How Elon Musk seized on baseless memo claim to fuel wave of misinformation

Elon Musk's online attacks on former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown over grooming gangs draw on a baseless claim about a Home Office memo supposedly issued 17 years ago, research by BBC Verify has established.

A wave of social media posts - including some amplified by Mr Musk - allege that a 2008 Home Office document advised police not to intervene in child grooming cases because victims had "made an informed choice about their sexual behaviour".

But BBC Verify has carried out extensive searches of Home Office circulars issued across that period and found no evidence that any document containing this advice exists.

Brown - who was prime minister in 2008 - has called the allegations "a complete fabrication" and the Home Office says there "has never been any truth" to them.

Social media posts referencing a memo and using either the phrase "informed choice" or a variation like "lifestyle choice" have circulated for several years with some gaining traction.

But that intensified dramatically since the start of the year, with posts repeating the claim generating tens of millions of views in the past week after Mr Musk amplified several of them on his social media platform, X.

In one post, which has received over 25 million views, Mr Musk alleged that "Gordon Brown sold those little girls for votes" while reposting another user, June Slater, using words that were apparently a variation of the memo claim.

The original unfounded claim about a Home Office circular to police seems to stem from an interview Nazir Afzal - the former Crown Prosecution Service chief prosecutor for north-west England - gave to the BBC on 19 October 2018. He now admits that he had not seen any such circular himself, despite apparently stating its existence as fact.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4's PM programme, he told presenter Carolyn Quinn at the time:

"You may not know this, but back in 2008 the Home Office sent a circular to all police forces in the country saying 'as far as these young girls who are being exploited in their towns and cities we believe they have made an informed choice about their sexual behaviour and therefore it's not for you police officers to get involved in".

Although the programme is no longer available to listen to on the BBC's website, a version has been uploaded to YouTube. BBC Verify has also accessed the programme through the BBC's in-house archives to confirm the audio is genuine.

The first post referencing Mr Afzal's claim appears to have been made one month after his interview, BBC Verify has found. But the first post to gain considerable traction was in July 2019.

Since then posts with versions of the claim have circulated occasionally on X and other platforms, with some posts from larger accounts in 2024 getting more attention, before intensifying massively in recent days.

Speaking to BBC Verify, Mr Afzal clarified his position admitting that he has never seen any circular with the form of words that he used in his 2018 interview.

Instead he now says he was referring to police officers who had told him some officers had misinterpreted instructions in a circular sent by the Home Office.

Mr Afzal pointed us to Home Office circular 017/2008 which is about the police's powers under the 1989 Children's Act.

However, the words "informed choice" do not appear anywhere in the text, nor is the circular about child grooming gangs.

It does contain, however, a section on how to judge significant harm to a child. "It is important always to take account of the child's reactions, and his or her perceptions, according to the child's age and understanding," it reads.

It seems difficult to understand how any police officer could misconstrue this section in the way Mr Afzal described in his 2018 interview

He told BBC Verify he was "paraphrasing what I thought that meant to them", when he gave his Radio 4 interview.

Asked how officers could have interpreted circular 17/2008 in this way, Mr Afzal said:

"You're right, it doesn't stack up. It doesn't give an excuse or explanation, but I can't give you any other circular."

BBC Verify also asked Mr Afzal if he could put us in touch with any of the officers that may have misinterpreted the circular in way he described, but he was unable to do this.

Mr Afzal's claim was not a one off. One year before his 2018 interview, Mr Afzal wrote an article for the International Business Times where he also stated the claim as fact:

"The term "child prostitute" was used extensively to describe them and it should be noted both that the Home Office in a circular to police in 2008 used that term and spoke of girls making an "informed choice" to engage in this behaviour. Parliament only finally removed the term from all laws a couple of years ago."

Despite interest in the claim going back several years we have been unable to identify any individual who is able to provide evidence of any circular to this effect.

The purpose of the circulars - or memos - is to provide police forces with guidance, policy updates and administrative instructions.

The Home Office says all memos and circulars to police forces are published online in the National Archives. They are also kept in the library of the College of Policing website.

BBC Verify searched all the circulars for 2008 and could find no reference to "informed choice" or "child prostitute" or any phrase similar to the one cited in the social media posts.

