Devon County Council has been accused of going out its way to hide a critical report into its ability to tackle child abuse.
The Council is being accused of using the Christmas period to hide the report.
Councillors from all parties asked for the probe into social services after an Ofsted report said the council's child protection measures were inadequate.
Councillors Alan Connett and Alistair Dewhirst, who both serve on the authority's people's scrutiny committee which commissioned the controversial report, say it was effectively 'buried' by Devon County Council which released the report on Christmas Eve, just as the county was going home for the holiday season.
Cllr Dewhirst said it has taken some weeks to get the wording of the final report agreed and he was worried it would be published at a time when attention would be elsewhere.
"I raised my concerns with the Conservative chair of the main committee and was given a verbal assurance it would not be issued Christmas week. But that's just what has happened," he said.
"The report highlights the lack of information being gathered by the County Council and Devon & Cornwall Police, even though the likelihood is that children are being sexually exploited on a daily basis in the county.
"Safeguarding children is a major, major issue for the county council and it is already struggling having been found 'inadequate' by outside inspectors.
"It seems to me this will look like yet another attempt to hush things up, limit the scrutiny process and sweep issues under the carpet in the Christmas period."
The report recommends that the illegal activity of child sexual exploitation should be declared a priority public health issue like smoking or obesity.
Recommendations from the all-party team of councillors on the task group also include that Police and Social Services should raise awareness of child sexual exploitation with district, city, borough councils, housing associations and businesses.
In addition to inspections by Ofsted, which oversees the standard of children safeguarding nationally, there should be spot checks on children's homes to ensure they are following Government guidance to inform the police and county council when a child moves into their home who is at risk of child sexual exploitation
Cllr Connett, leader of the Liberal Democrats on the county council, said it was the latest example of saying one thing and doing another from the increasingly gaff-prone County Hall in Exeter.
"We've learned that the county council sat on an important letter from the Department for Education for several months before admitting the letter existed and sharing it with councillors," he said.
"The letter was rather critical of the county council about its role in safeguarding children in Devon and we only learned about it because of a reference from the council's auditors.
"Then, an independent review was undertaken at the county council's invitation but only selected councillors were invited to the feedback session.
"They say it was all a terrible misunderstanding but these are highly paid members of staff who seem, in some cases, to think they need only have regard to the current Conservative administration which, of course, has been struggling to get to grips with these important issues in Devon."
He said he thought the council closed care homes for vulnerable children – like Tiverton's Birchen Lane home – not because residents were vulnerable to abuse from adults in the community, as was claimed, but because the council no longer wanted to be in the business of running residential homes.
"If you thought children at these homes were in danger, you would call the police, not shut the home," he said.
Devon County Council has not yet commented on the report.
