Cameron orders a probe into VIP child sex abuse - but only seven detectives are investigating explosive claims

Most senior Home Office official will investigate alleged paedophile ring

Prime Minister said probe would 'find answers' to 'reassure' about events

130 MPs called for inquiry over dossier given to former home secretary



Leon Brittan was given 'substantial bundle of papers' by Geoffrey Dickens



But Home Office has admitted dossier was either lost or destroyed







DAVID Cameron last night ordered a fresh investigation to discover what happened to the missing dossier detailing explosive claims of a Westminster paedophile ring.

Ministers including Nick Clegg and Theresa May have been rejecting calls for a full-scale public inquiry into historical child abuse, insisting a police investigation will be sufficient to get to the bottom of the claims.

Yesterday, however, the Prime Minister ordered the Home Office’s most senior official to launch an investigation amid claims that the department’s response to the affair so far had been ‘outrageous’.



Probe: David Cameron, left, has ordered the most senior Home Office official to investigate a missing dossier handed to Lord Brittan, the former home secretary, by Conservative MP Geoffrey Dickens about an alleged paedophile ring in Westminster in the 1980s

Mr Cameron said he understood mounting concerns about what happened to the dossier handed over to then Home Secretary Leon Brittan by Tory MP Geoffrey Dickens in 1983.

He said: ‘That’s why I’ve asked the permanent secretary at the Home Office [Mark Sedwill] to do everything he can to find answers to all of these questions and to make sure we can reassure people about these events.’

He added: ‘If anyone has information about criminal wrong-doing they should, of course, give it to the police.’ But the Daily Mail can reveal that only seven detectives have been deployed by Scotland Yard chiefs to investigate the allegations.

The tiny squad has been given the huge task of investigating historical allegations of child abuse relating to MPs, a guest house where rent boys entertained Establishment figures, a children’s home and the notorious Paedophile Information Exchange.

The police inquiry, launched in November 2012, is also responsible for investigating the activities of the disgraced Liberal MP Cyril Smith.

Sources close to the investigation, which has the umbrella name Operation Fairbank, say it has been poorly resourced since day one and claim that Metropolitan Police bosses have shown little interest in it.

Shadow home secretary Yvett Cooper said the 2013 Home Office review was 'not good enough' and led to a 'lack of proper answers'

By contrast, nearly 200 detectives have been deployed on the investigation into phone hacking and bribery allegations involving journalists, while about 30 officers have been attached to Operation Yewtree, the Jimmy Savile scandal inquiry into sex crimes committed by celebrities.

The revelation that Scotland Yard boss Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe and his senior officers put just seven officers on Operation Fairbank prompted widespread criticism and claims of a continuing cover-up.

Simon Danczuk, one of the original group of seven cross-party MPs who wrote to the Home Secretary urging her to launch a ‘Hillsborough-style’ inquiry into the abuse scandal, said: ‘Theresa May will know that barely a handful of police officers are assigned to these investigations, so when they claim this is a matter best left to the police they are essentially consigning it to the dustbin of history.’

He added: ‘They know full well that proper resources are needed to get to the bottom of years of cover up to protect establishment paedophiles, and without this there is no chance of the truth being uncovered. The public will now rightly want to know why our political leaders are not doing all they can to expose establishment paedophiles and bring them to justice.’

Labour MP Mr Danczuk, who helped expose the full extent of Cyril Smith’s vile paedophile attacks in a book serialised by the Mail, said more people have contacted his office in recent days with claims of a child sex ring at Westminster and naming one particular MP from the 1980s.

Responding to Mr Cameron’s announcement of a fresh investigation, he said: ‘The Prime Minister knows that there is a growing sense of public anger about allegations of historical abuse involving senior politicians and his statement today represents little more than a damage limitation exercise.

‘It doesn’t go far enough. The public has lost confidence in these kind of official reviews, which usually result in a whitewash. The only way to get to the bottom of this is a thorough public inquiry.’

From yesterday's Daily Mail: MPs had called for an full-scale public inquiry to be launched



Thursday's Mail: Pressure has been mounting on David Cameron to take action



Demands for a full-scale investigation into an alleged cover-up of a Westminster paedophile ring increased this week leaving Leon Brittan, now Lord Brittan, facing questions over his handling of the explosive dossier handed to him by Mr Dickens.

Lord Brittan has confirmed he received a ‘substantial bundle of papers’ – which detailed allegations of a paedophile network within Parliament and Whitehall – and passed them to his officials for investigation.

But amid claims of an Establishment cover-up, the Home Office admits the dossier was either lost or destroyed.

An internal review last year revealed that the Tory peer had written to Mr Dickens in 1984 saying the dossier had been assessed by prosecutors as worth pursuing and handed to police.

Yet the Mail has learned that the Met can find no record that the Dickens dossier was investigated by the force in the 1980s.

Speculation was mounting that Sir Bernard and Commander Graham McNulty, who is overseeing the Westminster paedophile ring investigation, could be hauled before MPs to explain the alleged under-resourcing of the inquiry.