YOU'LL NEVER WALK ALONE

I had intended to write something today about the outcome of the Hillsborough hearing.

That was until I read Mark Frankland's piece on it.

Now you'll know already that I'm a big fan of this guy, not only as a writer (his books are gripping reads, and available on Amazon) but as a food bank manager that goes just that step or two farther and provides for his clients more than just something to eat.

So I look forward to his posts, even if sometimes they make me angry, or sad, or just despairing of the United Kingdom and its foulness, and invariably make me cry.

It turns out that Mark was there that day in Hillsborough. At the match. 

Mark actually witnessed this stuff, and because he's Mark he got involved; wrote to his MP and ended up giving evidence to the court.

I'll not tell you more. 

It's a far better idea to read his own account, which you can do here (if you haven't already). He's a writer. He makes it real.

Suffice to say, I'm ashamed, once again, that we live in the kind of country where cover up by people at the very top is how we deal with incompetence and deceit in the very people we pay to competent and honest.

Any suggestion that leniency should be shown to people who put the football fans through this is, of course, beyond the pale in my opinion. Apparently the Daily Mail suggested that it may not serve the ends of justice for elderly men to be tried and possibly jailed for these crimes.

Nonsense.

We allow policemen and women to have a measure of power over us. We accept a similar, although different, situation for elected officials.  In return we have the right to expect them to behave as if they deserved that privilege.

When they fall short, we need them to be dealt with in the most severe fashion. 

Thatcher has form on covering up horrific crimes.

Of course it doesn't happen. When MPs and Lords stole money from the state in far larger amounts than any benefit scrounger, a few, a very few, hapless misfits that no one liked were thrown to the wolves and imprisoned for short periods; Hanningfield served as little as 9 days for the theft of thousands of pounds, before he was released to continue with his fiddling. 

I wonder how many DWP clients who've fiddled that kind of money could say the same.

At the same time people who stole from us to have their moats cleaned or their duck houses maintained, their wisteria removed or their hanging baskets watered, got off Scot free.

This though, was murder, by some other name. That's more serious than stealing a few million.

Senior police, no matter how old and frail need to be made to pay. Politicians compliant with orders from the top (Thatcher) to hush it up and blame the fans for crimes, including inventing preposterous stories about urinating on, and picking the pockets of, dead bodies, likewise. 

It's no good saying that speaking up would have ended their careers. So what? They were condoning murder, and we were paying them to do it!

Oh yes, just one final thought... what did they tell the Queen... these right honourable???? privy councillors?