Dr Ella Hill defines the activities of the grooming gangs as ‘racially and religiously aggravated rape’, perpetrated by a group or network. She revealed that the grooming gangs primarily target underage girls but also victimise young and old women. “Well, it’s all over the UK. There are a lot of different towns that have been named as being involved. There’s Burnley, Blackburn, (and even) Oxford. Really, there are very few major cities that haven’t had some sort of grooming gang scandal.”