Cameron Under Pressure For Independent Savile Inquiry

The Prime Ministr is under increasing pressure to set up an independent Leveson-style inquiry into the Jimmy Savile sex abuse scandal.

Labour leader Ed Miliband said an inquiry was needed to investigate what happened, not just at the BBC but also at the hospitals and schools where he allegedly preyed on vulnerable children and young women.

Miliband insisted that a broad inquiry into Savile's activities at the BBC, Stoke Mandeville hospital and Broadmoor is essential to "do right by the victims", adding that the two inquiries announced by the corporation are not enough.

Pressure for a wider inquiry is also coming from within Tory ranks.

Philip Davies MP has written to Ed Richards, the chief executive of Ofcom, demanding an investigation into the BBC's fitness to hold a broadcasting licence in the wake of the Savile revelations.

He said that given that Ofcom launched a "fit and proper" inquiry into BSkyB "relating to less serious allegations of phone hacking at a company owned by a minority shareholder in Sky", the regulator should undertake a similar investigation into the BBC.

Milliband, who pressured the Tories into launching the Leveson inquiry into the press last summer in the wake of the phone-hacking revelations, said it is inappropriate that the BBC conduct the inquiry into the Savile scandal.

"These are horrific allegations," he told ITV1's The Agenda on Monday night. "In order to do right by the victims I don't think the BBC can lead their own inquiry. We need a broad look at all the public institutions involved – the BBC, parts of the NHS and Broadmoor. This has got to be independent."

Miliband said he wants an independent inquiry to have the power to demand documentation and witnesses to give evidence.

"I think we now have enough [of a] set of allegations and further allegations to know this is not some isolated set of incidents," he added.

"This seems to be a pattern of activity which spanned a number of institutions. As I say, I just think about the victims in this. This is absolutely horrific and will scar people for life. And I think for them, the BBC – good institution though it is – I don't think they can lead their own inquiry," he said.

(H)