Kerslake Arena Attack Review

Mark Menzies Excerpts

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

The right hon. Lady will know there is still some way to run in the coroner’s inquest and other inquiries, certainly on Manchester, when it comes to attribution and the avoidability of death, etc. We should not forget that a live police investigation of the event in Manchester is still ongoing, with an extradition request outstanding that we are working to help the Libyans to fulfil so we can see justice be done—that is another plank in this process.

On Prevent and the case of the Parsons Green bomber, there has been an internal review by the police with the local Prevent organisation. I am happy to brief the right hon. Lady on some of that on Privy Council terms, if she would like to come. There are definitely issues there that need to be sorted, but Prevent, as a policy, is not guaranteed. We have to try, as a society, to deradicalise and divert people. There are people who are determined to commit acts of murder and brutality, but we would be totally wrong if we did not try to deradicalise them because we cannot give a 100% guarantee. We will continue to try to make sure we are safe.

[Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)]

As my right hon. Friend the Minister has already mentioned, this tragedy went beyond Manchester and into Lancashire. Indeed, the first two victims to be named—indeed, the youngest victim—were from the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Seema Kennedy) who, as a mum of two young children, asked me to mention it today. Georgina Callander and Saffie Rose Roussos were two young people whose lives were tragically taken. As has been touched on, it is important that the review also looks at the counselling services that are available in schools and that are available to younger people not just in Manchester but beyond, because young people’s lives were touched in a way that should never have happened at such a young age.

[Mr Wallace]

My daughter was at the arena not that night but a few weeks before. The arena is a hub for many teenagers in that part of the world. Being a north-west MP, I attended the first Cobra meeting in the morning not down in the Cabinet Office but from Manchester. The point my hon. Friend makes is the very point I made, which is that these teenagers will go back to their schools and their communities, which are not necessarily in the city centre or near the seat of the explosion. Have we put in place the messaging to our education authorities and so on to pick up on that? I was assured that the answer is yes. I asked them to go back and redouble the messaging, and we hope that was done. If it was not, I would be happy to hear from colleagues on both sides of the House to ensure that we follow up on those assurances. One lesson to remember is that people come to big cities from all over the country, and they will disperse back and take their injuries, whether mental or physical, with them.