A Labour MP has broken ranks to back calls for a national inquiry into grooming gangs.

Dan Carden, who represents Liverpool Walton, urged Sir Keir Starmer to "use the full power of the state to deliver justice".

Mr Carden told The Liverpool Echo: "The public compassion for the victims, thousands of young British working-class girls and children is real. The public call for justice must be heeded.

"It is shocking that people in positions of power could have covered up and refused to act to avoid confronting racial or cultural issues or because victims were poor and working class.

"We must question and challenge the orthodoxy of progressive liberal multiculturalism that led to authorities failing to act. We need a new doctrine to take our multi-ethnic society into the future."

Insisting that the issue was "not an obsession of the far-right", he said he was speaking out as "over the decades there have been far too few Labour voices expressing clear disgust and outrage at these heinous crimes, their cover-up and the lack of action."

Pressure has mounted on the Prime Minister to launch an inquiry specifically into grooming gangs since US tech billionaire Elon Musk posted a barrage of attacks on him over the issue on X.

The Conservatives used an attempt to block the Government's Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill on Wednesday to force a vote on calls for a new inquiry, although Mr Carden did not record a vote.

Mr Carden said: "Both Keir Starmer and (safeguarding minister) Jess Phillips have strong records in this area and yet the government has failed to take the high ground.

"It must communicate a clear message about whose side it is on and now direct the state to implement the rule of law without fear (or) favour and deliver justice.

"The Prime Minister must use the full power of the state to deliver justice. It must continue to unflinchingly pursue the perpetrators and bring to account those in positions of authority who turned a blind eye, failed to act, or gave political cover to the gangs."

The PM has so far resisted calls for a new inquiry, saying the Government will focus on implementing the recommendations of a previous broader inquiry into child sex abuse.