Jess Phillips worries about her safety after Elon Musk social media attacks

Safeguarding minister was described as ‘a rape genocide apologist’ by Elon Musk

Ms Phillips was targeted by the X supremo (Jordan Pettitt/PA) (PA Wire)

Jess Phillips has spoken about her fears for her life for the first time since Elon Musk unleashed a torrent of abuse against her over the child grooming scandal.

The safeguarding minister found herself at the centre of an international storm when she decided not to agree to a national inquiry into child grooming and rape across towns in the north of England because one had already been conducted.

The attacks were led by the X social media platform boss who described her as “a witch” and a “rape genocide apologist” as well as taking aim at prime minister Keir Starmer who yesterday defended his minister.

Musk's extraordinary attacks came in response to Ms Phillips rejecting a request for the government to lead a public inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Oldham.

Speaking to ITV News, Ms Phillips admitted she was still reeling from the experience.

Jess Phillips (Jordan Pettitt/PA) (PA Wire)

She said: “Of course I worry about my safety. Of course, and you have to, you know, anyone who has worked in the fields of violence against women and girls. Risk is dynamic and I have to take account of the risks in my life and this is one of them currently.”

Ms Phillips described Musk’s allegations against her being part of a conspiracy to cover up the scandals to protect Labour politicians as “ridiculous”.

She said: “The things that he’s saying are so ridiculous as to initially make me just go what? But then you wake up with the realisation that that’s millions of people that he has said that to and you feel immediately like this is going to turn my world upside down and I have to try and limit for how long that is the case.

“But you know, your immediate, my immediate thought was like just, it’s sort of like, what a joke. And then the realisation of what this is probably going to mean for you.”

The South African-born American billionaire has even tried to justify his actions by harking back to his British grandmother who he said used to clean people’s houses.

Already an individual in the south west of England has been charged with making threats against Ms Phillips.

The minister, who has been a campaigner for women’s rights and against domestic violence, admitted: “The thing that annoys me the most about it is it takes up so much bandwidth of my time from a man who knows absolutely nothing about the subject he's talking about.

“When the only thing I ever want to be doing is being able to use all of my brain power to focus on the hundreds of girls I have supported over the years who have been victims of grooming gangs and what needs to happen to make their lives better. And to stop what is still happening today.”

Elon Musk (Kirsty Wigglesworth/PA) (PA Archive)

But she questioned why the Tories have been supportive of Mr Musk’s claims especially as they did little to help the victims of the Asian grooming gangs in their 14 years in power.

“ I wonder how much Chris Philp or Kemi Badenoch have been involved or even read the documents that came out of Telford, or in fact, any of the inquiries that have already happened. I watched what happened there and I saw a process.

“That was the only one that has ever done anything to actually change the way the council, the local police, the local CPS, have actually changed and I took part in that process for years. And so actually, no, when I was asked to make that decision, my instinct was to try and get for Oldham what I’d seen in Telford, which was locally led, a locally led independent inquiry.”

However, despite her ordeal, Ms Phillips insisted that it was nothing compared to what the victims of rape by Asian gangs had suffered.

“The few days of madness is nothing compared to the decades sat in police stations with girls bleeding from a battering that they’ve taken from a grooming gang. So I’ll put on my big girl pants and just suck it up.”