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Posts Tagged ‘victims’

• New Internazionale manager gives £96,000 to support group
• Paul Dalglish confirms father’s interest in Anfield vacancy

Rafael Benítez marked his appointment as the new manager of Internazionale today by donating £96,000 to the Hillsborough Family Support Group.

The former Liverpool manager, who has signed a two-year deal to replace José Mourinho at San Siro, has returned to Merseyside following a family holiday in preparation for a new start in Italy. His round of farewells included a surprise visit to the HFSG’s office near Anfield this afternoon, where he presented the chairwoman, Margaret Aspinall, with a cheque for £96,000 and wished the committee well in its quest to unearth the truth behind the loss of 96 lives at Hillsborough in 1989.

“It was just nice to know that he wanted to see us before he went,” said Aspinall, whose son, James, was among the victims.

Benítez had earlier signed the contract that will see him unveiled as Inter’s manager next Tuesday, less than a fortnight after being given a £6m severance payment to leave Liverpool.

In a statement, Inter said: “Benítez is one of the true greats of European football, one of the few who brings trophies to the clubs he manages. Benítez comes to Italy fully aware of the club he has chosen: Inter, an exceptional team that has just won its fifth consecutive Serie

• Crucial documents will be made available for first time
• Panel will compile a report on the ‘full story of the disaster’

The government has announced the make-up of the panel that will next month begin making public key secret documents relating to the Hillsborough tragedy in 1989 and compiling a report that will tell the “full story” of the disaster.

Shortly after the 20th anniversary of the disaster in April last year, the government responded to pressure from the families of the 96 Liverpool fans who died by promising to make crucial documents from the police, fire and ambulance services, the coroner, the government and Sheffield City Council available for the first time.

It was revealed today that the panel, chaired by the Right Rev James Jones, Bishop of Liverpool, will meet in Liverpool on 4 February for the first of a series of monthly meetings and will be required to produce a report that not only explains its work but “will also illustrate how the information disclosed adds to public understanding of the tragedy and its aftermath”.

The seven members of the Hillsborough Independent Panel are: Christine Gifford, public information expert; TV producer and researcher Katy Jones; Paul Leighton, former deputy chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland; Phil Scraton, academic criminologist professor; Dr Bill Kirkup, former associate medical director at the Department of Health; broadcaster Peter Sissons; and archivist Sarah Tyacke.

Prof Scraton, who was formerly director of the Hillsborough Project and has written two books on the subject, said the move was “a clear recognition that the families and survivors have had neither the full story nor appropriate acknowledgement of the circumstances in which 96 men, women and children died and hundreds were injured”.

He added: “It confirms their resilience and courage in pursuing full disclosure of the context, circumstances and aftermath of an avoidable tragedy in the face of hostile opposition and it represents an unprecedented development in setting new standards regarding the wider public interest.”

Jones, who has worked on drama documentaries including Jimmy McGovern’s Hillsborough, said: “It is hugely important that the Hillsborough families will at last have access to all of the information surrounding this tragedy. Opening up the archive will, I hope, help to heal the pain of not knowing.”

The Hillsborough Independent Panel and its terms of reference were established last month. Its role is to oversee public disclosure of the documents, letting the victims’ families know their content first.

However, some documents will continue to be withheld for legal reasons. The terms of reference state: “The fundamental principles will be full disclosure and no redaction of content, except in the limited legal and other circumstances outlined in the protocol.”

As such, documents subject to “legal professional privilege” will not be made public and the names of junior officials and police officers up to and including the rank of sergeant will have their names redacted, as will members of the public.

The release of government papers relating to the previous administration will require the approval of the Conservative party.

South Yorkshire police, principally blamed for the disaster by Lord Justice Taylor in his official report, have agreed to make public the documents they hold in around 200 storage boxes.

The other public bodies releasing their records include Sheffield City Council, criticised by Taylor for failing to certify that Hillsborough was safe, and West Midlands police, who investigated the disaster for Taylor and the Director of Public Prosecutions.

The decision of the coroner, Dr Stefan Popper, to impose a 3.15pm cut-off time on his inquest into the causes of death angered many families of the deceased, who argued that it prevented a full analysis of the response by police and other emergency services.

Today’s announcement was welcomed by bereaved relatives. Hillsborough Family Support Group chair Margaret Aspinall, who lost her son 18-year-old son James in the disaster, said: “We welcome the panel which has the confidence of all interested parties and is felt capable of executing this very important task. We look forward to working with them over the coming months and hope that the outcome is satisfactory.”

The campaign for the documents to be released was last year taken up by Andy Burnham, now health secretary, and Maria Eagle, the junior justice minister, who consistently accused South Yorkshire police of “a conspiracy to cover up” its own culpability for the disaster by presenting a case that supporters’ misbehaviour was to blame.

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