Criminal Justice System: Families Bereaved by Public Disasters

George Howarth Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)]

I thank the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) for everything that she has done for Hillsborough survivors and families. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Weaver Vale (Mike Amesbury) for allowing me leave from the Building Safety Bill Committee. I know that he and my hon. Friend the Member for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer) both desperately wanted to attend this debate; however, they have to attend the Committee to scrutinise the Bill, so I place this on record on their behalf and for their constituents.

On Wednesday 26 May 2021, the British legal system and the establishment delivered their final insult to the families and survivors of Hillsborough, after three decades of what felt like a targeted attack on them and on a city. Ninety-seven people were unlawfully killed at Hillsborough, due to police gross negligence. A nightmare 32-year ordeal through the British legal system has ended with an outcome that feels like a final insult. Mr Justice William Davis’s ruling in May acquitted two ex-South Yorkshire police officers and the force’s former lawyer of perverting the course of justice by amending police statements. Mr Justice Davis’s view, apparently, is that the police officers and their solicitor could, in principle, legally withhold crucial evidence from the Taylor inquiry.

The result is that nobody has been held accountable for the needless deaths, injuries and enduring trauma suffered at Hillsborough, despite the 2016 inquest verdicts that the 96—now 97—victims were unlawfully killed due to the disastrous actions of the police and the officer in command, Chief Superintendent David Duckenfield. Is it any wonder that faith in the legal system has been utterly corroded for many after the experiences suffered?

This can never be repeated. Justice has been denied for so many. That is why the proposed Bill and set of reforms matter so much. My hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) has been a champion of the families and survivors since her election; I thank her for everything she has done for them. She will never know how much it has meant.

My own experience will be familiar to many survivors, but I would like to take the House back to a 16-year-old in 1989—how his view of the establishment was shaped and why this Bill matters so much to him. I watched the horrors of Hillsborough unfold from the side pen because of fate.

In 1988, I had stood with my two friends directly behind the goal—it was edgy, but we walked out celebrating a great victory and got home safely. In 1989, we had another Kopite with us. We headed back to the same place for the big game hours before, full of excitement and anticipation, like so many others. My friend started feeling extremely uncomfortable with the numbers, and we decided to move our way back down the tunnel to a side pen. That was fate, because it was before Duckenfield made his disastrous decision. I am sure all four of us who were there, and who are now parents and grandparents, thank whatever powers made us take that fateful decision to move.

I knew my dad and his mates—

[Sir George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Ian Byrne]

Yes.

[Sir George Howarth]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful and suitably emotional case. As he knows, I spent a day at the original inquest; does he agree that that inquest, which thankfully was overturned later, was an absolute travesty of what should have taken place? A few moments ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Paula Barker) talked about the importance of truth; an inquest should be the occasion on which we get the truth, but that inquest did not.

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[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for giving me the chance to participate. Just last Friday, the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) was here for the consideration of private Members’ Bills and referred to this debate. I wanted to come along—I do not provide support to any of the victims as an MP—to convey from my point of view our understanding of what the debate means to everyone here today. None of us could fail to feel the sorrow, hurt, loss and raw pain that we have all heard here today. The hon. Lady has been a stalwart in putting this matter forward, and I wanted to come and support her, and I am here today to do just that, and I put it on record.

If I may, I will refer to the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May). I am always impressed—I have said this to her, so it is not something she has not heard before—that she is on the Back Benches contributing to debates. I am impressed every time I come here and she does that, because it shows the depth of her and her commitment to the issues she brings forward. We should all be impressed by that, including the Conservative side.

This is a very sensitive topic, and I know there are people listening today who are members of families who have lost loved ones due to public disasters. Many out there will resonate with what those MPs who have spoken today have said, as well as with those who have spoken before and are not here now, and they will understand where the Bill needs to go. We look to the Government to respond positively. We all know—I have written down “96 Liverpool fans”, but as the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Kim Johnson) reminds me, it is now 97—that the impact goes long beyond the event. I remember well that awful day and the vivid scenes that took place afterwards.

The previous Justice Secretary stated that the Government would

“always consider opportunities to review the law”.—[Official Report, 10 June 2021; Vol. 696, c. 1128.]

Well, today is the day, and the House is asking for that to happen. However, given the devastating situations that families were left in as a result of what many families perceived to be Government inaction after the Hillsborough disaster, it is fair to say that a review of the current law is the minimum action that could be taken. Steps must be taken, as every hon. and right hon. Member has referred to, to ensure that this process is never repeated in any way and that the correct process takes place not only for victims, but the victims’ families who have been left behind.

The motion for this debate is clear. It calls for reforms that

“better respond to families bereaved by public disasters”.

I want to take a moment to reflect on an event in the past that also supports the claim for reforming the criminal justice system. I refer to the Omagh bombings of 1998. I also remember that day. It was a Saturday, and I always remember it very well. It was 15 August, and 29 people were killed.

