Bettison ‘boasted of plot to put blame on fans’

Shadow Cabinet member and Merseyside MP Maria Eagle told the House of Commons she has obtained a written account of an alleged conversation involving Sir Norman in 1989, in which the then-chief inspector revealed “a plot to fit up the Liverpool fans”.

Ms Eagle was speaking during last night’s powerful Commons debate over the Hillsborough Independent Panel report, during which it was revealed almost 1,500 past and serving officers in South Yorkshire are to be investigated over the affair.

Sir Norman – now chief constable of West Yorkshire Police, and currently facing two separate investigations over his conduct by the police watchdog – has always denied any involvement in the cover-up that followed the stadium disaster.

But Ms Eagle used Parliamentary privilege during the highly-charged debate to lay powerful new accusations at his door.

She quoted from a letter from John Barry, who was at Hillsborough for the FA Cup semi-final tie that led to the death of 96 Liverpool fans.

The letter, written in 1998 to a solicitor for the Hillsborough Family Support Group, was copied to Ms Eagle in 2009, and she has been given permission to make it public.

Ms Eagle said Mr Barry was studying part-time at Sheffield Business School where one of his fellow students was a “middle-ranking police officer”.

Mr Barry wrote: “Some weeks after the game, and after I had been interviewed by West Midlands Police, we were in a pub after our weekly evening class.

“He told me that he had been asked by his senior officers to put together the South Yorkshire Police evidence for the forthcoming inquiry. He said that ‘we are trying to concoct a story that all the Liverpool fans were drunk and we were afraid that they were going to break down the gates so we decided to open them’.”

Ms Eagle said: “Mr Barry confirmed to me in the covering letter in 2009 that the middle-ranking police officer to whom he referred is Norman Bettison.

“He has agreed to swear a statement to that effect and I have put him in touch with the families’ solicitors.

“Here we have an account of a contemporaneous conversation in which Norman Bettison boasted he is engaged in a South Yorkshire Police plot to fit up the Liverpool fans and deflect blame from the force.

“That is indeed what happened subsequently, so what Sir Norman denies in public he boasts about in private conversations.”

Sir Norman, who has announced he will retire in March, was referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission over claims that he gave misleading information in the wake of the Hillsborough disaster and that he tried to influence West Yorkshire Police Authority’s decision-making process in relation to the referral.

Sir Norman denies any wrong-doing.

Last night West Yorkshire Police said it would not be making any immediate response to Ms Eagle’s allegations.

But Conservative MP Alec Shelbrooke said Sir Norman could not continue in his position while facing the various allegations.

“In order for the public to have faith in this investigation, he should be suspended,” Mr Shelbrooke said.