A thread on BBC presenters stating facts that some still dispute and how that doesn’t stop them being facts.....
On the evening of April 15th 1989 scores of Liverpool fans returning from Sheffield or relatives of fans still there poured through the doors of @bbcmerseyside where I worked at the time. They came the next day. Then the next. And the next.
Even on the Saturday night they knew the lie - the lies - were halfway round the world. So they got their boots on and spent three decades stating facts that very powerful people never wanted you to hear.
That first week, hundreds of individuals who had been at the Hillsborough football ground told journalists at their local radio station the same story. Identical detail in every individual story. No doctored statements required to retrofit the desired story.
Remember, the tragedy happened on live broadcasts, and was filmed on CCTV. A provable set of circumstances happened. The initial subsequent public inquiry substantiated the facts. And yet, because of the self interest of powerful people, the lie was fed and watered for decades.
During two of those three decades I was a national news presenter on the BBC and when I covered the story of Hillsborough I was required to broadcast equally to those who knew the facts and thise who’d swallowed the lie. It was tough.
I always told the truth and I always served those who didn’t know it yet. It is possible to state facts and give room to those who still want to debate them, with some exceptions of course.
Last night @maitlis told the truth about the lockdown road trip of Dominic Cummings. It happened. It was not essential. That is demonstrable. Only his motivations are up for debate.
The return to Downing Street after being with a symptomatic wife, the journey in the night, not revealed until this weekend, the daytrip to Barnard Castle while isolating, the child going to a hospital he should never have been near. Facts.
Facts revealed to us by Dominic Cummings himself.
Argue nuance if you like. Argue motivation. Argue that some contraventions are morally, emotionally understandable. He still did wrong and millions of British people are exercised about that and the govt doesn’t get it. That’s all @maitlis was saying.
