Mull of Kintyre Review

Baroness Liddell of Coatdyke Excerpts

Wednesday 13th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Liddell of Coatdyke]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his repetition of the Statement from the other place, and also thank the Secretary of State for the willingness with which he has acknowledged the conclusions of Lord Philip’s review. Will the Minister reiterate his thanks to Lord Philip for his tenacity and his wisdom in dealing with this matter, and also to my noble friend Lord O’Neill of Clackmannan? He has worked closely with the families, as recently as today, to ensure that they are kept up to speed with what is happening in your Lordships’ House and in the other place.

All of this sorry saga hinges on a piece of legal advice that was wrong. It is unfortunate that that happened. There are family members of both Flight Lieutenant Tapper and Flight Lieutenant Cook who did not live to see this day. Our sympathy goes to them as well. Will the Minister acknowledge that many lessons had been learnt before now in matters of how deceased air crew are represented before a board of inquiry? It is not before time that we now have a system that ensures that this miscarriage of justice cannot ever again be repeated.

[Lord Astor of Hever]

I thank the noble Baroness for what she said, and I certainly echo her thanks to Lord Philip. I also thank the noble Baroness herself and my noble friend for all the very hard work that they put into this excellent report. I also assure the noble Baroness that many lessons have been learnt from this whole process, and hopefully we have a template to make things very much better in the future.