in hire cars, we'll be walking down the road and all you'd hear is them shouting your name walking up the road. And I've had situations where I've been invited to go to ASDA to go shopping with them. I've said no and they've gotten out the car and beating me up. So it's like the next time they pull you up and say, jade, get in the car, you're going to get in the car because you'll get beaten up otherwise. So that went really quick from meeting them.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So how, how, how long does this like love bombing bit last? Until they actually start being literally, they'll.

[Jade]

Be nice to you for about a month and then, and then they know, yeah, they'll gain your trust, but. And when you're, as I said, vulnerable girls, like, I had the dad that didn't look after me and I went into care. So it was, I craved that love and attention. Like when anyone would want to give me love and attention, I'd crave it. In a care home, they're not allowed to hug you and give you that affection in the care home when you're upset because they don't want to be accused eventually of sexual abuse or anything from giving you affection. So you go out and you crave that affection.

[Maggie Oliver]

Of course, then a care home, I would say, if you're American viewers, you know, it's when a child is taken out of the family and put into the care of the state, but the state doesn't care. And you know the staff there, even if you get a good member of staff, they are not allowed to hug one of the children. So, you know, 12, 13 year old child, 11 year old child wants physical contact. And the predators, the child rapists, they know that these children are very vulnerable and that's why they're targeted like Jade was.

[Co-Interviewer]

So there's going to be a lot of people who are listening to this Jade who's like, you've mentioned your father, but you haven't mentioned your mother.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah.

[Co-Interviewer]

Where was your mum?

[Jade]

My mum, she was in a domestic relationship and I did like a new partner, so. And I was a daddy's girl and I just craved my dad and wanted to go and live with my dad. Her thinking my dad was a good person for me to live with. Turns out he wasn't when I actually moved in with him.

[Co-Interviewer]

And so then you're in a care home?

[Jade]

I put myself into care, yeah.

[Co-Interviewer]

So you put yourself.

[Jade]

I rang social services. I said I couldn't live with my dad anymore, can I go to care?

[Co-Interviewer]

Okay.

[Jade]

And because I was on child protection, living with my dad due to him being a heroin addict, so they just took me into care.

[Co-Interviewer]

So it was a process of a month. And you were 14 years old, and what effect did that have on you.

[Jade]

Psychologically and physically at the time? At the time, it was horrible because the first time. The first time I got sexually assaulted was in 2008. Me and my friend was in a house. In a house party. Both got abused, both went to the police station. They took our DNA, they took DNA, they took our clothes, swabs, everything. My friend got bullied, dropping the charge.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Bullied by whom?

[Jade]

By the perpetrator. Perpetrator, yeah. Got bullied by him to drop the charge. So she dropped the charge, which then had all of ours dropped, had mine and hers dropped out due to insufficient evidence. Evidence, yeah. So then. And then she ended up actually going jail for lying to the court for being abused. And that was in 2008. And then my social worker took me into McDonald's and sat down and asked me if I was prostituted myself for drugs and alcohol.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

14 years old.

[Jade]

14 years old. Asked me if I was prostituting myself for drugs and alcohol. So when you go to the police and they don't believe you and then social services blame you for being a prostitute, you don't. You start believing it. You start believing that yourself. So even though you're out there being abused and you know what you're going through ain't right when nobody believes you, you don't cry out for help that much anymore. You just hold it. I've held it. I've held. I didn't ever go. I had seven men in the taxi base take it in turns on me when I was that drunk, throwing up in the toilet. I couldn't do anything about it. Seven men. And I couldn't ever tell anyone about it because no one believed me. There was a time I woke up in McDonald's. Not in my clothes, knickers, inside out, upside down in my friend's clothes. I found my friend in a house, in a bath, wearing my clothes. And it's like, I don't. I don't know how I woke up at McDonald's. I don't know how I got undressed. I don't know how I got dressed in somebody else's clothes. So it makes you think, who dressed me, who undressed me? That's how drunk they get you. They get you that drunk, you pass out and then it's like, what's happened? I remember them seven men taking it on turns on me. So it's the ones that I'm scared of are the ones that I don't remember.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah.

[Jade]

And because it's. I've. Yeah. They take you to hotel rooms, get you that drunk. I've woke up in a state, naked, that ran straight out the hotel, running up the road, naked out of a hotel room, trying to scream for help. And they've jumped straight in the car and forced me in the car again.

[Co-Interviewer]

And listening to this story, which is horrific, it makes me think, where would, where would the care. Where the people in the care home, where were the people who were meant to be safeguarding? Because what people don't understand is, is that every single person who works with children, as I used to do as a teacher, you were taught about safeguarding. You were taught about how to spot signs if a child is being abused, either physically or sexually. How, how did this not get picked up?

[Jade]

I. I've just recently got my care files and it is appalling. It is actually disgusting. What are in them files? I've gone into my care home with love bites all over my neck and, and stated that I got pinned down by a group of men. That's where I got it from. And they done nothing. They didn't call the police or anything. They just wrote it on a piece of paper and put in my files. At the age of 15, I've come running home saying that I've just had sex with a 21 year old. They wrote it on a piece of paper and put on the file, didn't call the police. I come home with a black eye, got beaten up on the file. Literally. I've got on the file, literally one short statement. Jada's made an allegation against a drunk man. No further action. They never took any of us serious. And it was like, where? Because I was in their eyes, the naughty child that kept running away from my Care home. It was like, where. Because I kept running away and I kept going to it. It's like that's what I wanted. I kept going back to him. I kept. No, it's not. If I didn't go back, I'd get a picture sent to my phone of my dad begging on the street, telling. Telling me, they're going to kill my dad next time if I don't come or I'll get battered. As I said, they'll pull up beside me. If I don't get in the car, they'll come, get out the car and beat me up. So it's like you had no choice. Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Did you. Did you ever try to. Other than that one, the first time when you went to the police, did you ever. Or did you just at that point decide there's no point?

[Jade]

No, I've done it. I've done another. I've done another one. And I got bullied by him and his wife. They all. They drove me to the police station and I got arrested for wasting police time.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You got arrested for wasting police time because you withdrew the allegations?

[Jade]

Because I withdrew the allegation. But I got bullied for about 3.3months by him and his wife.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So. So these guys are married?

[Jade]

Yeah. Married, kids.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

What. Does their wife know what's going on?

[Jade]

Well, yeah, I got bullied by one of them.

[Co-Interviewer]

You got bullied by the wife?

[Jade]

Yeah, when I made an allegation of rape against the perpetrator. And him, I was. He took me to his house and he. Him and his wife. Him and his wife, they'll drive past me, they'll put me in a car. I'll. I had. There was no choice. I had to withdraw it.

[Co-Interviewer]

And. And you say bullied and I think I know what you mean, but let's delve into it. What do you. What do you mean by the term bullied?

[Jade]

They'll intimidate me. They'll threaten me, like, they'll drive past my school. They'll be waiting outside my school when I come out of school, they'll be sitting there spying on me, driving behind me up the road. I'll get text messages to the point that it was like, I'm just going to do this. I'm just going to do this because even though my dad put me. What he put me through, he's still my dad and I'll do everything to protect him. I would never let anyone hurt my dad because I didn't follow through with what you want me to do.

[Co-Interviewer]

And what. Where were the teachers in all of this, because they must have known. They would. They would know you would be a child at risk, as it's called.

[Jade]

Well, during my time, Asian Community School, which most of them don't believe it's true.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Say that again.

