Mail Weekly Column: 9 January 2023

Last week, after almost three years of waiting, we were finally given a verdict in the case of Eleanor Williams.

I was relatively new to the job when the first email pinged in about the now infamous post that she'd put on Facebook.

We were locked down. Most people were at home, in touch with the world through social media. People were rightly concerned. Parents, teachers, and community leaders alike. Across Furness concerned residents posted pictures of elephants with the hashtag #JusticeForEllie.

For me began a very long process of learning about Ms Williams' allegations, speaking to the Police, and hearing a great deal from the community in surgeries, private meetings, and through social media.

The community were outraged. The images that Ellie shared were horrific. And the story she told - of being groomed, beaten, and abused - are every parent's nightmare.

That this could happen here, in such a tight knit community, exercised people most of all. How, they kept asking, was this allowed to happen? And perhaps more concerning: how did we know nothing about it?

I spoke to the Home Secretary, raised the issue time and again in Parliament, and worked closely with organisations like Women's Community Matters and national charities that specialise in abuse and violence against women and girls.

Soon the vultures who make their money and reputations out of others' misery, appeared. The far-right were the most obvious, with Tommy Robinson whipping up tensions still further in pursuit of 'justice' being the icing on the cake.

Soon my surgeries were peppered with families who had been torn apart by the allegations made against them, and local people who feared for their and their children's safety due to the colour of their skin. This was unbearable.

In spite of the resolution that this verdict brings, there are no winners here. People's lives have been ruined as a result of her stories, and Barrow has been put through the wringer. One man spent time in prison due to her (false) allegations. Others saw their windows put in. Or received death threats. Others still left town and have not returned. And trust in the Police has been shaken.

There are so many victims in this story, and we must support them.

While there is no evidence to support Ellie's assertions that Asian grooming gangs operate - or even exist - in Barrow, abuse does. Abuse, whether domestic, or the kind perpetrated by criminal gangs, exists in every town and city in the country. We must ensure that those who are genuine victims feel able to come forward.

The other person in need of support is Ellie herself. It may be her stories that unleashed genuine hurt on people and the wider community, but at the end of the day, no person commits the kind of physical abuse against their own body that we saw in that Facebook post, or fabricates the lies that she did, unless that are deeply unwell. I hope she gets the help she needs.

Ellie's story cannot and must not be a barrier to people asking for help and coming forward. We must work together to ensure that it is the catalyst for protecting more people, rather a barrier that traps them in harmful and abusive relationships, afraid to raise the alarm.

I hope that we can learn the lessons that will better protect genuine victims, and look to a brighter future for them.