My thoughts at the conclusion of the Hillsborough inquest are with the families of the 96 people who died and the survivors who witnessed such carnage more than 27 years ago. They have had to face a terrible ordeal over such an extended period of time that their ongoing trauma can only be guessed at.
At every stage, they have had to defend the reputations of their dead loved ones against gross lies and distortions by those responsible for the disaster and their cronies. Similarly, those who witnessed the events but survived have faced agonising trauma and this has been exacerbated by the attempt by authorities, in particular the South Yorkshire police, to blame the victims and survivors for what happened on that dreadful day.
As someone who has fought alongside the families for justice since I was elected to parliament in 1997, I am glad that this ordeal has come closer to being over with the delivery of the new inquest verdicts. The 96 were unlawfully killed and neither victims nor survivors contributed by their behaviour on that day to the disaster. Further legal proceedings may now result.
We must ask as a society why it has taken 27 years for the truth to be accepted in a court of law. Why is it that it was only a non-legal process, the work of the Hillsborough Independent Panel that got the truth accepted publicly, despite the fact that this disaster was filmed live and the public inquiry into its causes identified them pretty accurately within months? How can we stop this ever happening again?
These are important lessons to learn.
We need to change how the authorities deal with public disasters. We need to see that there is accountability for the 27-year smear campaign emanating from South Yorkshire police and enthusiastically taken up by elements of the tabloid press.
The Public Advocate Bill, a private member’s bill I have co-sponsored with Michael Wills, currently in the House of Lords, would try and ensure that there is a process available to other families of disaster victims in future to prevent them having to wait for 27 years to get to the truth.
We also need to see the government get on with part two of the Leveson inquiry into collusion between police and media. It was exactly cases like this that the second part of the Leveson inquiry was designed to investigate.
Promises were made before the general election that the second part of Leveson would take place, and victims’ groups have spoken with one clear voice that they wish this to be so. The results of the Hillsborough inquest demand that any collusion between the police and press is fully examined by Leveson, as was promised to survivors’ groups as part of the cross-party agreement.
Throughout the Hillsborough families’ campaign, the legal system has failed these grieving, traumatised and bereaved people at every stage. Its adversarial nature and the official defensiveness of public authorities in the face of public disasters often led those affected by them to feel that the truth of what happened is deliberately hidden from them.
In the case of the Hillsborough disaster, South Yorkshire police bear a particular responsibility for this. Institutionally unable to see itself as at fault and used to impunity in all it did, it thought it was appropriate to blame the victims and to continue to do so for 27 years even though the interim report of Lord Justice Taylor’s 1989 public inquiry saw through what they were doing and condemned them for it just months after the disaster happened.
If one looks at the evidence given in the inquest, South Yorkshire police have continued to do so right through these proceedings. It is a disgrace that they have done so and has unnecessarily added again to the trauma of families and survivors.
Those responsible should now admit their wrongdoings and accept fully the consequences of their actions. As a society, we must ensure that a situation like this can never occur again for no one should have to wait for 27 years to see justice being delivered.
Maria Eagle is shadow secretary of state for culture, media and sport, MP for Garston and Halewood, and has been working to help the Hillsborough families since 1990.