Margaret Thatcher, child snatcher?

Last night, Capt Gemmell told The Independent on Sunday he had had personal experience of the security services discussing using somebody's homosexuality to apply pressure on them. "Some months before I was told to leave the Kincora case alone, on the grounds that the service didn't involve itself with homosexual matters, I had a meeting at a hotel on Buckingham Palace Road. There were three members of MI5 talking about a known Protestant terrorist, John McKeague of the Red Hand Commandos, being homosexual, and they asked me if I thought he could be blackmailed over his homosexuality, because they had film of him."

BRITISH security services infiltrated and funded the notorious Paedophile Information Exchange in a covert operation to identify and possibly blackmail establishment figures, a Home Office whistleblower alleges.

Two senior ministers in the Thatcher government exposed by the Sunday Mirror last week for indulging in sex parties with underage rent boys were named in a damning paedophile dossier compiled in the 1980s.

Sir Keith Joseph and Sir Rhodes Boyson were cited in the “VIP” paedophile document drawn up by Labour’s Barbara Castle. Other MPs, senior policemen, head teachers and clergy were also named.

And today we can also reveal disgraced former Tory MP Harvey Proctor has been named by witnesses in connection with sex parties and faces being questioned by a Government inquiry.

Special branch officers seized Baroness Castle’s file in 1984.

A woman last night claimed she was raped at the age of four by a senior Tory MP who was one of Margaret Thatcher’s closest allies.

Susie Henderson waived her right to anonymity to describe the appalling abuse she alleges was inflicted on her by Sir Nicholas Fairbairn.

The late Conservative politician, who was appointed solicitor general for Scotland by Mrs Thatcher when she became prime minister, has been linked to the child abuse scandal threatening to engulf Westminster.

A children's charity has accused the government of "dragging its heels" over its historical child abuse inquiry, saying the Rotherham scandal is "the tip of the iceberg".

Barnardo's chief executive Javed Khan urged the government to announce who would lead the inquiry and its remit.

Baroness Butler-Sloss stood down as chair of the inquiry in July.

The Home Office said it was being "thorough" and would announce a new chair "as soon as possible".

THE HOME Office knows where its child abuse files are but might never release them, a campaigning MP has warned.

Files relating to Rotherham’s sex abuse case and historic child abuse by MPs and other figures have either been lost or held back by the Home Office and are now the subject of a high level investigation by Peter Wanless chief executive of the NSPCC.

But Labour MP John Mann has told The Yorkshire Post Mr Wanless faces a difficult task in getting the Home Office to release crucial reports.

Mr Mann has told this paper he has had witnesses come forward with evidence of abuse by “prominent individuals” newly linked to abuse enquiries such as the Elm Guest House child abuse scandal.

The Labour MP for Bassetlaw says he knows of further alleged paedophiles linked to the London guest home at the centre of Operation Fernbridge, in which the police are investigating claims of abuse by politicians civil servants and judges.

Mr Mann said he has handed over new evidence to at least two police forces and is urging victims to come forward.

He was speaking as the Home Affairs select committee publishes its look at the Rotherham abuse scandal in which at least 1,400 victims were failed by the police and the council.

In its report, the committee said it had serious concerns that research conducted by Home Office staff went missing when sent to Whitehall and other information was stolen from facilities provided by Rotherham Council.

The committee said a draft report for the Home Office in 2002 is thought to have contained severe criticisms of the agencies in Rotherham.

The most serious concerned alleged indifference towards, and ignorance of, child sexual exploitation on the part of senior managers.

The researcher told the committee that “an unknown individual subsequently gained access to her office and removed all of the data relating to the Home Office work. There were no signs of a forced entry and the action involved moving through key-coded and locked security doors.

“She was also subjected to personal hostility at the hands of Council officials and police officers, and was unable to complete the last part of the research.”

Earlier this week Rotherham report author Prof jay said she herself had been denied council minutes from a four year period covering the late 1990s and early 2000s because the council had apparently lost the minutes of key meetings.

Mr Mann said he had already faced the Official Secrets Act when enquiring into when evidence will be released.

“Without question there are a lot of important files regarding abuse in the Home Office that they are now claiming are missing.

“I think these files still exist, I think there are people in the Home Office who know where they are and what has been removed from where.

“The problem Mr Wanless will face is that where prominent people are involved the Home Office is prepared to use the Official Secrets Act.

A Labour MP has used parliamentary privilege to accuse former Home Secretary Leon Brittan of ‘improper conduct with children’.

A new police probe has been launched into *allegations of historic child sex abuse by MPs and other VIPs at a complex of luxury flats in the shadow of Westminster.

Detectives are probing chilling claims of “abuse parties” at *upmarket Dolphin Square, where many Members of Parliament had their London homes.

Nick told how the two well-known *politicians raped and physically beat him after he was forced to drink *alcohol. He *recalled being taken to Dolphin Square around ten times, from age 11, over a period of two to three years either side of 1980.

He and another man gave *accounts of how MPs and other prominent people sexually *assaulted them at abuse parties at Dolphin Square and elsewhere. The officer in charge of Fairbank and linked operations contacted Exaro to ask whether the two men would speak to him and his team at the Met.