Hillsborough Disaster

Andrew Miller Excerpts

Monday 17th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

I will be very brief because I want to leave time for my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) to wind up, but there are a few things that I would like to put on record. First, the whole House will congratulate my hon. Friend on an amazingly powerful and emotional speech. I do not think there have been many speeches in my 19 years here when there were so many damp eyes in the Chamber, and that is understandable given the circumstances.

When I moved to the north-west from Portsmouth in 1977, Liverpool supporters told me, “You’ll now learn about football”, and to a certain extent that was very true. However, it was my late neighbour, the late Cliff Lloyd, a one-time secretary of the Professional Footballers Association who was on Liverpool’s books as a schoolboy before the second world war, who told me about the stools that my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) mentioned. That is intriguing. In both the houses I have lived in during that time, a little stool was there, and it was for Dad to take along with him for his lad so that he could see the match. Those stools were used on the terraces in Liverpool by families who went for a family occasion and enjoyed their game.

I want to contrast that—the truth of the sport of football and the passion there is on the terraces—with what was said by the police, by The Sun, and by several other commentators. The contrast is so stark that we need to sit back, reflect and ask ourselves what drove the police leadership to get things so wrong—to encourage people to amend their statements. These are very serious issues. I am delighted that the Home Secretary has given such a positive response and that, I hope, we are going to get to the bottom of those issues.

We should contrast that with the way in which newspapers such as The Sun got it so wrong. What gave them the right to publish such disgusting filth when people had died? That is no way for responsible media to operate. Whatever happens at the end of Bishop James Jones’s inquiry, we have to reflect on this matter as a House. How can we ensure that the media take a more responsible view when they report on tragedies?

As has been said, we have given Bishop James Jones rather a lot to do given the responsibilities of the inquiries he is chairing. I hope that the Home Secretary will confirm that the Government want him to give this task the highest priority among the inquiries he is conducting into forestry and other issues. This matter is of such importance that we should encourage him to give it the highest possible priority.

I want to put on record my thanks to my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), who has been unstinting in raising this issue before public audiences. He spoke in my constituency a couple of months ago. In very emotional terms, he described what he saw as the roles of Parliament and Government in addressing this terrible tragedy and injustice. I hope that his role will not be forgotten, nor that of my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle). The two of them have been extraordinary.

I also want to comment on my hon. Friend the Member for Halton (Derek Twigg) who, as has been said, was at the tragic game. He is always an unassuming individual. He has taught me a lot about the events of the day. I congratulate him on being persistent in pressing this case.

We face a set of circumstances that require total openness. Today we have discussed the issues of data protection and redaction. The Home Secretary has been very positive. Many Members will know that I was quite heavily involved in bringing the Data Protection Act 1998 together from the Data Protection Act 1984 and the European directive. Unless, as the Home Secretary said, family members have specific reasons to request that the bishop does not publish certain things, there is no reason under the 1998 Act why anything other than minor details, such as signatures, should be withheld from the public gaze. We need to ensure that if anything is done beyond those reasons, it is annotated to record why it has been done. I would ask the bishop to think about how he could do that, so that anyone who has the slightest suspicion about any redaction can be comfortable about why it has occurred.

The list read out by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton was powerful and emotional. On that point, I think it is appropriate for the House to give the last few minutes to him, because he has done the House a tremendous service by raising this case today.

[Hon. Members]

Hear! Hear!