[Sir George Howarth]

The hon. Gentleman is right, as others have, to praise my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle). I add my thanks to the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) for all she has done to support the families. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of the major problems that has beset all this is the lack of a process that takes any account of the legitimate interests of those who either were bereaved or survived it? Does he therefore believe it is about time we put that right?

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for intervening. Absolutely, we want to associate ourselves with those who lost loved ones in Liverpool and their pain. We in Northern Ireland have had the same pain for some 23 years from the Omagh bombings in particular.

After multiple court cases and futile arrests, there was no real closure for those poor families. My point is: this is not a Northern Ireland-based dig-up of history but another illustration of how there is, as the right hon. Gentleman said, a lack of justice and judicial support for the families of the victims. For 23 years, the families of the Omagh victims have had no closure and no explanation. The process that they have been through shows again that we need to do better by victims of public disasters.

Such disasters should be treated no differently from individual cases. The mark left behind is the same. The pain is the same. The long-lasting hurt is the same. The feeling of losing a loved one hurts all the same, and more effort needs to be put into reforming the system to ensure that there is a better response to the families of the victims. They have waited for something to happen, but nothing has happened. That could be done through communication and better liaison between families and the police, emergency services and, ultimately, the courts. I look to the Minister for a response.

The Public Advocate (No. 2) Bill would allow for better scrutiny for investigations. The hon. Member for Garston and Halewood said that, as did the right hon. Member for Maidenhead—everyone has said it. Perhaps I sometimes look at things simplistically, but it looks simple enough—so just do it. I fear that, all too often, victims are left in the dark, making the process more devastating. An independent advocate would allow for those all-important questions to be answered from the aftermath of a tragedy that is still raw. We have witnessed that in recent years with Grenfell, which other hon. Members referred to, and the Manchester Arena bombings. Many of us did not cry tears at that, for people we did not know, but for the victims, the tears, the sorrow and the hurt are the same, and we need to help the victims. They and their families should be at the forefront of legislation. The authorities have a moral duty to ensure that information and investigative movements are transparent to all victims’ families.

One of the most prominent duties of hon. Members in this House—we all do this, hopefully to the best of our abilities—is to represent our constituents. I stand up here for all who have suffered loss with no closure or justice at all. Unfortunately, Northern Ireland knows only too well about victims, and there is often little to no closure. As we have heard from right hon. and hon. Members, it is crucial that no negligence or wrongful information has the potential to dissipate relations further. I cannot fail to be angered about that; I want the response to be as it should.

The core element of the Public Advocate (No. 2) Bill is to ensure that things are done properly from the start. The hon. Member for Garston and Halewood has raised this issue in Parliament over a great many years—long before I came here—and I hope that consideration will be given to the Bill. I urge the Minister, to whom I look as a friend, to work collectively with the victims’ families. It is not enough, and moreover it is not fair, that it is down to the families to set out their own methods of support and victims support groups. The Government must do more to ensure that the pain that victims’ families go through is met with understanding and support. If we cannot give support to our grieving and vulnerable, we as a society are failing and we in this seat of democracy as MPs have failed. Today we want to take failure and make it success, so we look to our Minister to make that happen.

I support the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood and everyone who has spoken across the Chamber. I would just say this: to their repeated efforts to secure this support in legislation, I add my voice—as one who represents Strangford in Northern Ireland and does, I believe, understand the pain—as I do to the request they have put forward today. That request in this House today will help us all in this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and, on behalf of the victims and on behalf of the families, make sure that we can learn from past mistakes and simply, but most importantly, do it better.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Chalk)]

Occasionally—very occasionally—a debate takes place in this House that has such searing force that it lodges forever in the memory because of the way in which it measures up to the gravity of the subject matter. This is one such debate. I thank the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) for securing it, but even more for giving a speech that was of such exceptional clarity and force that I hope not just her constituents, but those more widely in the great city of Liverpool, will read it and, even better, listen to it.

I also thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), to whom I shall return in a moment; the hon. Member for Bootle (Peter Dowd)—what a joy it is to see him in his place—my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill); the hon. Members for Liverpool, Wavertree (Paula Barker) and for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley); the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Ian Byrne), who also made an exceptional speech; and the hon. Members for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood), for Liverpool, Riverside (Kim Johnson) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon).

I want to mention the former Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead, because it says an awful lot that, having acted as Home Secretary and as Prime Minister, she now acts as a Back Bencher. That can be encapsulated neatly, hon. Members may think, by the single word “duty”. She encapsulates duty, and Parliament is the richer for it.

