Theresa May dismisses claims her child sex abuse inquiry is 'too broad' – but Amal Clooney says departure of top lawyer has left a 'huge gap' that will be hard to fill

By Matt Dathan
Daily Mail
October 4, 2016

https://goo.gl/P9fOYx

Theresa May (pictured at the Tory conference in Birmingham this morning, left) dismissed claims her troubled probe into child abuse is too broad in its scope but faced criticism from Amol Clooney (pictured in Strasbourg, Germany last month) over the handling of the investigation's lawyers

Challenged over the beleaguered investigation this morning, Mrs May (pictured at teh Tory party conference in Birmigham this morning) insisted that the inquiry's work is carrying on despite the resignations

Amol Clooney, a human rights lawyer (pictured with husband George Clooney in May) said the departure of the child sex abuse inquiry's senior lawyer Ben Emmerson QC had left a 'huge gap' that would be difficult to fill

Theresa May dismissed claims her troubled probe into child abuse is too broad in its scope but faced criticism from Amol Clooney over the handling of the investigation's lawyers.  

Mrs Clooney, a human rights lawyer, said the departure of the inquiry's senior lawyer Ben Emmerson QC had left a 'huge gap' that would be difficult to fill.

Mr Emmerson quit the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) 24 hours after he was suspended by chairwoman Alexis Jay over concerns about his leadership, but the inquiry has refused to release any further details for the barrister's suspension.

Junior counsel Elizabeth Prochaska sent the inquiry further into crisis on Friday when she announced she had also quit the inquiry. The investigation is now under its fourth chair.

Mrs Clooney, a friend of Mr Emmerson, lavished praise on him and highlighted the problems his departure has created.

She told The Times: 'He is one of the most intelligent and talented lawyers I have ever worked with and he is one of the leading experts in the world in the field of human rights. His resignation leaves a huge gap that will be very difficult to fill.'

But challenged over the beleaguered investigation this morning, Mrs May insisted that the inquiry's work is carrying on despite the resignations.

She said it had to maintain its wide focus in order to properly learn the lessons of what went wrong in a series of institutions.

Former chairwoman Dame Lowell Goddard, who quit in August, has called for the inquiry to be overhauled, saying 'there is an inherent problem in the sheer scale and size'.

But the Prime Minister told LBC Radio: 'I don't think it's too broad.'

She said: 'People look at the issues around the lawyers and the chairmanship, what they forget is that work has been ongoing now for some time.'

Mrs May said the work was being divided into looking at the various institutions, but it was important to have an overarching view.

'The way they are approaching it is they are dividing up the different sorts of investigations they need to do.

'There are different areas - for example the Roman Catholic church, the care homes - they will look at different parts of the overall scene and look at those in terms of investigations.

'What we need to do is make sure that we learn the lessons overall from that and that's why I think it is so important that it has got this broad reach, because it is not just saying what went wrong in care homes for children, for example.'

She added that some of the victims had been waiting decades for somebody 'actually to listen to them and to do something about it'.