Legal aid for all bereaved families affected by state action moves closer
In extremely positive news for grieving families, Parliament will debate a law that will provide legal protection for bereaved families and victims involved in public inquiries, investigations and inquests.
It means that families who have lost a relative and are up against a state body, such as the Ministry of Defence for example, will receive publicly funded representation at an inquest into a death.
This will finally end the terrible inequality whereby a state body is represented by lawyers paid for by the public, while the family affected by that body's actions are left to fund their own representation, or go without.
The proposed law, introduced into Parliament for debate by each House, should then become an Act that will enshrine non-means tested legal aid for families at all inquests where the state is involved.
It will also introduce a statutory duty of candour towards families from the state body or public officials to tell the truth and fully cooperate with investigations.
The bill, to be called Hillsborough Law, is the result of years of campaigning by people who lost friends and relatives in the Hillsborough football disaster in 1989.
Years of cover up by the South Yorkshire Police were finally uncovered in 2012 when an independent panel confirmed original criticisms of police efforts to shift blame onto fans.
The panel's report overturned inquest conclusions of accidental death and new inquests were opened that found unlawful killing by gross negligence by the police and ambulance service. An independent review was also opened into the actions of the police.
Important to the families, supporters were also found not to be to blame for the dangerous conditions in the stadium that caused the tragedy. Hillsborough Law will hopefully prevent another such travesty ever being repeated.
Where this new law would benefit the work of Fieldfisher's personal injury and medical negligence teams in particular is when a case is complicated on liability. In that case an inquest can lead to evidence that enables a claim to brought for the surviving family. It may also apply to inquests involving an NHS trust, meaning family members could receive funding for representation at an inquest following a death during medical treatment. That in turn can uncover evidence that enables a claim to be brought.
Currently, many families have to negotiate sometimes very complex inquests without legal representation in the face of state actors fully represented by highly experienced lawyers, paid for by the public. The new availability of public funding together with the duty of candour will go some way towards redressing this imbalance.
Read about our case against the MOD following the death of Staff Sergeant John McKelvie in 2019.
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