Professor Phil Scraton:

I can be very quick, but a range of issues were raised by the Deputy. They are complex, different but distinct. Different states operate in different ways in memorialising the dead and also in their record-keeping and the establishment of cause and consequences surrounding death. When the Deputy spoke, the genocide in Australia sprung to mind and the deaths of Aboriginal families at the hands of the British invaders. We have seen that very same matter raised again about the relationship between sites of memorial and sites of genocide, on the one hand, and sites of respect. The Deputy is raising an important question but it is separate and distinct.

It is important for us to consider today how those deaths are investigated, specifically with regard to their individuality and specificity. It is a question of how they are understood. The Deputy is absolutely right that we should be thinking of that broader level of memorialisation. Broad memorialisation does not help individual families come to terms with the circumstances of these deaths. I am not in any way discounting what the Deputy is saying, I am saying it is a twin track.