Yvette Cooper clashed with her Tory counterpart over the disclosure of information about the Southport attack.
The Home Secretary stressed that what could be made public had been limited to avoid prejudicing the trail until yesterday when Axel Rudakubana, 18, pleaded guilty to murdering three girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport, Merseyside, in July.
But shadow home secretary Chris Philp argued that more information could have been shared without prejudicing the court to help prevent the riots that followed.
He told the House of Commons: “On October 29 Rudakubana was charged with possessing the ricin and the terror manual, that was then made public. So, if it can be made public in October, without risking prejudice of the murder trial, it follows that it could have been made public in August, without prejudicing that same trial.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper addresses MPs in the House of Commons (Image: house of commons/AFP via Getty I)
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“Background facts on other cases over the years have been made public after arrest and before trial without prejudice, and the shields relating to two of those cases are in this chamber. So why did the Prime Minister not make public some of this background information in August when he knew it, when later disclosure of that information in October demonstrated such disclosure could be made without prejudice?”
He added: “Does she accept there should and could have been more openness and transparency, as I just set out, without prejudicing the trial and that disclosing more of that truth, openly and transparently, would have helped combat the damaging misinformation that circulated and which arguably fuelled the riots?”
Ms Cooper insisted the Government was “keen” to publish the information on Prevent referrals but that the advice was “clear”.
She added: “If we had ignored the advice that we were given about the case that was put towards us and about the information that the police and the Crown Prosecution Service were working through in order to get justice, and if as a result a killer had walked free, no-one would ever have forgiven the Government or anyone else.”
Despite contact with state agencies such as anti-terror programme Prevent, authorities failed to stop the attack which claimed the lives of Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven.
The Home Secretary said “there were so many signs of how dangerous” Rudakubana was ahead of the killings.
Ms Cooper said she has ordered a “thorough review” of his referrals to Prevent “to identify what changes are needed to make sure serious cases are not missed”.
She added that the probe will also “consider the wider challenge of rising youth violence” and the Government is requesting tech companies remove online material accessed by him.