Met Police merges child sex abuse inquiries

Scotland Yard says it has brought all its ongoing historical child sex abuse investigations under the control of one team.

The Met says officers from Operations Midland and Fairbank had identified "people and locations" in common.

It says it is "operationally important" to have the same officer in charge.

Operation Midland is an inquiry into claims of child abuse by establishment figures, while Operation Fairbank is a wider child abuse inquiry.

The homicide and serious crime detectives working on Operation Midland are merging with the expanded Fairbank team.

The merged operation will investigate child abuse and allegations of police cover-ups and support the Goddard Inquiry - the independent inquiry into historical child sex abuse in England and Wales, led by Justice Lowell Goddard.

'Three child murders'

The combined investigation team will be led by Det Supt Ang Scott, from the Met's sexual offences, exploitation and child abuse (SOECA) unit.

Det Supt Kenny McDonald - who had been overseeing Operation Midland - was widely criticised for describing the allegations as "credible and true".

BBC home affairs correspondent Tom Symonds said Mr McDonald was being moved to other work investigating murders.

He said the Met denied the move represented a downscaling of Operation Midland, its most sensitive investigation into allegations of child abuse and three child murders.

"Midland has been a separate team until now, made up of 27 officers focused on claims that a high-level paedophile operated in Westminster and other locations in the late 1970s and early 1980s," he added.

The new team will continue to investigate historical allegations of impropriety by police officers dealing with sexual abuse in the period 1970-2005.

To date the force has received 48 such allegations - the Independent Police Complaints Commission is currently managing 29 of these.