Hillsborough

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Wednesday 12th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Kelvin MacKenzie needs to face up to his own responsibilities. I have not had time to look at the detail of the media aspects, but we now have an account of what happened, where these false allegations came from, how they got into the newspapers, and what the newspapers, particularly The Sun, did to give them that prominence. Now it is all there, anyone with responsibility needs to face up to their responsibilities, and I very much hope that they will do so.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

The events in Hillsborough stadium that day were undoubtedly a shocking tragedy. The subsequent investigation, cover-up and media coverage were a shocking travesty. To gain something positive from these awful events, what assurances can the Prime Minister give the House, and what have we learned, to ensure that these failings will not, and cannot, be repeated in the future?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. Obviously, in terms of safety at football grounds, huge steps have been taken with all-seater stadiums, much better rules, far better knowledge about how to police football matches, and all the issues with crowd safety and the rest of it. There are no longer a lot of those terrible cages and things that were there in the past, and I think that we live in a different world. In learning from these inquiries, when a disaster such as this takes place it is important that we look at its causes and at what happened, rather than muddle it up with a whole lot of other issues, which I think is what far too many people did in this case.