There has been a great deal of concern in our community for a long time that police may have been too cautious in their approach to the issue of gangs grooming young girls for sex.

There is a whole folklore that has developed about it over many years in Keighley and Bradford but little real evidence has come to light and the police and other agencies seem to have shied away from tackling it head on because of the sensitivities about one of the key groups – young Asian men – that it appeared to involve.

That has done them no favours in the eyes of the wider community which felt that political correctness was allowed to get in the way of proper investigations, as the former MP Ann Cryer has been fighting to show for some time.

Following the publication of the Government’s action plan on grooming, it is pleasing to read the comments of Bradford Council for Mosques and the Ramadan Foundation, one of the leading Muslim organisations in the UK, which makes it abundantly clear that most Muslims are disgusted and deeply offended by this evil crime and want the authorities to shrug off political correctness in favour of directly dealing with the issue, from wherever it emanates.

It is important that the police and social services and others now take those comments extremely seriously and work closely with organisations like the Foundation within the Asian communities to drive out this horrible abuse.

Grooming and abuse of young girls is clearly not an issue that is just confined to one particular ethnic group. It is a problem that affects many parts of the city, as it does in all cities, and can arise within any cultural group.

But we cannot close our eyes to the fact that there is an open door here for dealing with what is a very specific issue where it relates particularly to young Asian men, with the blessing of the community that the authorities have fought shy of offending.