[Jade]

Us white girls, we. We used to get called the white hoes. We used to get called. I don't know if I'm gonna say this.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You're allowed to say anything you want.

[Jade]

We used to get called Paki bashers by white people.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So just, just so people understand, if you complained about the fact that you were being sexually abused by a Pakistani man, you would be basically called racist. Effectively, that's what they're saying. Right?

[Jade]

Yeah. Or we'll be the slags. We. We're the ones that got drunk and let it happen.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Right.

[Jade]

That was the main one. We was drunk. We get it.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And with your school, you're saying because it was minority, white people like you wouldn't be taken seriously at all.

[Jade]

No.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Wow.

[Jade]

All family members.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

What about teachers?

[Jade]

No. No one. No one took anything serious really. Yeah. Literally nobody took me serious at all. I got to blame for everything.

[Maggie Oliver]

And actually the key point is that Jade. Another key point is Jade was on the child protection register. So it's not just teachers were aware, social services were aware, the police were aware.

[Jade]

The police put me on police protection. The police themselves put me on police protection. Untold times for being high risk of sexual exploitation.

[Maggie Oliver]

This was known by everybody officially. And Jade is one child like high risk. Thousands like Jade.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Just say that again, Maggie, because it might have got lost. And I think this is an important question for people watching this because your story is horrific. Like what's. What you're telling us is just mind boggling. And no, no one can imagine actually how, how terrible what it is. But you're saying this is actually normal?

[Maggie Oliver]

You know, my journey of the past 20 years, I've lost count of the number of children like Jade who I have spoken to and that we in the foundation have tried to support. And what it shows is that this was not a mistake. This is systemic neglect of vulnerable children who have nobody fighting their corner. Jade and thousands of other children were and are on what's called in England a child protection register. And that means that they are assessed as being at high risk. Now, it could be at risk of neglect, it could be at risk of violence, it could be at risk of sexual exploitation. Jade was on there for much of that. But the sexual exploitation was a key part that everybody knew was happening and nobody took any action.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And what. Why not? If you're on this register, presumably that is done so that you're protected.

[Maggie Oliver]

Supposed to be.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Right. So why did that not happen?

[Jade]

Because the system is basically. Yeah, they don't. They don't care. They do not care. They were literally, I believe they're all in it for themselves. They really don't care about us.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, I always say children like Jade have got nobody fighting their corner. If this was Keir Starmer's daughter or it was Boris Johnson's daughter, do you honestly think we would have had decades with children in care or in difficult home lives being neglected in this way, that their rapist would not have been dealt with? They've made decisions because, you know, those in authority couldn't be asked to act. They wouldn't put the money into protecting. They wouldn't put them in a secure accommodation when men were picking them up outside the children's home to rape them on a daily basis in England now, in the uk, it's very well known that this is true, it's a fact and it's not an exaggeration. We've now got awareness, but children like Jade are living with the consequences of that neglect for the rest of their lives. And even now, we've got people in authority like Keir Starmer wriggling and saying, you know, people like me and like Jade, we're far right extremists for daring to speak out. But it's children's lives that are destroyed. And, you know, Jade was an isolated case and it wasn't a hidden abuse. It was known to everybody who legally had care of her.

[Jade]

I've had my leave and care worker even message me on Facebook recently saying that I should sue the local authorities because they neglected me.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Well, that sounds like the very minimum.

[Jade]

Yeah, that's the minimum, yeah. Because I actually went to jail with perpetrators.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You went to jail?

[Jade]

I went to jail with perpetrators. With perpetrators. Me and a girl from my care home, we went to a house party. We both got abused that night. Obviously, I don't go to the police because they don't believe me. She did. And me and four perpetrators got arrested.

[Maggie Oliver]

I just want to clarify something. Two weeks before that, Jade was a child.

[Jade]

Yeah, sorry. So 18 days before I got arrested, sorry, I got put on police protection. So I got put on police protection for being high risk sexual exploitation. Eighteen days later, I got arrested as for being a perpetrator. And I was 15 and then 16.

[Maggie Oliver]

The only difference was her birthday, 10.

[Jade]

So, like, after I turned 16, it was like all of me being a victim didn't. Didn't matter. Didn't matter.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And what were you the perpetrator of?

[Jade]

According. Taking a G out with me.

[Maggie Oliver]

She wasn't a perpetrator.

[Jade]

Yeah, they. Basically what they're saying is, is that I took a G out to get abused.

[Maggie Oliver]

What the way.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So you are getting arrested because you and your friend went to a house party, by the way, for listeners. She's using inverted commas every time she says house party. And you then effectively got arrested for. For putting her in that position. Yes.

[Jade]

Called inciting sexual activity.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You got arrested for inciting sexual activity?

[Jade]

Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

With four men.

[Jade]

Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So the 16 year old gets arrested with four.

[Jade]

With four adult men.

[Maggie Oliver]

I think what I want to clarify is that the children are going to these sex parties every night, children like Jade. And the way this kind of abuse happens is one child goes with another child, goes with another child. Because actually, you know, the only chance Jade has of not getting raped is if there's another person there who will be raped. But it's. They go together as friends. Nobody acts until while they're a victim as a child. But as soon as they become 16, there is a perception that then they are an adult, even though the law says they're a child up to the age of 18. And then by arresting Jade and prosecuting her, it means that all of that abuse and the investigation into what happened to her doesn't have to be dealt with. But the reality is that nothing happened between the day before her 16th birthday, nothing different, and the day after was exactly the same. But the element of not protecting her falls away. And then it's easy to treat a child as a perpetrator. Do you know, does that make sense?

[Co-Interviewer]

It makes complete sense. The thing to me that again, as somebody who's worked with children, that makes this even more heinous is the fact that you went through these horrendous experiences, these horrendous experiences when you were a child, and then the moment you turned, you became an adult and inverted commas, an adult, which you weren't. I've taught 16 year olds, 16 year olds are not adults. And then they arrested you and charged you, so you became you. Not only were you a victim of these awful men, victim of the system, you then became a victim of the criminal justice procedure. That to me is evil. It's evil. I mean, I can't even begin to comprehend what that must have been like.

[Jade]

It's been horrible. It's been like. So when they arrested me in My statement, I stopped my. I said I didn't go. No comment. Once I named everyone that I could name, I stopped the interview and took them to the house that it happened in because they said it will go for me. Yeah. The two people that I did name didn't get charged and they said to me that I was stand trial on my own because I was a juvenile. I stood trial with both the adults and. Yeah, and I got sentenced with them and everything. I actually went to jail and put on a sex vengeance register.

[Co-Interviewer]

How long were you in jail for?

[Jade]

They sent me, they sentenced me to two years and I've done 14 months.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And 16 years old at 16.

[Co-Interviewer]

And for those people who don't, who haven't got experience of the prison system, if you go in as a sex offender, you are the lowest of the low in prison and you are actually in great physical danger.

[Jade]

Yeah, I got called a nonce near enough every day in there and I was 17. Do you know I spent my 18th birthday in jail? I missed my auntie's funeral in jail. That's a lot of my life.

[Maggie Oliver]

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[Co-Interviewer]

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[Maggie Oliver]

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[Maggie Oliver]

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[Co-Interviewer]

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[Jade]

I lost my childhood, obviously, due to the abuse and then being in jail. I had to grow up because I was in there with brutal people and me being classed as a nonce, it was something I had to do. I had to grow up. And then I become a mum really soon after I got out. So I haven't really.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

I think it's really brave and important that you're. You're coming and telling your story, Jade, because what happened to you is just completely awful. And I think the point that Maggie makes as well, which is people like you who are talking about this, being smeared and called all sorts of names when you're just telling the truth about what happened to you is just so awful.

