Jack Straw, the former home secretary, has expressed regret that a review of
the Hillsborough disaster he ordered in 1997 failed to "get to the
bottom" of what happened or expose the police cover-up.
The investigation, by Lord Justice Stuart-Smith, concluded that while some
alterations were made to police accounts of the disaster, these were "at
worst an error of judgement," Mr Straw said.
At the time, he added, he assumed that the peer had reviewed all the documentation
into the 1989 tragedy, which was finally made public yesterday by the
independent panel and which has led to growing calls for prosecutions of
police who doctored evidence.
But with "hindsight" it was clear that the Stuart-Smith report was not thorough
enough.
Mr Straw told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "If I could turn the clock
back I would do so and some years of heartache for these families could be
saved.
Source: telegraph