The Government recognise the fundamental importance of placing the bereaved at the heart of any investigation that follows a major disaster. That, perhaps, is taken as read. We remain committed to ensuring that bereaved people are supported. That means that they are not just treated with the basic humanity and respect, which I am afraid was not the case in the past, but provided with—the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood used this word—agency, given a voice and thought of not as spectators but as participants. The way she put it—I think she was absolutely right—was that the bereaved cannot be considered a mere adjunct to proceedings. I cannot put it better than that.

Stepping back from inquests for a moment, I think that there is a new and welcome culture in that regard in criminal courts, as well as in inquests, in so far as I remember that when I began prosecuting as a barrister, witnesses and the bereaved were considered to be completely incidental. In fairness, because of reforms made when the Labour party was in power and while we have been in government, there has been a welcome trend to ensure that witnesses are spoken to by prosecuting barristers, shown round the court, given a copy of their statement and so on. However, we do need to go further.

Before I turn to the IPA proposals specifically, I want to take a moment to set out a bit of context. Just before I do that, however, let me reiterate that the apology that was made from this Dispatch Box by David Cameron for the double injustice that the hon. Lady referred to is as relevant today as it was then. It is worth spelling out what that double injustice was: the first injustice for the families was losing their loved ones, and the second was being traduced.

Let me turn to that context. In recent years, as the House has discussed, a forensic spotlight has been shone on the experience of the bereaved, and on bereaved people in general. First, there was the report by Dame Elish Angiolini into deaths and serious incidents in police custody. Then, most pertinent to today’s proceedings, there was the report by Bishop James Jones, commissioned by the former Prime Minister, to ensure that the pain and the suffering of the Hillsborough families would not be repeated. I want to take a moment just to focus a little on what was said in that report, a copy of which I have here and have had the opportunity to re-read.

In section 2 of the report, on the proper participation of bereaved families at inquests, Bishop James Jones talked about two things in particular: first, legal representation for bereaved families in appropriate cases; and, secondly, cultural change. Legal representation can be so important. It was, in fact, the former Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead, who ensured that in those second inquests the families did have legal representation. If one takes a moment to read what is in Bishop James Jones’s report, one can see that he included some of the testimony from the bereaved families. One said:

“The second inquest gave me my children back.”

The opportunity to lodge pen portraits, and to have those lawyers to speak to, was transformational in terms of providing the very agency to which the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood referred.

Bishop James Jones went on to talk about another matter as part of proper participation: cultural change. Here, I wish to pick up the point made by the former Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead. Bishop James Jones, in paragraph 2.95, said:

“I believe that ‘proper participation’ of bereaved families at an inquest is not just a question of funding, but also of cultural change.”

What he observed was the point that others have made:

“the highly adversarial behaviour of some lawyers employed by public bodies suggests that additional training may be required for solicitors and barristers working in the inquest system.”

He was not the first person to make that point. The Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge, in his judgment of 19 December 2012 which quashed the original inquests, described the original proceedings as having been “scarred” by having degenerated into “a kind of adversarial battle”. That is something we need to consider as well.

The current Chief Coroner, his honour Judge Teague QC, said publicly that it is “precisely the inquisitorial nature of the coroner’s investigation that is important to the centrality of the bereaved. Where proceedings take on a more adversarial character, the focus is liable to be diverted away from the bereaved where it properly belongs and channelled instead into some extraneous satellite dispute, with the risk that it ends up as yet another form of litigation.” I speak as a lawyer myself. I know that sometimes that can make the situation worse.

[Sir George Howarth]

Mr Deputy Speaker, I neglected to apologise earlier for not being here at the start of the debate. I was chairing Westminster Hall and it was therefore impossible for me to be here.

The Minister is making a very good point. I can remember an exchange between the right hon. Member for Maidenhead and myself when she was Home Secretary in which we talked about the stereotyping of people. Somewhere at the bottom of all this, the way in which the judiciary and some sections of the media dealt with it was all about a stereotype—a stereotype of football fans—which was convenient for them, but actually, in this case, bore no resemblance to the truth. Does he agree that stereotyping in any situation is wrong, but that in this one it has been absolutely appalling?

[Alex Chalk]

What an excellent point. The idea that all football fans are the same, behave the same way and think the same way is an absurdity. Perhaps we understand that better now than was the case 30 years ago.

To conclude the point about the context, what has happened since 2017 is a document that was referred to, but which I just want to take a moment to discuss—“A Guide to Coroner Services for Bereaved People”. I mention it because there is a welcome focus on bereaved people and it contains all the information that one would expect. I will not rehearse it in exhaustive detail, but I just want to pick up on one point made by the former Home Secretary and former Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead, which is that it is really important that there is never inequality of arms—in other words, in a situation where the state is potentially on trial or certainly under scrutiny, it acts towards the bereaved parties in a way that is defensive and unfair. So I was very pleased to see the annex to that document effectively has a code of conduct in those circumstances. It states:

“Where a Government department has interested person status to an inquest, the Government and the lawyers it instructs at inquests will adopt the following principles”.

