Luciana Berger
Main Page: Luciana Berger (Liberal Democrat - Liverpool, Wavertree)Department Debates - View all Luciana Berger's debates with the Attorney General
(12 years, 10 months ago)
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Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)
I pay tribute to Anne Williams, Kevin’s mother, for the incredible courage and determination that she has shown in the pursuit of justice for her son. All of us here hope that today marks the beginning of the end of what has been a long battle for her and her family. I congratulate the hon. Member for City of Chester (Stephen Mosley) on securing the debate and my hon. Friend the Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson) on the important role that he played in ensuring that it took place. I also pay tribute to the 118,000 members of the public who signed the petition. I echo the comments made by some of my hon. Friends; this debate should be taking place in the main Chamber this afternoon.
Much of what I wanted to say has already been said by the hon. Member for City of Chester in his forensic remarks at the beginning of the debate and by many other hon. Members who have spoken before me. Like all of them, I welcome the fact that the Attorney-General has agreed to look at the applications made to his predecessors, and to consider whether to support an application to the High Court for a new inquest into Kevin’s death. I urge him to make that application, please.
To many of us here, the evidence is conclusive. We have heard the chronology of events on 15 April 1989 in detail from the hon. Member for City of Chester, and from the BBC tapes, we have heard from PC Michael Craighill, Mr Bruder and WPC Debra Martin. It is clear that their visual evidence alone contradicts the original verdict, and when it is added to the evidence that discredits Dr Slater’s conclusion at the inquest—evidence that has already been mentioned—the strength of the case is overwhelming. I sincerely hope that the weight of all this evidence, along with the clear inaccuracies of the original inquiry, will convince the Attorney-General to recommend a new inquest.
It is sometimes suggested by some in the media or by those who are not connected with the terrible events of Hillsborough that it is time to draw a line under what happened on that fateful day in April 23 years ago, that it would be better not to rake up the past, or that the families of those who lost their lives that day should he spared from reliving their trauma. However, those of us here today who have met the families of the 96 victims, or who knew people who were at Hillsborough or who were even at the ground themselves, know the deep sense of injustice felt by so many people about what happened then and afterwards. We know that it simply would not be right to draw a line, not while families still have questions that deserve to be answered, not until the full truth of what happened at Hillsborough is known, and not until justice has finally been served.