In May 1979, a local underground magazine, the Rochdale Alternative Press, alleged that in the 1960s Smith had spanked and sexually abused teenage boys in a hostel he co-founded. The matter was investigated by the police, but Smith was not prosecuted. The story was repeated in the same month by the magazine Private Eye. Smith never publicly denied the accusations of abuse or took legal action in response to those accusations. After his death, the allegations were denied by his family. The Press Office of the leader of the Liberal Party, David Steel, commented, "All he seems to have done is spanked a few bare bottoms".
2012
In November 2012, speaking in the House of Commons, Simon Danczuk, the Labour MP for Rochdale, Smith's former seat, called for an inquiry into alleged acts of abuse by Sir Cyril Smith.
Rossendale councillor Alan Neal alleged that at the age of eleven in 1964, during Smith's membership of the Labour Party, he was beaten by Smith at a hostel for boys. Neal said: "I'm speaking now because someone has taken a right decision to raise this issue with the authorities". He added that he told police about the incident in 1968 when he left the school, but that when he did so, "everyone made the same comment that the person in question was a very important, powerful man". Neal said that he lost two front teeth and needed stitches to a head wound after Smith assaulted him for refusing to eat a potted meat sandwich.
Another alleged victim of abuse by Smith waived his right to anonymity in November 2012 to claim that Smith smacked him and stroked his buttocks when he was a teenager at a Rochdale care home in the 1960s. Barry Fitton said he was spanked "very, very hard" by Smith and that he was left in tears by the alleged incident.
On 21 November 2012, Greater Manchester Police (GMP) announced it would investigate allegations that Smith had sexually abused boys at a hostel in Rochdale after 1974, and Lancashire Police would investigate claims dating from before 1974. The police said it would look at whether investigations had taken place into Smith during the 1980s and 1990s.
On 27 November 2012, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said that Smith should have been charged with crimes of abuse more than 40 years earlier. In a statement, the GMP said Smith had committed "physical and sexual abuse". Smith was never charged, although investigations were undertaken in 1970, 1998, and 1999. The method of assessing the probability of a conviction has changed since 1970, and the decision not to charge Smith then necessitated the outcome of the 1998 investigation. Following the sexual abuse allegations, Rochdale Council removed a blue plaque to Smith from the town hall. GMP Assistant Chief Constable Steve Heywood said: "Although Smith cannot be charged or convicted posthumously, from the overwhelming evidence we have it is right and proper we should publicly recognise that young boys were sexually and physically abused [by him]".
On 28 November 2012, an alleged victim waived his right to anonymity in a television interview with Sky News to say that he was sexually abused by Smith at a council-run residential special school. Chris Marshall broke down in tears during his interview when describing the sexual abuse he said took place at Knowl View school in Rochdale in the early 1980s. He said that as a nine-year-old boy he was taken to a room and made to perform oral sex on Smith and one other man. Smith was a governor at the school and allegedly had his own set of keys. Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg at the time said: "I am deeply shocked and horrified by these terrible allegations and my thoughts are with the victims who had the courage to speak out".
In November 2012, Tony Robinson, a former Special Branch officer with Lancashire Police in the 1970s, said that a dossier of sexual abuse allegations against Smith which police claimed was "lost" was actually seized by MI5. Robinson said that he was asked by MI5 to send to London a police dossier that had been kept in a safe in his office which he said was "thick" with allegations from boys claiming they had been abused by Smith.
In December 2012, Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk alleged that Smith raped some of his victims. Danczuk said: "There is no doubt that Cyril Smith seriously sexually abused young boys: why the CPS didn't prosecute more recently is puzzling."
Following claims by MP Tom Watson of "a powerful paedophile network linked to Parliament and No 10", it was reported that Scotland Yard detectives investigating allegations of child abuse at the Elm Guest House were looking into allegations that senior politicians abused children in the 1980s and escaped justice.
2013
In January 2013, The Independent on Sunday reported that police were investigating claims that Smith sexually abused boys at the London guest house. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police later said: "We can confirm Cyril Smith visited the premises." A 16-year-old boy was allegedly sexually abused by Smith at Elm Guest House. MP Simon Danczuk said he was convinced that there was a "network of paedophiles" operating in the House of Commons who helped to protect Smith.
In September 2013, a Channel 4 Dispatches programme "The Paedophile MP: How Cyril Smith Got Away With It" quoted the Crown Prosecution Service as claiming that they had not prosecuted Smith for crimes of abuse because he had been given an assurance in 1970 that he would not be prosecuted, and that prevented them from subsequently reopening the investigation under the law at the time. Political journalist Francis Wheen said that he found this explanation incomprehensible.