I will not read them all out, but it includes, in paragraph 3:

“Communicate with the bereaved in a sensitive and empathetic way which acknowledges and respects their loss.”

Hon. Members would have thought that that is obvious, but it bears emphasis. The annex also includes:

“Keep in mind that the bereaved should…Be at the heart of the inquest process…Feel confident that the inquest will get to the facts of what happened…Feel properly involved throughout and listened to.”

That is part of a new code of conduct and it is absolutely right.

I want to make a final point in focusing on there not being a “closed door of the public sector” , which is the phrase that my right hon. Friend the former Prime Minister used. The Bar Standards Board published, I think as recently as this week, resources for those practising in the coroners’ courts, which includes instructions to:

“Adapt your style of communication and engagement to the unique purpose of inquests”—

and so on. That effectively says to representatives, “Remember bereaved people. They are not simply observers in this. They are participants. They are vulnerable people. They deserve to be treated with respect.”

Finally on context before I turn to the IPA, there have been very important changes made to the exceptional case funding scheme. I know that there are a lot of people in the House who greatly value legal aid, and we certainly do. The Government recognise that although legal aid is generally not available for inquests—by the way, that is as it should be, because the inquest is essentially a fact-finding process—there are some circumstances where legal representation may be required for bereaved families, as the former Prime Minister noted in respect of the second inquests, and that is provided through the ECF scheme.

We believe that where there should be legal aid for bereaved families, access to it should be as simple and easy as possible. That is why we have reviewed this process as part of our legal aid means test review. Following that work, I am delighted that we have made a commitment, in the Government’s response to the Justice Committee’s report of its inquiry into the coroner service, that ECF applications for representation at inquests will no longer be means-tested. That is a very important development. It will broaden the scope and access to legal advice and support.

Let me turn to the IPA and the Bill that the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood prepared, which I have read. As the House knows, in 2018, the Government consulted on proposals to establish an IPA, and the consultation looked at a range of issues about how best to support those bereaved following a public disaster. It asked a number of challenging questions because, as always, we know in this House that the devil is in the detail. We need to focus on issues such as: how exactly an IPA should interact with investigatory bodies, how one avoids duplication, whether the IPA should be involved only where fatalities occur, whether it ought to have a wider remit, and so on.

It is right to say that there was a mixed reaction from those who provided responses, including on the circumstances in which such an appointment should be triggered. There was also the issue of the name. As the consultation document noted, the Government do not see an IPA as providing legal advice and representation—of course not—and it is not an advocate in that sense. It also noted that such an IPA may be supporting a

“diverse group of people whose views may differ, perhaps strongly”.

Just as the right hon. Member for Knowsley (Sir George Howarth) made the point that it is absurd to put all football fans in one category, it is also very dangerous to put all the bereaved in one category, and we must be mindful of that. There was, however, more agreement on the importance of the IPA dovetailing with other support already provided. Plainly on that latter point, it will be important to consider the new and, we would suggest, significantly improved landscape, in terms of the culture and support that I referred to.

Since that consultation, there have been a number of significant events, such as a new Government, a general election and a pandemic, but perhaps most importantly, there has been a criminal trial, which has been referred to. Right hon. and hon. Members will be aware that that does mean that there are necessarily some things that cannot properly be discussed for fear of prejudicing, but that is now behind us, and I am pleased to announce today that we will be responding to the 2018 review by the end of this year, and I expect it to be rather earlier than that.

Quite apart from that, the Government are committed to continuing their engagement with the families bereaved by the Hillsborough disaster. Indeed, we have done so earlier in the summer and will continue to do so. It is critical that the lessons that can be learned from their awful experience are not lost. To that end, the Home Office has been working closely with its partners in the relevant Departments and organisations, and is now engaging with the Hillsborough families before publishing the Government’s overarching response.

The former Prime Minister made the point that we must make sure that other types of inquiry do not fall within the loophole that has been observed in criminal cases such as this. If an inquiry is not set up under the auspices of the Inquiries Act 2005, we need to ensure that we do not have a situation in which people can apparently avoid the consequences of their actions. We are considering very carefully a report from the Law Commission, which, as Members will know, is there to look at lacunae in the law and try to improve it. The commission came up with some recommendations in December last year, considering potential offences of corruption in public office and breach of duty in public office. Those are two potential offences that we are looking at with great care.

Ensuring that the bereaved are still at the heart of the investigatory process that follows a major disaster remains fundamentally important, and important steps have been taken. However, we are going to go further and, as we do so, we will continue to welcome the interest and, yes, the challenge—the proper challenge—from people standing up for their constituents, standing up for their city and standing up for accountability. I thank Members on both sides of the House for some measured, powerful and principled contributions today.