Fans are being warned they face being banned from football matches if they commit tragedy-related abuse. Tragedy-related abuse is when fans sing, chant or gesture offensive messages about disasters or accidents involving players or fans – including references to the Hillsborough Disaster.
00:00 Football fans are being warned they faced being banned from matches if they commit tragedy related abuse.
00:08 This is when fans sing, chant or gesture offensive messages about disasters or accidents involving players or fans, including references to the Hillsborough disaster.
00:20 To actually start coming out with horrible things about people who have died, I think they should actually get a prison sentence, I'll be honest with you.
00:32 I think it should be banned. If they're doing the club and it belongs to the club and they're doing it, or the folks and fans do it in Liverpool, then I think the folks and fans should be out a light siren ban.
00:42 But you would hear all the time, like, you know, a lot of people died, you know, and that thing is in poor taste.
00:48 They've lost something really important to them and hearing all this abusive shouts and everything, you know, they're living with this day in day out anyway.
00:56 But to have that on top of it, it just makes matters worse.
01:01 It used to be just rivalry, but now it's become real hatred and bitter, you know, and I find that sad. I do.
01:13 Locally, the Real Truth Legacy Project works with Hillsborough survivors and some families of the 97.
01:19 They go into schools to educate current and future generations about what really happened at the disaster and about the subsequent cover up, as well as the long fight for justice.
01:31 The older generation has a lot to answer for, really, because the youngsters, they just copy and they just copy.
01:38 They don't know what it's all about. And it's in Munich or Hillsborough. Any of these things, they don't know what it's all about.
01:44 They don't know the hurt it's caused for many, many people.
01:48 Maybe start like an awareness course where they've got to go and sit and sit down and actually understand the consequences of what they're actually saying.
01:58 Of the parents, or of the internet. Sadly, the internet does good things, mainly does bad things, because they keep promoting this thing.
02:10 I think sometimes you look at the internet and see who's doing it on the internet.
02:16 Like posting football fans saying, "The Whites have done this." I'm banned now from the internet.
02:23 You kind of look at it now and you think, "It is a sin, right?" Because for someone who wasn't alive when it happened, where have you got that kind of hatred from?
02:33 And it is. It's bred into you. It's come from families before us.
02:38 The Crown Prosecution Service has updated its guidance on football-related offences, saying that tragedy-related abuse can be prosecuted as a public order offence,
02:47 and sets out how lawyers can apply for football banning orders, which not only stop fans from attending matches,
02:53 but can also impose other restrictions such as not being able to travel to certain areas or be allowed in pubs at game time and travel during tournament time.
