The ringleader of a gang of Asian men who groomed young white girls for sex has been jailed for 22 years for a "campaign of rape" against a young Asian girl.

Children in care homes are being subjected to sexual abuse of a “violent and sadistic nature”, England's Deputy Children's Commissioner Sue Berelowitz has warned. 

A sexual predator who led a gang of Asian men in grooming young white girls for sex was named today after he was convicted of 30 child rape charges.

Children’s care homes which are meant to look after the most vulnerable youngsters in England are “not fit for purpose”, despite costing at least £200,000 per child, a parliamentary inquiry has found.

Girls as young as 11 "expect" to have to perform sex acts on rows of boys for up to two hours at a time in parts of London, a watchdog said in a warning that serious child abuse is rife right across England.

Vulnerable young people should no longer be sent across England to Rochdale's privately-run children's homes because their safety cannot be guaranteed, the leader of the council said last night.

The practice of moving children in care to towns where low housing costs make it cheaper to run children's homes may make financial sense. But it has little else to recommend it. Indeed, the leader of Rochdale Council is so concerned about the huge number of privately run homes in his area – 41, compared with just nine in similarly sized Haringey, say – that he believes that children's safety is no longer guaranteed.

Two workmen were taken to hospital following a fire at a factory.

Two men have been arrested in connection with an ongoing investigation into child sexual exploitation which led to the jailing of nine men.

Three people were arrested as far right-groups were accused by police of using diversionary tactics to promote their message.

Official figures to measure how many vulnerable children go missing from care and are subjected to exploitation are confusing and meaningless, the government admitted today.

Mistakes by police, social services and the Crown Prosecution Service led to potentially dozens of young girls being raped, beaten and trafficked by a child exploitation ring, it emerged yesterday.

Police missed chance to break up Rochdale ring two years before reign of terror was finally ended

I think one big problem for the couples in Love Life, ITV's new romantic drama, is that they're absolutely lousy at buying Christmas presents for each other. We got not just one but two flashback unwrapping scenes in last night's opening episode, neatly employed by the writer Bill Gallagher to fill out the relationship dynamics but unfortunately only at the cost of making the characters look like complete idiots. Here's Joe, for example, unwrapping his gift from long-term girlfriend, Lucy. What has he got? Oh, that's so thoughtful. A memory foam pillow and a book of pudding recipes. Is it possible that Lucy is trying to send a message about domestication and nest-building? Never mind, perhaps Joe will do a bit better with his present for Lucy. No, seems not. She's got a pair of high-altitude climbing gloves, which is very clearly what adventurer Joe wants her to want, rather than what she actually does. Then again, Joe is a paragon of selfless generosity when compared to Dominic, whose wife tugs aside the decorative wrapping paper to find a brochure on adoption. Nice one, Dominic. There was an outside chance that she might forget her traumatic childlessness for at least one day of the year, but you've blown that.