[Jade]

I can't even take my kids on a school trip because I'm classed as a sex offender.

[Maggie Oliver]

And it honestly breaks my heart that the country and those in power and influence allow this to happen to generations of children. That's what keeps me going.

[Jade]

And it's like 18 years I've been feeling this pain and 18 years they've been laughing, walking down the street with their family.

[Co-Interviewer]

And it's very important for people to realise as well, is that you got put in a youth offenders institution and in many ways people don't understand this. Those youth offenders institutions are actually worse than prison because there's far more violence in them. So you must have been terrified every single day of your life.

[Jade]

Yeah. I would find girls in my cell reading my paperwork, threatening me of when I go to chapel, that they were going to beat me up in chapel. But I had to, I didn't do it. So I still walked out of my cell every day with my head held high. But it was a battle every day. Still is to this day.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And what about the. The perpetrators? Tell us a little bit about who they were and anything. Share with us.

[Jade]

They were taxis.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Taxi drivers.

[Jade]

Taxi drivers, yeah. Majority of them are taxi drivers from all different bases in the same town. Yeah. It was run by the whole family. So it's just a family of abusers, really. They are all. Every single one of them are British, Pakistani men and every single one of them are older than 20. When you're at the age of 14, I think my oldest would. Would have been about in the 60s. They would bring their uncles over from Pakistan. I've got taken to snappy snaps to have a photo shoot with one of the uncles so he could take the pictures back to Pakistan and show everyone his English girlfriend.

[Co-Interviewer]

And I think it's also important because people associate grooming gangs with towns in the north. But you're not from the north, you're from High Wycombe.

[Jade]

Yeah.

[Co-Interviewer]

When I think of High Wycombe, I think of Buckinghamshire. And for those people listening, Buckinghamshire is one of the wealthiest counties in the uk.

[Jade]

High Wycombe. Wycombe is absolutely vile. It is full of them. Since. Since I've come out and spoken, I have had a good lot of girls come shout out to me from High Wycombe, saying thank you to me for speaking out for them. Yeah. It is not a nice area at all.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And one of the things I wanted to ask you, we had Another survivor called Dr. L. A. Hill. I don't know if you're familiar with her. A very. A long time ago. It's kind of how we first really became aware of this issuance, why we've had a lot of people on to talk about it, because that's when we really understood the horrific nature of everything that was going on. One of the things that she talked about was that it's difficult to talk about because you get called all the names and whatever, but I think it's really important to talk about. She was talking about the fact that her abusers were very explicit in the fact that they were abusing her because of her race and because she wasn't Muslim, et cetera. Did you ever get anything like that or did they ever justify why they were doing it or explain to you why they were entitled to or anything? Or was it just.

[Jade]

No, I wouldn't say they really. I'd get called a white slug all the time or they would ring me up going, you're coming out, you white? It was always. The white would always get brought up into it.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah.

[Jade]

But I never really, at that time I didn't really see it as a race thing. But now probably.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Well, I'm not trying to put words.

[Jade]

I know you're not, but I'm just saying it is majority, majority of the people that I know that have been abused aren't, aren't Pakistani girls, let's just put it that way.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

But also it's. The fact that they are using your race in that way implies that there's some kind of moral judgment that's being made. Well like you are. They're entitled to do that. Do you see what I'm.

[Jade]

Yeah. And, and, and it's more like even, even like their family members of things, it'll be because of how we dress. Well, if your girls ain't showing their skin the way they do. What site gives you the right to abuse us because we show our skin?

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Right.

[Jade]

That don't mean, don't mean that just because we, we don't wear the same clothes you do don't mean that gives you the right to then abuse us.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Of course.

[Co-Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah.

[Co-Interviewer]

And the thing that I always found horrifying about this jade, and you've touched on it a little bit, is the people who, in that community who just condoned it and not only condoned it, they covered it up.

[Jade]

Yeah.

[Co-Interviewer]

I mean it's just mind boggling. Like you would say, like wives would cover it up, girlfriends would cover it up.

[Jade]

Yeah, yeah. All of them. I don't know why or how they do it, but they're all just as bad as each other. It's actually disgusting, even in the system. I had sex with this, with this bloke before I got taken to the woods and it was. Dropped me in the middle of nowhere and he took me into the middle of the woods. A week later I see him walking down high Wycombe High street in a PCSO uniform. Yeah. And then after me and him clocked eyes. And then after, I never see him again. So I don't know if he got a transfer, don't know if he quit his job. But even people in the police.

[Co-Interviewer]

I mean, for our people overseas viewers of PCSO is a police community support officer. It's a run. It's a level below a police officer.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

But there's someone in authority that's supposed to be.

[Jade]

Yeah. So they. So they all know about it. They're either. The police are either getting paid off or they've. Or they've got them in. In their police force. Same as teachers in the school I was at. They're all related.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Was there anyone who tried to help?

[Jade]

No.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Not at all?

[Jade]

No. Not.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Not in the police. Not in social services.

[Jade]

The police sent me to jail and didn't believe me. Social services. All they done was write it on a piece of paper and didn't actually go to the police or do anything. For me, the only thing that actually helped me, even though it's the worst experience of my life, the only thing that got me away from it all, was going to jail because it got me away from it. They. I was locked up so I couldn't. They couldn't pick me up and I could run away of them do. I mean, it was.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

That's what I was going to ask you. How did you eventually get out of it? Going into jail, going to jail. And what happened when you came out?

[Jade]

I fell pregnant quite soon, so I managed to get away from it because I had my baby.

[Maggie Oliver]

And that's actually really typical. That many of the. Many of the girls that I've known over past 15 years, 20 years, their escape route is when they get pregnant and then they have a purpose and it gives you a sense of belonging and you can love your baby. It kind of removes the vulnerability. And the other side is that you are getting older. These gangs target very young children because by the time that child knows that they are being sexually abused and raped, they're already in too deep. They carry the shame. The authorities are not stepping in.

[Jade]

Yeah. Once you get to a certain age, they're not interested in you.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah.

[Jade]

If you're walking down the road wearing a school uniform or looking. Looking young and vulnerable, they'll scream and shout you as soon as you hit like 21 and actually got some age to you then. It is crazy. It is crazy. The attention you get when you're 14 to the attention you get when you're an adult body sort of people.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So they're deliberately targeting vulnerable children?

[Jade]

Yeah, 100%. 100%. So I, even after I was still living in High Wycombe with my babies, but I would walk past my rapist every day. They'll be walking out the shop going, hi, it's my Jade. And I'm like, I nearly killed myself. And that's why I moved out of Wickham, because I couldn't physically walk past them every day. It took me to have two kids and nearly kill myself to get me away from them all, because it was just traumatizing every day of my life. Walk into the shop, they'll drive past you, still preying on you, just traumatizing you every day.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, you know, I mean, for me, this, this, the abusers themselves, they need to be dealt with. But the neglect of the authorities, that, for me, is what's driven me. Because those in power, police, social services, they know what's going on. And by not acting, they're sentencing another child to what Jade went through.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Maggie, just explain that a little bit more. What do you mean when they say they know what's going on?

