GB News national reporter Charlie Peters has ripped into Baroness Rachel Maclean, asking if she feels "ashamed" for not supporting Suella Braverman with the grooming gangs task force.
Charlie accused the Government of “hypocrisy” over its approach to tackling sexual exploitation, questioning why lessons were not acted upon sooner and why the ethnic element of perpetrators had not been addressed more openly in the past.
Charlie demanded: "Andrew Norfolk highlighted the pattern over a decade ago.
"Two years ago, when Suella Braverman launched the Grooming Gang Taskforce and spoke explicitly about the ethnicity link, what did you say?
Charlie Peters grilled her on whether she feels ashamed
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"Did you publicly defend her when she was being criticised? And if not, do you feel some shame that you are now attacking Labour on this issue when perhaps your party didn’t support her at the time?”
Tripping over her words slightly, the baroness said: "I honestly can’t remember what I said or didn’t say then.
"That was two years ago and I wasn’t the minister at the time. Andrew Norfolk never contacted me.
"None of the people raising this now contacted me when I was Safeguarding Minister.
"When I was actually doing the job, no one said, ‘You’re being misled.’ I simply didn’t know about all of this.
"When I left the job, I’m not aware of what information my colleagues had.
The Baroness says she 'wishes she had done more'
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"Now, clearly, I wish we had done more. I’ve said it before: we should have been much clearer and acted faster.
"We did take action, as you rightly said, but I wish it had been sooner.
"At the end of that Government term, we were distracted by other things. It was a failure, and I am deeply sorry that my government failed those people.”
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
The national grooming gangs inquiry is facing month-long delays after the front-runner to become its chairman stepped down.
Both candidates vying to lead the inquiry have withdrawn this week.
Jim Gamble, a former police officer and the lead contender, and Annie Hudson, former director of children’s services for Lambeth Council, resigned following criticism from survivors over their professional backgrounds.
Although both candidates have extensive experience tackling child abuse, campaigners and survivors argued that the police and social work sectors had failed victims in the past.
Many believe the inquiry should now be led by someone with a legal background.