A high-profile peer is to stand trial accused of three sex attacks on children. Lord Ahmed, 61, was charged yesterday with two attempted rapes and an indecent assault. His alleged victims were a girl and a boy aged under 13.

The alleged offences are said to have taken place in Rotherham in the 1970s, when Lord Ahmed was a teenager. He is one of three men facing linked criminal charges after a lengthy investigation by South Yorkshire police.

Born in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, Nazir Ahmed came to Britain aged 12, joined the Labour Party aged 18 and later became Rotherham’s first Asian councillor. He was also the town’s youngest magistrate. Married and a father of three, he was made a peer by Tony Blair in 1998