Time not for closure but opening

Closure seems to be the modern buzzword when it comes to dealing with grief, and you can only hope the relatives of the 96 are feeling a measure of that kind of emotion today; but in reality what those families really need right now is openings.

The opening, for instance, of one last full and independent inquiry — unfettered by British government policy and unhindered by those in authority wishing to cushion or mask their responsibility — which can enshrine in a verdict the facts that came to light yesterday.

The opening, too, of new inquests in the cases of many fans whose deaths may no longer be seen as accidental — and the opening of minds so that football fans are never again seen as second-class citizens who deserve to be herded like animals and treated as potential criminals instead of human beings, a sentiment which was at the root of just about everything that went wrong at Hillsborough that fateful day.