[Maggie Oliver]

That these were not mistakes, these were systemic failures. And I believe fully that from the top level of government, that they were telling police forces not to do anything about these gangs. And nobody will convince me any different. This is decades of neglect. You know, you only have to look back at. There are some people who have spoken out. You know, I remember one of the first was Anne Cryer. You know, she was an MP and was calling out in Parliament about Pakistani abusers in Keighley, in Yorkshire. She was accused of being a racist. She kind of was haunted out of Parliament. Nobody wanted to act, so why? Why? And they've abandoned generations of children to the trauma that Jade is just beginning to recover from. But you can see it will never go completely. But as a country, it's the duty of police and social workers to protect children.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

How much of this do you think, Jay, you mentioned this, that you were like the problem child. You. You'd run away, you. You come from a difficult family background, etc. How much of this is just. It's easier to blame it on a. On a problem child than to actually deal with the fact that there's a complex crime involving numerous people, et cetera, and it's just easier to just, oh, you blame on the kid and you kind of move on. Is that what was going on here as well?

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah, I don't think that that's possible now. Because the country now, you know, I've been speaking about this for 15 years. The country, the public now know that this is a real problem and that it has been a systemic failure. So you can't blame children now for their own abuse. But I've always felt you couldn't. But they got away with it for so long by hiding it, brushing it under the carpet. You know, children like Jade don't matter and it's as though there was collusion from everybody in those positions. It's a lot cheaper to blame a child like Jade than it is to prosecute, maybe. How many abusers did you have?

[Jade]

Over 100.

[Maggie Oliver]

You know, you prosecute 100 men, you've got complex investigations, you've got court costs, you've got lawyers, you've got. They're not going to do that. If they can discredit Jade, Jade will never get justice, justice for her abuse.

[Jade]

Because I'm a criminal now.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah, she's been discredited. You know, if she ever went to court, they would say that she is not a credible victim witness, you know.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So it's any of the men who. Who did this to you been prosecuted? No, None.

[Jade]

None. And what the funny thing is now, the. They. The Thames Valley police told the journalists that they had no acknowledgment of me. Thames Valley police turned up on my door the other day wanting my help for. To investigate child sexual exploitation between 2008 and 2011, when it was happening to me, because they have information that I've got information for them.

[Maggie Oliver]

And that's because of the media work.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Of course.

[Co-Interviewer]

Yeah, of course, of course.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

So this is why I'm. I'm. I'm wondering whether. I mean, maybe I'm being naive here and you'll probably correct me, but is there maybe hope that with all the media attention now, actually there will be.

[Maggie Oliver]

Some justice for Jade?

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yes.

[Jade]

Oh, I wouldn't want. I don't even want to go through it. I gave him DNA 18 years ago. I cannot now go through that for another six years for. For them to be sentenced for four to four years in jail when I've done nearly 20 years of trauma, 20 years of waking up every day crying because of the abuse I went through. I mean, my house, I have anxiety, I can't leave my house, I have trouble with relationships because I don't trust anyone. I can't get into taxis on my own. Like, there's so much stuff that, yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You probably just want to get on with your life.

[Jade]

Of course I do.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You've Got three kids.

[Jade]

I wanted to work with vulnerable kids and I can't do that because of what I'm classed as now.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

This is such an injustice on so many levels. It really is horrific and it's disgusting that this has been allowed to go on for so long and to so many people.

[Jade]

And the worst thing is, it's not just me. I know there's untold girls out there that are going through the exact same thing as me. And this is why we need to try and make change now. Because I can't physically let another girl go through what I went through. I can't have another girl out there for another 18 years waking up crying every day cuz they feel like for what they've put you through. Because it's not just the perpetrators that have done this to me, it's the police, it's social services, it's the cult people that sent me to jail, it's all of them, cps, everyone.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, when I first met Jade, how many years ago was that?

[Jade]

Two?

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah, in Euston Station. I mean, Jade's upset now. You couldn't speak, could you? You know, you carried all this guilt, all this shame, all this hiding from the world, wouldn't admit what had happened. And she came. I started a charity because of children like Jade, but to see her blossoming and I know she's upset now, but to see her. To go from somebody who hid from the world to finding a voice, to recognizing, you know, from day one, I said to her, we all, you know, my team, you have done nothing wrong. This is not your fault. You have been failed. You believe that now, don't you? Yeah. But she's had a year and a half of emotional support through the charity. We all believed in her. We've, you know, you've told your story to the Channel 4 documentary. And that journey of being believed and being supported has led to her recovery and now finding a voice and knowing she's done nothing wrong. But the state doesn't provide that support. Without us, Jade would still be where she was two years ago. And every child like Jade is in that place. You know, seven year wait.

[Jade]

I've been trying to wait to get on a trauma course for. Since I was 25, I'm now 32 and I still haven't been put on a trauma course. I start a trauma course in September because Maggie's managed to put me on it. NHS has not helped me at all with anything, with my mental health. No. And we don't do anything.

[Maggie Oliver]

We're a Charity. So we're not a state agency. We exist because of donations.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Maggie, tell everybody about the charity.

[Maggie Oliver]

It's there.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Well, what's it called?

[Maggie Oliver]

The Maggie Oliver Foundation. I mean, you, you.

[Jade]

The Maggie Oliver foundation is absolutely amazing. I signed up to them two years ago and if it weren't for me, I wouldn't be here now. Like where I am at this point of my healing process now. I've had a year and a half of emotional support, one phone call every week. I've done a trauma focused workshop. I'm now going on a 12 week trauma course. Like, the foundation is amazing. The best support I've had and, you.

[Maggie Oliver]

Know, we give emotional support. But Jade's also being supported on the advocacy side and she shared her story with Baroness Casey. You know, I brought a team of a group of 10 survivors together that she spoke to and she delayed publication of her report to include their voices because voices like Jade are hidden. The establishment do not want her to find a voice to share these experiences. But as a police officer, I have seen this repeatedly and lives are destroyed, but they can recover. And in the absence of the state providing that which they should be, you know, Jade's recovery should be a priority. Not, you know. Well, there's so many things that we as a country waste money on when children like Jade do not get the help that they need. So we're trying to make it better because I do think that every victim, every child that's been through what Jade has been through can get better, but they can't do it on their own. So supporting individuals like Jade in the foundation is critical. But I want to change the system and Jade is part of that work for change now. Because I can't tell Jade's story. Your story is so important, but it's important that you tell it. My job is to join the dots and to show that Jace isn't one isolated story. She is one of thousands. And that's why we have to change the system.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

It's really important that you're doing that, Maggie. And the Maggie Oliver Foundation, I really encourage everybody to go and support it because it's clearly making a massive difference. And Jed, just so you know, we have lots of people in the studio, some of them are really famous and whatever, a lot of them come in super nervous. And for you to come and tell your story the way you're telling selling, it's really admirable and, and thank you for doing that. Yeah. So, Maggie, let's talk a little bit more about the, the, the thing that you talk about, which is, of course, the Jed's not the exception.

[Maggie Oliver]

No, no, no.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Right. So is this still going on, first of all? Well, are there still grooming gangs in this country?

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, perhaps that's Jade, you know.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Do you tell me.

[Jade]

Yeah. 100. 100.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

How do you know?

[Jade]

I. I met someone recently that has come over to me and asked me because a girl has recently been arrested for the same thing I've been arrested for. There are girls still hiding in toilets, crying on the phone, crying to their school workers for help to get out of the situation.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Like, now this is going on right now.

