Some parents, support workers and community leaders claim that an ugly pattern has emerged across Lancashire and Yorkshire in particular in which vulnerable, white, working-class girls are being used for sex by groups of older and predominantly Asian men.

Once the girls have moved into these social circles, they are encouraged to rebel, with peer pressure leading to petty crime, says Samantha Pratt, of CROP, the Leeds-based Coalition for the Removal of Pimping.

The victims become criminalised themselves, she said. “A lot of these kids are getting ASBOs and being treated as if they are naughty teenagers. But these men are puppeteers.”

This is a universal pattern, familiar throughout communities across Britain. Julie (not her real name), whose 13-year-old daughter fell prey to this kind of sexual exploitation, believes that, in her case, sensitivity about perceived racism led to a reluctance to tackle the problem. “There must be hundreds of girls going through the same thing. But I felt I had a brick wall to knock down before you even got to the real issue. I do believe if it had been white guys, it would have been reported a lot sooner.”

She believes that the men have no respect for the victims. “These guys think the girls are white trash. They know what they can get away with.”

It is a point picked up by Abdul Hamid Qureshi, chairman of the Lancashire Council of Mosques.

“We in the Muslim community are failing in the sense that there are young people in society with little or no moral values. After the age of 12, nobody is engaging with them. We have to transform ourselves.

“It is not just white girls being exploited. Asian girls are involved too, but their numbers are less. There is less access to them, and the criminals are more likely to be deterred by their fathers and brothers, who they know will come after them.”

He rejected an argument by Ann Cryer, the local MP, that forbidden extramarital sex and the expectation of arranged marriage is leading Asian men to use white girls for sex.

He said: “I think that is a shallow way of looking at it. This is a social evil. We have to put up enough barriers so that it becomes difficult for [these men] to operate.”

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