Hillsborough Independent Panel

The Panel considers that the implementation of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 should bring about a more consistent approach to the archiving and availability of transferred records and encourages the newly appointed Chief Coroner of England and Wales to issue guidance in consultation with the Keeper of Public Records.

The Panel recommends that police force records are brought under legislative control and that police forces are added to Part II of the First Schedule to the Public Records Act 1958, thereby making them subject to the supervision of the Keeper of Public Records.

The Panel recommended placing police force records under the Public Records Act 1958. In December 2023, HM Government stated that a review concluded against immediately applying the legislation, finding that adherence to the 1958 Act alone would have caused more Hillsborough material to be lost (Home Office response, Dec 2023). It reported that statutory adherence remained "a desirable objective", but accepted recommendations to update police records management standards first (Home Office response, Dec 2023). In July 2023, the College of Policing issued an updated Code of Practice covering corporate records, which the Minister of State for Crime, Policing and Fire laid before Parliament to ensure wider retention (College of Policing, Jul 2023; UK Parliament, Jul 2023). The record holds nothing dated later than the response of December 2023 (Home Office response, Dec 2023).

The Panel recommends that central government documents relating to Hillsborough which were disclosed to the Panel be transferred to The National Archives at Kew in due course, with redactions agreed by the Panel retained.

The Panel proposes a Distributed Permanent Archive of the original material at Sheffield Archives and Liverpool Record Office and for central government records at The National Archives at Kew. Such a Distributed Archive is in keeping with the nature of the records and the services which the three archives can best provide and which they are willing to do.

The National Archives has provided no response on the record, while the Independent Office for Police Conduct stated in September 2026 that its legacy team is working on the return of historical material alongside a complete audit trail (Independent Office for Police Conduct, Sep 2026). It had previously reported in July 2025 that an initial return of records to the Liverpool Record Office was planned for August 2025, with remaining materials to follow to their respective destinations (Independent Office for Police Conduct, Jul 2025).

Private owners of documents and other material made available to the Panel, especially where those records have been disclosed on the Hillsborough website, should be encouraged to deposit their records in the archives.

An Editor-in-Chief should be appointed to be responsible for the policy and implementation of the digital archive post-disclosure and continuing technical support should be provided to manage existing and new material.

A protocol for allowing additional material to be incorporated into the digital archive and for taking down material is recommended.

The digital archive and the audio-visual material should remain available for the foreseeable future at Liverpool and Sheffield with advisory and support staff as necessary; it should be accessible according to the access protocol agreed by the Panel.

In a written parliamentary answer in November 2022, Chris Philp, Minister of State at the Home Office, stated that the government had ensured public access to online archive material regarding the Hillsborough Independent Panel and the Hillsborough Inquests through The National Archives website since January 2022 (Chris Philp, Nov 2022). The record holds no update since the Home Office's response of November 2022 (Chris Philp, Nov 2022).

The digital archive, including audio-visual material, eventually should be permanently archived at The National Archives.