[Jade]

There are girls reported missing right now, guaranteed, locked in a house, being abused. 100%. I know, a million percent. I could put my life on it.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, Jade was involved in the recent Channel 4 documentary. And that brings this problem right into the current time on cases that we're involved in in the foundation. You know, cases that have been reopened because they were failed the first time around. You know, girls are waiting. Six years later, they've cooperated with the police. Six years ago, they're still waiting for their abusers to be charged. Their lives are on hold. Again. The police have actually done very little. I mean, I'm thinking of Chantal, for instance. Cause some of your listeners will have watched that documentary. She identified some of her abusers four years ago. They're not even on police bail. They're out walking the streets. So I would say that we've got the authorities saying how. You know, I remember the chief constable saying, as. As sure as night follows day, if anybody came to us today, they would not be treated the way that Jade is. But that's not the reality of what we see in the foundation. I think there is now awareness throughout the whole country. There is outrage, there is awareness. And they're still talking the talk because they can't do anything else. But when it comes to walking the walk and putting the resources in and dealing with each individual victim who needs the help that there is, it's still potluck in what you get. There is no right to have your case investigated properly. There's a lack of police experiences, a lack of police numbers. We've got cases that are four and five years wait for a trial. So the system is on its knees. And I'm, you know, myself together with, you know, victims and survivors like Jade, we're trying to push for the changes that are needed to prevent this continuing. Again and again and again.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You say there's outrage, and I think it's True. But whenever we have these conversations, I just think there's not enough outrage. I really don't.

[Maggie Oliver]

Well, you know, it's taken over my life. And you know, see here, you know, hearing stories like this every day, somebody has to shout about it. And I think through that, those stories very, very slowly raising awareness is the first point in pushing for change.

[Jade]

There are definitely more survivors coming forward. There are, which is what we needed because obviously one person come in to sing, you're not going to hear them. But when you've got choir behind you, you can't not hear it. So I feel like the more, the more survivors we're getting, the better, because we have to be heard.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah.

[Jade]

I mean, not all of us could be like lying or joke, you know, we've got to be listened to at some point.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah. I think people are listening to you and I do think that the country hears that. What I don't see is a real determination from those at the top to bring change. They will talk the talk and then as soon as the media spotlight turns away, they carry on and do nothing. So for me, my aim is to give survivors like Jade a platform because their voices are what will educate people. But my priority is to force those in power to change. And I don't believe that will happen without personal accountability. I honestly and truthfully believe, Constantine, that if a Chief Constable finds themselves in a criminal court charged with misconduct in a public office, I think every single person in a high position today will look at their own position and think, that might be me. In 10 years time, I might be in prison or for gross neglect of duty. And that's how I think we will see change. Because what happens now is when something happens, the whole of the machine gathers around the public institutions because they're more concerned about reputational damage than they are in bringing change. So everything is geared, and this isn't me speculating. I know this because of what I've seen and what I've learned. Corruption is rife. The COVID ups go to the top of these institutions and if you're at the bottom and you're moaning, they don't take it seriously. But the higher up you start to target, the more of a threat it is. And the establishment gathers around them. So it is a battle, but I do think it's one we have to win. I think we have to have personal accountability for these. These are not mistakes. This is systemic failure. It's neglect. It's deliberately turning away from generations of vulnerable children because they couldn't be asked These kids didn't matter. They weren't gonna spend the money. They are collateral damage and that's where we need to see action. So we've become closer to that, I think, over the past five years. But, you know, when I look at the. The national abuse inquiry that we've had, it's called icsa. Independent Inquiry Into Child Sexual Abuse. You know, that took seven years. Hundreds of millions of pounds. Dozens. Hundreds of victims, survivors like Jade. 20 recommendations 3 years ago, not one of those has yet been implemented. They're sitting on a shelf in the Home Office gathering dust. What's the point in having a national inquiry when you don't implement those recommendations? So the foundation, my charity, we are taking the government to court under a judicial review to try to force them to implement those. Those recommendations don't go far enough, but they are a start. And if you know that, you know one of them is to have a Children's Minister. We don't have a Children's Minister in the Cabinet to legally prevent pain compliance of children in care. Do you know that a child who's 13 can be pinned down and tortured if their staff consider that they are at risk? That's still not outlawed in law. So the Judicial Review will try to force the government to implement those 20 recommendations. We can't force them to, but what we can force them to do is to say that they're not going to implement them. So rather than this smokescreen about pretending and kicking the ball further down the road so nothing happens, that's the first step. The second step, I'm involved in something called Action for Accountability, where there's a team of lawyers and barristers now looking at the evidence to see where there is evidence of gross criminal neglect, misconduct in a public office, where we can bring a private prosecution. Because quite honestly, the CPS will never prosecute a state body, they will never do that. So we have to be creative about how we push this ball further down the road. So I'm trying my best to. The foundation now is very well developed. We've got fantastic team. So the individual help is there without me. My knowledge and expertise should go to that. So Baroness Casey, who came not only to speak to Jade, but we had a meeting, didn't we, in a room she listened to. Her report reflects their voices. She has also stated in that report, as a result of Jade's story, that she is going to be behind us and we're gonna be behind her in making it impossible for an abuser who rapes a 13, 14 year old child to not be charged with rape. So it would be a statutory, a sense of rape. If a 30 year old man has sex with a 13 year old, 14 year old, 15 year old child, they will not be able to argue that that child consented. And that's quite right, you know, but, you know, you remember when. I'm not gonna go over old ground because I told this story when I was with you last time, but Jade kind of found out about me and the foundation through the drama Three girls. Because Jade could be Amber, really. Without me, Amber would have gone to prison. But I knew the inside story. But on that case, there was also Ruby. You know, a fetus was found in the police property system. We had DNA. She was 12 years old when he started to rape her. 13 years old when she got pregnant even. He was not charged with rape. He was charged with conspiracy to commit sexual activity with a child. Because they didn't want to have a debate in court about whether or not she consented. She couldn't consent. But if this law comes in, that man, who was 43 years old, he was out of prison in three years, he was back in Rochdale and she bumped into him in the supermarket. That for me is horrific. That's not justice and that's not right. And so if this law, which actually that would give you such an enormous sense of pride for the rest of your life, that your case has affected the situation for every other child victim and that's what has given Jade her voice. And that's what I want for every victim. Yeah.

[Jade]

That's what makes you drunk.

[Maggie Oliver]

And that's why we're achieving three minutes.

[Jade]

Out now till the day I die.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah.

[Jade]

Do you know what I mean?

[Maggie Oliver]

So that is a really important, life changing decision. We've still got to get the government to do that, but we will be fighting for that. And now it's in an official report, it gives it extra weight. I didn't need Baroness Casey to tell me that that's wrong. But the government do, apparently, because they don't listen to individuals. So those changes are really important and my voice is best used in those platforms. But bringing survivors like Jade into those conversations so that you can share what happened to you and every, you know, there's lots of Jades, but you found your voice. Many are not as far along the road, are they, as you?

[Jade]

And it was like with the little bits of story that I told you of what I went through and everything, that's just like little trips and traps. I was getting abused for nearly Two years, every. Near enough, every day, if not every day, every other week, every weekend. So it's like you could. That was only happening, like that's them scenarios happened near enough every day of my life for the two years of my life, should I say, you know.

[Co-Interviewer]

I'm listening to this story and it has real parallels with abusers like Jimmy Savile, abusers like Cyril Smith, who was a notorious pedophile. He was a Liberal Democrat in Rochdale because they targeted children's homes. So it's not just about grooming gangs. There is a pattern of how these type of abuses actually operate. If you could just go into that.

