A campaigner whose son died in the Hillsborough disaster has said that a new law named in honour of the victims must not be “watered down”.
Margaret Aspinall, who lost her 18-year-old son James in the tragedy, has been a key campaigner for what is now the Public Office (Accountability) Bill, known as the Hillsborough Law.
The legislation is intended to make sure the authorities will face criminal sanctions if they attempt to cover up the facts behind disasters such as the 1989 Hillsborough disaster or the Grenfell Tower fire.
Speaking at the Labour party conference on Tuesday ahead of Sir Keir Starmer’s speech, Ms Aspinall thanked the Prime Minister for keeping his promise to bring in a Hillsborough Law, but warned that it must be brought in “in all its entirety”.
She said: “I now would like to thank the Prime Minister.
“I met the Prime Minister when he was the DPP (Director of Public Prosecutions), I met him when he was the Leader of the Opposition and I asked him then: would you promise me that if you become Prime Minister that will you give a Hillsborough Law for the ordinary people? He promised me that.
“I met him numerous times, he phoned me up privately and told me ‘Margaret, there will be a Hillsborough Law’. He’s kept his word.”
She said: “It wasn’t easy. He promised me it would be on April 15. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a Hillsborough Law by April 15. Things get watered down. We don’t want anything watered down.
“I want a Hillsborough Law in all its entirety, that is so important.
“The Prime Minister didn’t have an easy time to get it, we’ve still got work to do and we’ve got good people behind this who will be watching and making sure that we get it in its entirety.
“What we’ve got so far, I’m very, very grateful and I thank the Prime Minister for listening and for keeping his word.”
Sir Keir had previously pledged to bring in the law by the 36th anniversary of the tragedy, which was on April 15, but Downing Street then said more time was needed to redraft it.
Responding to her speech, the Prime Minister said: “Even after the unimaginable loss of losing James, after all those obstacles deliberately put in your way, with this Hillsborough Law, you and the other families – some of them with us this afternoon – and other campaigners, have served a degree of justice for James, for the 97, but also for thousands of people that you will never know and you will never meet who will never now have to go through what you went through. Thank you.”
He said: “The Hillsborough Law is not just a promise delivered, it is also a recognition of whether its Hillsborough, Windrush, Grenfell, Horizon, the grooming gangs, infected blood and so many more, the British state consistently refused to see injustice because of who the victims are.
“Because they’re working-class, they’re black, they’re women and girls. And so Margaret, I know we can never undo the pain for you and all the other families, but we can show that in the Britain that we are building, the state will see, the state will listen, the state will be accountable to working people, because now injustice has no place to hide.”
