Blame Game

Three quotations appeared, apparently by coincidence, in the Times on the day that the Police Commander at the Hillsborough football disaster was reported as cleared of manslaughter:

“I would like to know who is responsible for my father’s death because someone is.”  Christine Burke, from the public gallery after the judgement by Mr Justice Openshaw.

“Name the greatest of all the inventors.  Accident.”  Mark Twain.

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity or incompetence.  Hanlon’s razor.

Mr Duckenfield’s defence argued that he had done “what he was expected to do in difficult circumstances.”

I conducted two major Boards of Inquiry into aircraft accidents; one in which there were no survivors to tell their side of the story and the second in which political considerations, eventually, trumped reason and fairness.  In both cases I had to negotiate the fine line set out in my terms of reference: distinguishing the determination of the cause with apportioning blame, if any.

Determination of the cause relies on pure logic and a painstaking process of analysis of the facts.  There can be no conjecture – either something happened as a result of something or it didn’t.  When we come to apportioning blame subjectivity inevitably arises and it follows that one man’s interpretation could be open to challenge from another. Did a human act or omission either cause the accident or made the consequences of the accident more severe?  In identifying a human act or omission was it reasonable to have expected the individual to have acted otherwise (according to the standards and criteria of the time)?  Difficult territory indeed and probably the subject of ongoing disagreement, regardless of the judgement.

My wife suffered the trauma of losing her first husband in an aircraft accident, the 48^th anniversary of which is shortly to arise.  Historians might examine that Board of Inquiry and, even by applying the standards of the time, conclude that the tragic events arose through more than misfortune with hubris and stupidity to the fore.  Joan has the same suspicions but, long ago, decided that nothing in the future could change the past and got on with her life accordingly.  I am most grateful.