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LABOUR MPs demanded legal immunity for police officers who name and shame members of a VIP paedophile ring yesterday.
The call came after it was claimed former Liberal MP Cyril Smith, who is known to have abused teenage boys, was arrested but released by officers in the 1980s.
A former police officer who worked on the case told Newsnight that Mr Smith was saved from prosecution in order to protect other high-ranking paedophile MPs and police officers.
Labour MP Simon Danczuk revealed yesterday that another officer has told him that a number of investigations had been halted for that reason.
“It’s inevitable the police would have known what was going on and would have investigated it,”Mr Danczuk told BBC World at One.
“What we’re now concerned about is that they were stopped from taking those investigations further.”
The officers are concerned that they could breach the Official Secrets Act if they disclose information relating to their investigations.
The government blocked Labour MP John Mann’s Bill that would have given them immunity from the act.
The Home Office said yesterday that the act is “not a bar to giving evidence” to the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPPC).
But Labour MP Tom Watson, who first raised the issue in Parliament, said: “It is now clear that the Prime Minister must guarantee that former police and intelligence officers who wish to help the IPCC with its inquiries will have the threat of the Official Secrets Act lifted.”
The IPCC revealed on Monday that it is following 14 cases of alleged corruption in the Met police relating to child sex offences from the 1970s to the 2000s.
Among the allegations is a claim that a Houses of Parliament document found at a child sex offender’s address linked a number of “highly prominent individuals.”
Another allegation is that an abuse victim’s account was altered to omit a senior politician’s name, while it is also alleged that no further action was taken into claims of child sex abuse involving a former senior Met Police officer and senior judges.
by Our News Desk
