In an article about “the terrible story of Aberfan”, Huw Edwards reminded readers of the Sunday Telegraph that it “was a man-made disaster”.

He was marking the 50th anniversary of the colliery tip collapse in the Welsh village that cost the lives of 116 children and 28 adults on 21 October 1966.*

In so doing, he argued that the lessons of Aberfan “are still of profound relevance today” because “they touch on issues of public accountability, responsibility, competence and transparency”.

One of those issues relates to the media, specifically the failure of national newspapers to hold to account the state-owned National Coal Board (NCB) and its high-handed chairman, Lord (Alf) Robens.



His conduct, wrote Edwards, “was, by general consent, thoroughly reprehensible”. He tried to avoid blame for the tragedy, lied to the tribunal of inquiry and refused to pay for other dangerous tips to be cleared.

Edwards wrote: “Those in charge of a public body found liable for a disaster on this scale would be justly denounced, vilified and prosecuted. There would be charges of corporate manslaughter brought”.

At the tribunal, the NCB’s lawyers argued that the collapse was due to a “critical geological environment” and insisted there was no way of knowing that a slide was foreseeable.

Edwards wrote: “This was the line Lord Robens had given to a (mostly gullible and deferential) press when he finally appeared in Aberfan some 36 hours after the disaster happened... Robens had powerful friends in politics and, it goes without saying, in the press”.

Gullible and deferential? And, it would appear, some were even willing to accept a muzzle. Before the tribunal opened, the attorney general, Elwyn Jones, “imposed restrictions on speculation in the media about the causes of the disaster”.

Imposed restrictions on the media? Imagine that. Not that every editor obeyed, of course, but Robens - despite some reputational damage - went on, remarkably, to chair a government inquiry into workplace health and safety.

A further point. Edwards believes there “is a powerful parallel between the conduct and response of the NCB in 1966 and that of South Yorkshire police after Hillsborough in 1989”.

They were “public bodies, led by strong-willed men, seemingly determined to put institutional face-saving before the needs of bereaved families”.

But there is an even more powerful parallel: in both instances, several newspapers allowed themselves to be spun by those institutions. That was a classic case of gullibility and deference.

*Aberfan: The Fight for Justice is being screened on BBC1 tomorrow (18 October) at 10.45pm



See also two recent Guardian articles, A cantata for the people of Aberfan and Aberfan 50 years on.