And so I asked the policeman Was her body very badly damaged And he said, No she’s not too bad looking So I asked could I see her, and the police and the hospital staff took me towards this room, I think it was marked, resuscitation unit, and her Mummy was outside the resuscitation unit already and so they took us in together, and there was the shape of a body underneath a white sheet, on basically a slab, , and right up until that point I was hoping that perhaps there’d been some type of mistaken identification, and that it wasn’t Lauren, and but then they dropped the white sheet from her head and I looked, and sure enough it was Lauren.

I’m so sorry.

Thank you. She didn’t look too bad, she had sort of a gash, in this part of her head, exposing her skull, but apart from that she looked as if she should be alive, and in fact I put my hand on her leg and her leg was still twitching.

And did your son go and see her too?

No he didn’t go and see her at, in the hospital. He stayed outside the room, at that time, I think it was probably the right thing to do because he’d enough to deal with on that day, but when her body was brought back to the house two days later after the post- mortem he certainly went down and had his final moments.

You had her brought home?

Oh yes, yes, and in a strange way, you know there was a certain excitement about her body coming home. I think for, for the first number of days and indeed weeks, it doesn’t sink in that this person has gone forever. And so when the undertaker said that you know on the, I think it was on the Thursday morning, the accident happened on Tuesday it was on the Thursday morning the undertaker said he was bringing her home, it suddenly it wasn’t so bad, and it was nice to have her home and in her room, and , came the time of the funeral, and it was an all, it was, when it came time for the funeral it was with great reluctance actually that you know we were parting with her again as it were.

But the funeral was on the Friday. I remember that one, you know there was a couple of wee things happened in the lead up to the funeral, that are just awkward, but obviously it’s a very awkward situation anyway. Firstly, I mean this is, this was in the summer of 2005, and having an open coffin in the summer, by the time it was the morning of her funeral there was a distinct smell of death in the room, which was not pleasant. There was some relatives wanted to, who went to the room and see her, and others didn’t, and that’s fair enough.

Were there any important practical things that you want to talk about, that you had to do afterwards?

What do I say, what do I say? Well, one issue is what do you do when, you know, with her bedroom obviously, what do you do with the room?

And again it helps to talk to other people. I thought that I was being a bit you know a bit mad, a bit loony to think that I really wanted the room left the way it was, and not touched, but I found out that, that’s quite common. And so three and a half years later her room is just the same as it was on the day she died. And I don’t know if that’s healthy or unhealthy, but it is fairly common. I know that other people who feel that when they’ve lost a loved one they have to clear the room out, you know make it a bare shell, give away all the clothes, all the possessions, and completely redecorate. If that works, then fine but I couldn’t at this point, I couldn’t entertain doing that, except for the eventuality of say the house changing hands. And all her possessions are still there. Now there is a gradual integration of her possessions, or some of her possessions with her brothers. You know, in as much as, you know if she had a MP3 player and her brother didn’t, then you know, but strangely enough there is a tendency with her brother that he’d rather get something that hasn’t been Lauren’s than take something of Lauren’s as his.

Have you got any message for other people whove been bereaved?

I suppose one of the, one of the messages I would have is that they’ll get all sorts of , they will see in some people the best in humanity and they’ll see in others the worst in humanity, and I suppose trying to be more philosophical about it now than I was three years ago, so when people are being insensitive and people are saying stupid things like, you know it’s been two weeks now, I’m sure you’re feeling better it’s not that they’re horrible people, it’s just that they’re silly because they don’t understand. And I think that on balance, although it’s not for everyone, I think it does help to talk to others who have been similarly bereaved, because I think it’s very important to know that you’re not the only one that’s going through the emotions that you feel. And in fact when you get to speak to someone who is maybe a few years further down the road, having had a similar experience, you find that it’s really quite predictable the, the different stages that you will go through. There’ll be the anger, there’ll be the feelings of guilt, there’ll be the you know, the feelings that life’s not worth living, that you know what lies ahead is going to be a living hell, a living nightmare for the rest of your life. But then you realise that because there are still those that you love around you and there are others that you know that you love that you have to take into account, you mustn’t wallow in self pity, and that that you must be careful not to you know fall into that trough of Oh poor me you know, Why am I having to go through this You know, that you really do have to pull yourself together, give yourself a kick in the backside and say There are other people here that need you, get up and get on with it You know?