[Maggie Oliver]

You'Re absolutely spot on. Because paedophiles, child abusers, target vulnerable children. So wherever there are vulnerable children, you will find child abusers. So whether it's in, you know, outside children's homes, outside schools, outside schools, outside, you know, they'll infiltrate kids clubs that they will target. But, you know, Jimmy Savile, you know, he went into hospitals where there were disabled people. I've. I've. When I've been in the police, I've. I've had allegations, been aware of allegations in mental health institutes, because nobody will believe that person in a mental health institute. So that's where the predators go. But the. You know, I think I said to you before, Frances, that the criminal justice system, the law and prosecutions will never get rid of this. And I think it's really important that every individual who sees it takes responsibility for doing something about it. So if all those social workers or all the people in the children's home that knew what was happening had acted, they could have changed that. The police officers that you went to have a personal responsibility to act. It cost me my job to. Because I saw this and I couldn't believe what I was seeing. But the further down this road I've got, the more horrified I've become about how people turn a blind eye and think it's not my responsibility. Well, if you care about children, it's all of our responsibilities. But we shouldn't have to lose. Give your job up to speak the truth. And that's why I think the only way, I think you were saying before about whistleblowers should be rewarded, that's never gonna happen.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah, we said that before we came on air. But it's something actually, I heard somebody talk about that really resonated with me, which is the way to prevent things like this across all kinds of different areas of life, actually, is to incentivize whistleblowers. With financial rewards. If you got a million pounds for coming out and revealing this stuff was being covered. Right, but. But not only would you be happy that the police would know. Yeah, the authorities would know. They would know that if we are allowing things to happen that shouldn't be happening, someone is going to come forward because they're going to get a big payout. And by the way, that probably a hell of a lot cheaper than everything's going to happen. Now, the money is the most important part of this, Jade, obviously, but you know what I'm saying, right? So there are solutions to this, but ultimately, I think you put a finger on it when you say that these institutions, they don't want scrutiny, they don't want. No, they don't want this stuff to be. To be unraveled in this way.

[Maggie Oliver]

And what they do, they operate through the fear factor. And when I started to. When I first saw what I saw, I actually naively thought it was one lazy officer who wasn't doing his job. And I didn't want to be. I didn't want to kind of mix anybody a bottle, if you like. But as I sat there at home thinking, you know, what am I gonna do? I was threatened. You know, I thought I'd go to prison for speaking out. I was told that everything you know, you only know because you're a police officer, you've signed the Official Secrets act, you do not share it. I faced that fear and I went public. Not because I had any big plan. I just wanted to be able to look myself in the mirror and know I'd done the best, so that my best. So when my children switch the telly on 30 years later and there's all this scandal about Rochdale, they're gonna say, why did my mum not say anything? That's what drove me. But in order to speak out, I spent two years as a serving police officer facing my fear. And I accepted that I might go to prison, but I knew that I was telling the truth and I knew that I was doing the right thing. But most people, you know, you've got a mortgage, you've got children, they can't take that risk and they're never gonna incentivise it. I took power away from them by resigning from the police, then they had no hold over me. But I do believe that personal accountability, if we can make an example of 1, 2, 10 public servants, will have the same effect.

[Jade]

Coca Cola for the big, for the.

[Maggie Oliver]

Small, the short and the tall, Peacemakers, risk takers for the optimists, pessimists for long distance love, for introverts and extroverts, the thinkers and the doers for old.

[Jade]

Friends and new Coca Cola for everyone.

[Maggie Oliver]

Pick up some Coca Cola at a.

[Jade]

Store near you, Maggie.

[Co-Interviewer]

And this is me being conspiratorial, but it seems to me that this is almost, you know, when somebody has been diagnosed with cancer and it's too late and they do the checks and the cancer has spread everywhere. It seems to me that with this type of cases that you've been speaking about Jade and you've been talking about more broadly, does this go right the way to the top? Has this been a cover up from the very, very, very top?

[Maggie Oliver]

I believe so. I hundred, I 150% believe so.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You're both nodding very. Why do you, why do you, why are you so convinced? I'm not disputing, I'm just, you know.

[Maggie Oliver]

At the beginning of this journey, I didn't believe that. But my journey of the past 15 years, the similarities between every area in this country. So whether it's Yorkshire or Manchester or Cumbria or Thames Valley, they're identical. They are identical. And I do believe that it's been, I mean, I think I've referred several times to Nazir Afzal was the chief prosecutor on the Rochdale case. He's a spokesperson now who goes out and does a lot of interviews. He spoke publicly about a circular that was sent round from the Home office, allegedly in 2008, to every police force, telling them not to investigate these grooming gangs. He said that publicly. He has now withdrawn that. But I do not believe for one moment that he said that without having seen that circular. And I believe that he has now been silenced because he's been told to be silent. That would show that you can't find that circular anywhere. But I believe that this has been. I think that there was two factors that have fed into it. The fact that you girls didn't matter and the second one was the racial dynamics of the abusers and they didn't wanna rock the multicultural boat. And the third part is the money. It's a lot cheaper to send Jade to prison than it is to investigate a whole very organized network of paedophiles. So those three things have meant it's convenient to throw kids like Jade on the bonfire and who's gonna say anything? And the reality is that other than a very small handful of people like Anne Cryer, like me, like Andrew Norfolk, most people have kept quiet about it. So actually it paid off. They have saved billions and billions of Pounds. And they have sacrificed children like Jade on the altar of political correctness. So I think those days are done. You can't sweep it back under the carpet now. It's out there and nobody is going to be silenced. We're at the next step now where they're trying to pretend they're going to do something. Actually they're not doing very much. And that's where the battle now lies.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Have you had any contact with the government?

[Maggie Oliver]

I've spoken to most of them. I've met Rishi Sunat, Swella Brahman, Priti Patel. They talk the talk, but they go off the call. They don't walk the walk.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

What about the labor government? Sorry, Francis, the current government? Have you. Had they been interested at all?

[Maggie Oliver]

They've never wronged me. There was, you know, there was a meeting and actually, you know what? I don't buy into the anymore. I'm fed up of having pointless conversations with people. It's a waste of my time. I would rather focus my mind on action. I've been down that road. I've put my trust in these people and I've wasted years doing it. I. Now look at, you know, we. Look at. We were talking, weren't we, on the, on the train. There's a lot of survivors have been to Parliament. Yesterday, the day before, I was in that place, maybe eight, nine, ten years ago, and I thought, oh, it's great. They're going to talk to me, they're going to do something. I don't need another inquiry to tell me what's wrong. But I respect that. Survivors want their voices heard. But it's. I'm not needed in that conversation. My knowledge is needed on the next bit, which is forcing change. And they are not gonna do it because they think it's the right thing to do. They're only gonna do it if they are backed in a corner and there is no where else to wriggle. So that's what I believe.

[Co-Interviewer]

Isn't that appalling? Isn't that just appalling?

[Maggie Oliver]

Disgusting.

[Co-Interviewer]

Girls have been raped and sexual abused on an industrial scale. And the only way they're gonna get justice is if the politicians, in your words, get backed in a corner and there's no way to wriggle out of it.

[Maggie Oliver]

That's true. You know, on my life, I honestly believe that is the truth. And this action for accountability, I think that is the only way you find your own evidence. You bring a private prosecution, you show the country what they are capable of. And you know, today we're having this conversation when we've just seen what they've done with all the Afghanistani, you know, lying and getting a super injunction. Look at the post office scandal, you know, all those people who went to prison and they pretended that the, you know, the government pretended that there was nothing wrong. It was. I don't know how these people sleep in bed at night.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

I don't either.

