New Hillsborough enquiry expected

Last updated : 19 April 2009 By Adam Bryant
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has met with South Yorkshire's Chief Constable Meredydd Hughes to discuss waiving the 30-year-rule preventing the disclosure of official documents.

The unanswered questions include:

Were any victims still alive beyond the official 3.15pm time of death?
Why were ambulances not allowed on the pitch to aid the injured?
What were the police briefing the media about the tragedy?

Families of the 96 who died on that day are keen to see the minutes of a meeting between then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and the South Yorkshire police which apparently place on the Sunday morning after the disaster.

"We believe that a decision was made at that meeting that the police would not be blamed for what happened," said Trevor Hicks, of the Hillsborough Families Support Group.

"We would like to see the minutes of the meeting, to know what the Prime Minister was told and what decisions were taken about the handling of any inquiries."

"The claim that all the 96 were dead at 3.15pm has never been accepted."

Disclosure of these documents will almost certainly prompt a fresh enquiry and finally justice for those supporters who didn't make it home on 15th April 1989.