Kerslake Arena Attack Review

Yasmin Qureshi Excerpts

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady, but think I need to check her assertion. I have been to the Merseyside joint control room, where they do incredible amounts of good work. The north-west fire control is a regional control room. The report does not point to that as the failure; the point was the failure in the inter-agency liaison officer not being able necessarily to take the right decisions, and their being involved in almost too many of the decisions; it was not about the location or organisation of the control room. Before we suddenly seek to change that in the north-west, we should look at the report’s findings, which were very much about the roles of a few individuals and the decisions that they took on the night.

[Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)]

May I put on record the fact that after the attack, many people volunteered their services, whether they were cab drivers, or restaurant owners who opened their restaurants to the victims and everyone around?

My constituent Rebecca Ridgeway is a disabled person who uses a wheelchair. When she went into the arena, she had to be taken out of her wheelchair and placed on a seat. When the incident occurred, there was nobody there to look after her. In fact, somebody came in, put her in her wheelchair and she was taken out—not by the arena staff or the security staff, but by a member of the public. As a result of the incident, she has not been able to leave her house, so I visited her in her home. She told me that there has been no counselling, psychiatric services or psychologists available in sufficient numbers to deal with her and many other people who suffered trauma from the incident. Will the Minister provide proper funding for that?

[Mr Wallace]

I am sorry to hear about the hon. Lady’s constituent’s experience. First, I am absolutely happy to take the detail of that case to event organisers throughout the country, whom I meet regularly, to make sure that they think about disability. Secondly, with regard to her particular constituent, I have met the victims liaison team and many of the health trusts in the region, and they are delivering services, so if she is not getting that, will the hon. Lady please tell me the details? I will take that, either with her or on my own, to the relevant health trust to make sure that her constituent is given counselling and support. Many others are getting it and it is wrong that she is not.