Of the 32 circulars listed on the National Archives website for 2008, only one - 017/2008 - falls under the category "child abuse". We have also searched circulars for 2007, 2009 and 2010 and found no references to "informed choice". We also searched for other phrases in Mr Afzal's original statements and variations from later social media posts - for example "get involved", "sexual behaviour" and "lifestyle choice" - and found no occurrences.

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There have been several Freedom of Information requests regarding a supposed memo or circular with the "informed choice" phrase, but no police force has found any trace of such a communication.

We were able to find a circular from 2009 that links to a webpage that further links to a document on child sexual exploitation released by the Department for Children, Schools and Families that mentions the phrase "informed choice". It is not an instruction to police and the context it appears in is emphasising situations where local agencies might need to report sexual activity in order to protect children "unable to make an informed choice".

There were circulars in 2007 and 2010 that contained the phrase "child prostitute". The first was in connection with some technical changes to offences like "controlling a child prostitute". The second again dealt with technical changes but this circular on prostitution also said: "In short, any steps taken, whether relating to criminal proceedings or not, should be designed to protect the child from continuing sexual exploitation and abuse."

The term "child prostitute" was taken out of the law in 2015 as it could imply that children could consent to abuse.

Circulars and memos are received by senior individuals in each police force, former Chief Constable of Norfolk Constabulary Simon Bailey told BBC Verify.

"They would've gone to crime registrars and the head of the crime and they would've cascaded the guidance," he said.

If there was any doubt about how to interpret the guidance a force would have gone back to the Home Office to seek clarity, Mr Bailey added.

"And even going back 17 years, I cannot believe the Home Office would've sent out a circular of that nature."

In a statement to BBC Verify, the Home Office said it had never instructed police not to go after grooming gangs:

"There has never been any truth in the existence of a Home Office circular telling police forces that grooming gangs should not be prosecuted, or that their victims were making a choice, and it is now clear that the specific circular which was being referred to does absolutely no such thing."

Jacqui Smith - now Baroness Smith - was the Labour Home Secretary in 2008. She told BBC Verify: "It is categorically wrong that the Home Office or I instructed police forces not to prosecute grooming gangs or not to protect young girls."

A spokesperson for Gordon Brown said: "There is no basis for such allegations at all. They are a complete fabrication. There is no foundation whatsoever for alleging that Mr Brown sent, approved or was in anyway involved with issuing a circular or statement to the police because it did not happen."

BBC Verify has attempted to speak to those who repeated the claim on X and had their posts amplified by Mr Musk.

In one post, Mr Musk alleged that "Gordon Brown committed an unforgivable crime against the British people" and shared a video clip from campaigner Maggie Oliver appearing on GB News.

In the clip, Ms Oliver alleged: "Gordon Brown sent out a circular to all the police forces in the UK saying 'do not prosecute these rape gangs, these children are making a lifestyle choice'."

Ms Oliver said that she based her claim on what Mr Afzal said:

"My knowledge of this comes from what Nazir Afzal said publicly in 2018 in his BBC interview."

BBC Verify also reached out to June Slater, whose post was also amplified by Mr Musk. She told us she had not seen the memo, but her claim was also based on what Mr Afzal and Ms Oliver had previously said:

"I thought he was a reliable source as is Maggie Oliver."

Asked if he regretted the misinformation that had stemmed from his statements, Mr Afzal told BBC Verify:

"I regret that people have interpreted what I interpreted and that it's sort of got lost in translation."

BBC Verify also contacted the Police Federation, the National Police Chiefs' Council (NPCC) and the College of Policing about the alleged circular.

The NPCC referred us to the Home Office's statement while the College of Policing said it was not aware of any circular.

While there is no evidence for the existence of the circular, the performance of the police and other institutions in protecting victims and investigating abuse has been heavily criticised during this period.

Prof Alexis Jay - who carried out the independent inquiry into child abuse - said some victims would never recover from their experiences.

"We heard time and time again how allegations of abuse were ignored, victims were blamed and institutions prioritised their reputations over the protection of children."

Additional reporting by Ned Davies and Lucy Gilder.

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