[Maggie Oliver]

And so I don't.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And this is the thing, right? I think we. Horrific as all of the things you described. I think we all accept the institutions make mistakes.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Things, problems happen. But it's, it's the lying about it, it's the covering up. It's a pretending it didn't happen. It's the victimizing of the already victimized that is just. I don't, I, I don't know. Has this changed your, your understanding of human nature? Do you like. Because you, you want to live in a world where you think most people are decent, good people who are doing their best and the right thing. Do you still think that's true?

[Maggie Oliver]

I think ordinary people are generally decent. I believe that as people start to climb this slippery pole up the ladder of whether it's getting to Chief Constable or getting to be the Prime Minister or the Home Secretary, you are being tested at each step up that ladder. And you get to a point where you have to decide, am I gonna go with what my conscience tells me is right or am I going to protect this organization? And if they can't protect the organization, they don't get to the top of that slippery pole. And that's what I honestly believe.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Do you know, I feel like the.

[Jade]

Further you get up that pole, the more corrupt it gets.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

It's interesting you say that. It's interesting you say that because I'm from Russia, as you know, and in Russia, no person at the top of the power dynamic is immune from being charged with like tax evasion or other crimes or whatever. Mostly because if you are allowed to get to that level, they know you've committed all those things already, so they've tested you for being liable to be exposed in this way. Do you see what I'm saying? And I guess what you're saying is it's kind of like that.

[Maggie Oliver]

In some ways, I would put my life on it. I have not the slightest doubt in my mind that that is true. And I've come to that conclusion through a lot of pain and a lot of depression, because it is. I wish I didn't know it. The other thing that is in my Mind a lot now is there is an element of me that is a bit frightened because, you know, when you're not wrapped in any cages, nobody bothers about you. I found myself in a position where I want things to change for children.

[Jade]

We need them to change, they have.

[Maggie Oliver]

To change, but they're not willingly going to change it. And I want somebody else to pick up this mantle and fight this battle. But I don't see anybody else, really. You know, my experience and my learning of 20 years doesn't come in two minutes. So we've got people now, like Rupert Lowe, for instance, talking, but he hasn't got the knowledge. And I spoke to him in January. I think he's a decent guy. I think what he's saying is really connecting into the public psyche. But you need more than a desire to change things. You've got to have evidence and you've got to have people who come to you because they trust you. So I think we're going in the right direction. Yeah, but all we can do is try. But I honestly believe that the system is corrupt. I mean, was it Dominic Cummings the other week who was talking about, you know, when Andrew Norfolk did the expose in the end of 2010? Because I was on the Rochdale job, that the Cabinet tried to get that story blocked, didn't they? And the. Dominic Cummings and some others were prepared to go to court to argue the toss that it was true. And that's the only reason they let the Times publish it. Problem is, it's taken Dominic Cummings 15 years to say that he should have said that at the time. And that's what you don't get.

[Co-Interviewer]

What do you think this case, Jade's story, tells us about the UK as a whole? Because I'm listening to it and I'm gonna be honest, it's not making me think good things about the country. The education system that I worked in for over a decade. I mean, what do you think it says about all of this?

[Jade]

It says a lot of corruptness, is what it says of everything. So, like, I have no words. I actually generally have no words.

[Maggie Oliver]

I think we've lost our way. I think, you know, we've lost our way as a country. And I think that the country has woken up to that. I do. I honestly feel wherever I go, most many people recognize me. I have yet to have one conversation with somebody who comes up to me and says, you're talking a load of bullshit. Not one person in 15 years. I think that the cat's out of the bag. I don't know how we're gonna reverse all the damage that's been done.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

I don't think you can. But what you can do is what you are doing, which is try and make sure this doesn't happen to anyone else, number one. But Maggie, talk to us about, you know, we have people who watch the show who may be able to do things about this in the future. What needs to happen, what needs to be done, what are the practical steps that can be done? A to number one, make sure this doesn't happen to any more children.

[Maggie Oliver]

I think one of the, one of the first things, and I said it in an interview, I had a bit of a set to with somebody. I think this is a non party political issue.

[Co-Interviewer]

Yes.

[Maggie Oliver]

So they're like big kids in Parliament scoring points and you know, they're like little kids in a bloody private school. They are running the country. You have got children's lives in your hands. So stop messing about. Accept that we are failing children and look at how we put it right. Cause you can do it. You know, all the money that has been wasted on Covid, you know, lining pockets of people and the cronies, if that had gone into child protection, into children's homes, into policing, you know, we're on our knees because nobody's invested in our public services. So we need investment in public services. But in this issue, we need cross party collaboration with people, with survivors like Jade, with experts like me who genuinely want to change things. What happens though is they listen, they don't really want to change it because they won't put the money in and they hope it's going to go away.

[Jade]

But it won't, I believe where we're such a multicultural country, I feel like they don't want to do anything for the votes as well. So like where, because it's such a high, there's such a high percentage of Pakistani people in this country, I believe that they do it for the votes. And they don't want to be racist because they don't. They're not going to get the votes. That's what I personally believe. Because if they started doing all this, all these rape gangs, all these Pakistani rape gangs, all these Pakistanis ain't gonna fight for them. So then they're not gonna get the votes because there's a high percentage of that culture in this country. I mean, I, I personally believe that 100%.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, I've tried to take this conversation further than just the grooming gangs because as we see unprecedented levels of immigration to this country the vast majority. And it's a very emotive subject. Yeah. You see all these boats arriving and bringing all these young men in who don't share our values. They are actually of the mindset of Jays, rapists. They're not educated, they don't speak the language. They, they are being put in hotels all around the country.

[Jade]

They have different beliefs in their country.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah. They believe that a girl.

[Jade]

They believe, some of them believe that if a girl starts their period at the age of nine that it's okay to then marry them off and that they're old enough to have sex at the age of nine. No, no you're not. That's absolutely disgusting. In this country at 16 and even that is still young. It should be 18.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah. So those attitudes and those belief systems and different cultures, we can't allow those to flourish in the uk. But we have to have the conversations to work out how we're going to address it.

[Jade]

We all know that there's bad in everyone. We all know that there's white pedophiles, we all know that there's black pedophiles, Chinese pedophiles. They're everywhere. Wherever you go, you're going to get a pedophile. What we're trying to say as survivors of rape gangs is that we all got abused by that one. One thing. It's not a racial thing at all. I've got my, my children, I've got two children that are caught Pakistani. So it's not a race thing at all.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

I'm so glad you said that.

[Jade]

It is what, who we got abused by.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah.

[Jade]

How can I be racist when I've got Pakistan children?

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

No, I'm so sorry.

[Jade]

I mean, it's definitely not a race thing. It's a factual thing of that's really important.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Oh yeah, well that's what I'm saying. I'm so glad you said that, Jade, because you're right that we live in a very multicultural. I don't like the term multicultural society. We live in a multi ethnic society. There are many different people from different groups. But actually we shouldn't have a multicultural society. We should have one culture, which is British culture. And within that it's really important that we're super honest. Like I'm an immigrant myself, Right. And we should be very honest and say not all immigrants are the same. Different cultures are different, different cultures have different value systems. Right. And most importantly, if something is being done by one particular group, we should be very careful not to scapegoat those people. But at the same time, we should not shy away from the reality. And that's really important. Otherwise, that's when you actually are going to encourage racism.