2014
Danczuk, with researcher and campaigner Matthew Baker, published Smile for the Camera: The Double Life of Cyril Smith, an exposé of the child abuse committed by Smith. Danczuk alleged that Smith was part of a high-level paedophile ring and that Smith had used his influence to escape prosecution. Danczuk said: "Once you looked beyond the jolly clown playing for the camera, there was a sickening, dark heart. This wasn't just about abuse, it was about power - and a cover-up that reached from Rochdale all the way to the very top of the Establishment." Danczuk said that in the 1980s police discovered child pornography belonging to Smith, but he escaped justice. Danczuk described Smith as "a predatory paedophile and a prolific offender who would target the most vulnerable boys." He said: "A lot of manpower went into investigating Smith over the years, but the only thing he was ever convicted for was mis-selling a lottery ticket."
In 2014, The Baron Steel of Aikwood, the former Liberal leader, said he had confronted Smith about his "unusual" behaviour with boys at a hostel in Rochdale. Following allegations published in 1979, Lord Steel of Aikwood said that Smith confessed to spanking boys and conducting intimate "medical examinations" on them but was allowed to remain as a Liberal MP. Steel said: "I asked Cyril Smith about it. I was half expecting him to say it was all wrong, and I would have been urging him to sue to save his reputation. To my surprise he said the report was correct." Steel said that Smith had a supervisory role in institutions in Rochdale where he was involved in corporal punishment. Steel said of the abuse allegations: "They had been investigated by the police, as Private Eye stated, and no action had been taken on them. So there was nothing more I could do."
In April 2014, following reports that there had been 144 complaints against Smith and that attempts to prosecute him had always been blocked, the President of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron, said that his party needed to answer "serious questions" about who knew that Smith had faced allegations of sexual assault. However, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg refused to hold an inquiry into what he called the "repugnant" actions of Smith. Clegg said: "My party, the Liberal Democrats, did not know about these actions." Clegg stated that the child abuse allegations were a matter for the police.
In May 2014, it was alleged that Smith had molested an 11-year-old boy at the National Liberal Club in London in 1978. Smith allegedly insisted that the boy remove his underpants before attempting to fondle him. A spokesman for the Liberal Democrats said: "Cyril Smith's acts were vile and repugnant and we have nothing but sympathy for those whose lives he ruined."
In June 2014, Detective Chief Superintendent Russ Jackson of Greater Manchester Police admitted the force's previous investigations into abuse linked to Smith at Rochdale Knowl View residential school "fell well short" of what would be expected today. Allegations were made that a paedophile ring had been operating for decades in the town of Rochdale and that men from as far away as Sheffield were travelling to Rochdale to have sex with Knowl View boys aged between eight and thirteen. Greater Manchester Police said there were 21 suspects, 14 of whom it had identified, including Smith. In July 2014, Rochdale council's inquiry into child abuse linked to Smith at Knowl View residential school was halted at the request of police. Greater Manchester Police asked the authority to suspend their inquiry while detectives investigated claims of an institutional cover-up.
In July 2014, it was reported that Smith had put pressure on the BBC in 1976 by asking the corporation not to investigate the "private lives of certain MPs". According to letters in the National Archives, Smith wrote to BBC Director-General Sir Charles Curran in September 1976 saying he was "deeply concerned about the investigative activities of the BBC", especially relating to "the private lives of certain MPs". Former children's minister Tim Loughton described Smith's letters as "bully-boy tactics". Loughton said: "It was an abuse of position that somebody as an MP was saying, 'You shouldn't look at us, we're above the law.'"
A report released by the Crown Prosecution Service in July 2014 showed that in 1970 a police detective investigating Smith presented evidence to his superior of Smith's abuse of young boys at a care home in Rochdale, but no action was taken.
2015
In March 2015, Cabinet Office papers were released confirming that Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was made aware of allegations against Smith before he was knighted in 1988, although she gave him the "benefit of the doubt" because the Director of Public Prosecutions had previously investigated him and had decided not to prosecute him due to lack of evidence. Shortly after, a BBC investigation on Newsnight revealed that Smith had been arrested in the early 1980s in relation to his participation in a paedophile ring, but a high-level cover-up reportedly led to him being released within hours, the evidence destroyed and the investigating officers prevented from discussing the matter under the Official Secrets Act. Theresa May, the Home Secretary, called for immunity for whistle-blowers in the case. Reports also emerged of Smith's arrest by Northamptonshire Police, where he was again released in mysterious circumstances.
In 2015, a retired police officer said that he was threatened with the Official Secrets Act after he found Smith in the home of a known sex offender with two drunk teenage boys and a police sergeant in civilian clothes. The retired officer said that he was summoned to a meeting with a senior officer at Stockport Police Station and told "in no uncertain terms" not to say anything about it. The alleged incident took place in 1988 at a house in Stockport after a complaint that the occupant had committed a lewd act in his window in front of a newspaper boy.