Delays to justice after disasters such as Grenfell are ‘stain on society’, says new victims advocate for England and Wales

Victims of disasters such as Hillsborough and Grenfell having to wait years for justice is “shameful and a stain on our society”, the new Independent Public Advocate (IPA) has said in her first interview in the role.The former police complaints commissioner Cindy Butts said she was determined to stop people from being forced to “become investigators and de facto lawyers at the time of grief” in order to get justice after tragedies involving state failings in England and Wales.“It’s shameful and it’s a stain on our society that following major incidents, where there are clearly failures of either the state or its institutions, we are not getting to the truth soon enough,” she said.“What we see over and over again are the same failings. People denied the truth, documents going missing or being altered, families being blamed, families not being treated with respect. Forcing people to fight in grief is inhumane.”The IPA role, first announced in 2023, was born out of a report that found failings in the way the bereaved families of the Hillsborough disaster were treated by authorities.The role is the first of its kind in the world, and Butts will be responsible for ensuring victims of large incidents know their rights, get access to support, and are represented in inquires and inquests, as well as regularly reporting to parliament on her findings.Butts says an important part of her role will be uncovering the truth in the immediate aftermath of large tragedies to avoid lengthy public inquiries. Photograph: Jill Mead/The GuardianShe will also be able to produce independent reports on incidents without the need for ministerial approval.Only days after starting her five-year term in September, Butts travelled to Manchester to support the victims of the synagogue terror attack. “Within 24 hours, we set up a dedicated casework function so that victims, families and the wider community had a direct route to us for information, advocacy and practical help,” she said.“Its a stark reminder that this office is not symbolic. It’s operational. It’s active in real time and built to stand with victims from the very first moment a crisis happens.”She said an important part of her role would be ensuring the truth was exposed in the immediate aftermath of disaster so there would be no need for the substantial inquiries and reports the country had seen in recent years.“We are there in the early hours, weeks, months and years so that we don’t have to get to the stage where we have to have a public inquiry that lasts decades, where the truth has to be prized from institutions,” she said.“That’s the point. The lesson from Hillsborough is not that we should recreate Hillsborough-type panels, but we should build a system where we never again need one.”Butts has a long history in advocacy work. She said she was inspired by her mother, who campaigned on issues such as school exclusions, poor housing and racial disproportionality in “sus” [stop and search] arrests when she was growing up in west London.Butts joined the Metropolitan police authority, where she oversaw significant change in the aftermath of the Stephen Lawrence inquiry, and went on to become a commissioner at the then Independent Police Complaints Commission (now the Independent Office for Police Conduct) during its Hillsborough investigation.She also chaired the Independent Commission for Equity in Cricket, which published a landmark report in 2023 finding the sport was “racist, sexist and elitist”.She said her biggest challenge as standing advocate was likely to be building trust with people who are “justifiably mistrustful” of the state and the officials who represent it. “My ambition is to quickly build credibility and to show through my actions that my loyalty is with victims, not to institutions,” she said.Her remit covers incidents that take place from September 2024 onwards, defined as events “declared in writing by the secretary of state to have caused the death of or serious harm to a significant number of individuals”, which would include events similar to the Grenfell Tower fire, the Hillsborough disaster and the Manchester Arena bombing.Butts said she wanted more resources for her office, which come primarily from the Ministry of Justice, saying she did not think she had enough funding and staff to deal with a large-scale incident – although the body could “draw down funds” if needed.She also said she would be keen to expand the role to include individual deaths in “exceptional circumstances” where there is a significant public interest, such as in cases similar to Harry Dunn and Stephen Lawrence.To help inform her approach, she has been speaking with bereaved families from previous disasters still campaigning for justice decades later, such as the relatives of the 50 people who died in the Isle of Man 1973 Summerland fire. “They’ve not been given space and dignity to grieve because they have to fight for the truth – that’s profoundly wrong and inhumane,” she said.One of her first priorities will be pushing for full implementation of the Hillsborough law making its way through parliament, which will lead to public servants who deliberately cover up state-related disasters facing prison.She said she welcomed the legislation, particularly how it would ensure “victims’ families are not outnumbered by armies of lawyers” when attending inquests and inquiries, but it that it had some significant shortcomings.“It’s taken 36 years since Hillsborough for parliament to stand on the verge of legislating for honesty, accountability and equality of arms. Yet families are absent from the bill itself. I think that’s a gap. It’s a massive legitimacy gap,” she said. “And it’s truly shameful that we need legislation at all.“The very fact that this legal duty of candour is required tells us how deep and persistent the problems have been.”