[Maggie Oliver]

And that's what's happened here.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And that's what's happened here. Right. We should be very, very honest. If one particular group is overrepresented, we have to find out why that is. Now, we've had people on the show to talk about the fact that it's not just Pakistanis, but it's actually Pakistanis from a reputation particular area of Pakistan which is perhaps culturally more backward. It's mountainous, so it's isolated. That's kind of repeated through history, really. Mountainous cultures tend to be much more backward in that way. So we just got to have these conversations, honestly, so that justice A happens in. In cases like this, but also so that we don't have these problems in the future. And also if we are going to live together in one country, black, white, brown or whatever, the only way to do that is to be honest. Because the moment you start covering things up, that's when people start having ideas about things like that, generalizing. And this has been a really terrible thing that happened to you and to other girls, but it's also a terrible thing for our country.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean, what I would say, Constance, I mean, when I first started speaking out, it's true that the vast majority of the abusers in these gangs are Pakistani Muslim men. Those who were not are still Muslim, but they can be Afghanistani or Iranian or from Iraq, but like you say, from very kind of from an underclass in those countries, they have a different belief system and they feel entitled that they can rape vulnerable children. So we have to open up those conversations. But if people come to this country, the laws of this country are what we live by. And we cannot avoid the difficult conversations. And what's happened with this, it's been brushed under the carpet. That's when extremists hijack a conversation because nobody else is brave enough to have them. But I see in this country at the moment, freedom of speech is critically important to me. You and whether it. You know, I would speak to anybody from any faith, any background, any belief system, left, right, middle, wherever, because you learn and you compromise. But what's happened with this is there have not been those conversations. I was having them when nobody else would speak. I remember going on the Today program and they were talking about Asian grooming gangs, and I said, well, hang on a minute. You know, they're not from Thailand or Japan or China. They are predominantly Pakistani Muslim men. The other key part, just before I forget, because it goes out my head, the other key part, which is one of the big things I'm fighting for, is that there is no mandatory recording of the data around sexual abuse, any kind of data. So nobody can provide statistics. And the reason they've done that, I highlighted that to the home office in 2013. The reason they don't is because they don't want the facts to show what the truth is.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

But we know what the truth is.

[Maggie Oliver]

We know what the truth is now.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

The stats are out.

[Maggie Oliver]

But it's taken 15 years for me to persuade people that that's the reality. Why are they not? You know, you'd know how many burglaries there were in your street, wouldn't you? It would just be there on a database. This is a deliberate attempt to muddy the waters.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And they think they're helping people, but they're not helping people. They're not helping and they're not protecting the people they think they're protecting. Like there is a. The taxi driver that I use in my town, it's Afghani company.

[Maggie Oliver]

Yeah.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

My wife and son use that taxi company all the time. If my wife was passed down in the back of a taxi, there's no one I'd rather drive her than the guy who, because he's a great guy and a lot of the people that work with him, they're wonderful people. But they are precisely the people that are going to suffer from COVID ups like this because people will make generalizations.

[Maggie Oliver]

Absolutely.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

If people cover things up. That's, that's why honesty is so important in this.

[Maggie Oliver]

I mean the other part of that is in my charity and actually even when I was in the police, you know, but now in the charity we have women from those communities coming to us for help because within those communities women are a second class citizen. Many of them don't speak English. They are very isolated. They are. There is abuse within that community, but it's hidden. You know, we've got inter family marriages where there is a very, very high percentage of very disabled children. Those conversations have to be had. Absolutely. And you know, we're not helping those women in that community. They come to us because we are seen as outside of their community. We're safe. And even in the police. I was working on cases where I remember one case where a girl, young girl, was an eyewitness to a murder and she was not allowed officially to speak to the. So those are conversations we have to have because there's Good and bad everywhere. But when they are bad and they are raping children. I'm sorry, if you want to call me racist for saying that, call it me, but I'm not. It's about child protection. It's about the law. It's about the laws of our country and we have to stand up for those laws. And those who are looking at being voted in, like you've just said, if they won't do their job properly, we have to do it for them and, you know, expose what's going on.

[Jade]

If we went to a different country and done what they're doing to our country, we'll get killed straight away. Like we need, we need that here, Joe. Like our government, sorry to say, are pussies compared to every other country. Like even our justice system are pussies compared to every other country. They wouldn't think twice about shooting us if we went over there and raped one of their kids.

[Maggie Oliver]

No.

[Jade]

So why, why do these don't even get sentenced to two years. Half of them walk or get nfa. They don't even want to look into it.

[Maggie Oliver]

You get longer for putting something, you know, a naughty tweet on, on Twitter, don't you?

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Yeah.

[Maggie Oliver]

You know the girl who, what was the name? Lucy Connolly, she's in prison for putting in that little tweet that the guy who got Ruby pregnant, he was out of prison. You know, she's a 13 year old child with special needs. We had a fetus, she was out of prison in just over. He was out of prison in just over three years. It just makes my blood boil. And we have to change the direction.

[Co-Interviewer]

Of travel because it's a really important point you made there about these abusers and within their own community. Because if somebody is a pedophile who is a rapist, chances are he's not going to channel those instincts in one particular direction. He is going to be a threat wherever he goes. That's on the streets, that's our children's homes or schools. And that's also within his own home.

[Maggie Oliver]

Absolutely.

[Co-Interviewer]

And the fact that these people weren't prosecuted means that actually you're also making vulnerable children in that community. You're putting their lives in danger.

[Maggie Oliver]

Absolutely. I think it's about priorities at the end of the day. And you know, we have to have other conversations about what kind of people are in the prisons. You know, what crimes do we not need prison for? And you know, I would argue that Lucy Conley shouldn't be in prison. That's my opinion. You know, we are using the law. You know, last year in the charity, we'd spotted a pattern of behavior where vulnerable women actually, and a couple of men were being unlawfully arrested, unlawfully strip searched, because they were daring to challenge the police about their investigations. So they were targeted. They're the kind of things that we need to be stopping. You know, free up the prison places for the. For pedophiles and those who are destroying lives. You know, I mean, a conversation around drugs is another one I think we need as a country at some point, because many addicts will rob a phone because they're an addict. You know, we've got to have different difficult conversations. But that costs votes and that's why they won't have them. You know, we need more prison places. We need a better criminal justice system. We need social services to protect children. You know, children of 11 shouldn't be put in a children's home with kids of 15 and 16 that are already very, very damaged. There's so many layers to this, aren't there?

[Interviewer (Constance)]

And what we need above all, I think, is honesty. People to be honest about things instead of covering them up and pretending they're not happening. Thank you so much, both of you. Coming on. Maggie, you're doing really important work with the Maggiola Foundation. We're not. Whenever we've had these conversations, we've never put any adverts and we don't like the idea of making money from these type of discussions. So if anybody wants to contribute financially, they should send it straight to the.

[Maggie Oliver]

Just go to our website. Maggie Oliver foundation, maggioliverfoundation.com and Jade, thank.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

You for taking the time and for sharing your story. Is it terrible? Terrible story to share and it's terrible what you went through, but I'm really glad you're doing it. Not only because it's getting the word out there for people to really understand what's going on, but also it seems to be making a really good impact on you, actually, to feel more empowered to be able to tell people and prevent this from happening to other people.

[Jade]

Thank you for having me.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Thank you both. We're going to ask you questions from our supporters that they've submitted, but we really appreciate your time.

[Jade]

Thank you.

[Interviewer (Constance)]

Thank you. Head on over to triggerpod.co.uk to hear our discussion with your questions. Are some areas and streets of many of our big cities and towns being made systematically hostile for women by the aggression of, he says, Muslim men? And how do we combat this?