I remember reading in a book about bereavement. A family of, you know, a husband, wife, two children, had lost one of the children through an accident and the remaining family each felt that they were in a boat, small boat on a huge sea with giant waves, and that the waves were never going to stop. And that unfortunately the three of them weren’t in the one boat, each individual was in a different small boat, and couldn’t help the other two, because they each were suffering their own pain. But I think it’s a very, very important that as soon as possible you realise that the other loved ones you have that are in their own boats, going through their own pain, need you know, need each other, yes.. And even if it’s only within the family you need a wee tiny support network, you know, so that you can be that crutch for you know your partner, or your sibling, or your other child to prop them up, and they can be that crutch for you whenever it’s you that needs to be propped up. And the worst thing would be to completely isolate yourself and shut yourself away in a room, and you know close all lines of communication even to those you love most.

Lauren was an outstanding actress, and she used to enjoy acting, singing, dancing, generally performing, and she was selected to participate in a specific event in 2005 called A Night of Shakespeare, and on that particular day her school was taking her to the city to rehearse, for A Night of Shakespeare, and that was on the 21st June 2005. And rehearsals progressed throughout the day, but the party began to run late, and she was returning from the city towards her home town, around an hour later than was anticipated and I think she began to worry that she was going to miss her connecting bus and so she asked the teacher, who was in charge of the group, if she could get off at a location that would have brought her back home slightly earlier. And that was at the side of a motorway. And the teacher just referred her to the bus driver, and whatever the bus driver and Lauren said to each other I don’t know, but it resulted in the bus pulling to the side of a motorway, and Lauren disembarking. And the bus drove off, and she attempted to cross I guess four lanes of traffic, and she made it across three lanes, but when she tried to cross the fourth lane she was hit by a lorry, traveling at between 50 and 60 miles an hour. And a later inquest stated that unconsciousness was almost instantaneous and death would’ve followed shortly thereafter.

So around sort of 6pm on that day I was pulling into a petrol station near where I work, to fill up with petrol, and I just heard on the radio news that the motorway near Lauren’s house was closed due to a serious accident, so I decided to phone home to see if Lauren had got home safely before the accident. And when I got through to the house her mummy answered and said that there, there were policemen in the house and one of them wanted to speak to me. And so the policeman came on the phone and he said that Lauren had been involved in an accident, and he said that I should make my way as quickly as possible, but safely, and I said, Right, I’ll head home right now And he said, Well make your way down to the hospital because that’s where she’ll b. So it took me around 20 minutes to drive to the hospital and you know it seemed like much longer at the time.

I’m sure it must’ve been very hard for you.

Yes it was, I could certainly feel the adrenaline working on me during that time, and I suppose I was driving fairly rapidly, but as soon as I made it to the hospital and parked the car and ran down towards the casualty department, I noticed that my father and my son were already there, and they were standing at the door of the casualty unit, and as I tried to make my way over to them to find out what was going on, a policeman took me to one side, and he said, There’s no easy way to tell you this so that immediately triggered the thought that perhaps it was the worst possible news, and I said, Is she dead He said, Yes she is And I remember my initial response was that it would kill my father getting the news, because he’s very elderly anyway, but apparently he’d already been told, so he knew.

There were two main emotions that were very near the surface, and one was guilt and the other was anger. And the guilt was firstly, you know the very obvious guilt that at her time of need, that the moment of the accident on 21st June 2005 that I wasn’t there to meet her needs. But also that earlier on that same day, you know, when I was getting her out for school that morning, normally I would hug her, give her a wee kiss and make sure I’d said bye-bye properly, but on that particular morning her brother woke up early and as she was leaving the house I was attending to her brother, and it was just a very quick cheerio, or See you. And so I didn’t really even get to say bye-bye properly on that morning, and I never got to speak to her again.

And so guilt for that, and guilt that I’d, for every time that I’d shouted at her, guilt for times that I’d raised my voice with her, not because of anything particular that she had done, but because I was in a bad mood.

Things like that. And the other emotion was anger. Anger that because of the actions of another individual, and in fact the actions of three other individuals, you know the bus driver, the teacher and the lorry driver, that my daughter had lost her life. And, it’s not that I was wallowing in self pity thinking, Poor me, you know, look what lies ahead for me, it was the unfairness to Lauren because she was a wonderful child. She never gave me any cause for being anything but proud of her, she had a lovely nature, she was very loving, and very well behaved and because of the actions of others she didn’t get the life that she deserved. And there’s unfairness with regard to her brother as well, because her brother lost a wonderful sister, and is now an only child, and that has taken him down a different path.

Yes, one, one of the horrible parts of the journey is that because Lauren’s death was caused by the actions of other people there is a civil case to be answered. And in civil law if the actions of others have caused something really nasty, whether it’s a nasty injury or a death, then one, you know, a party such as Lauren’s family can pursue a civil case against the parties who caused the death.

Where more than one party contributed to the fatality, you’ll find that there’s all these legal arguments and ducking and diving and it’s no longer about the fact that you’ve lost your loved one, it’s about money. And it’s about some, you know barrister saving his client two or three thousand pound. And so the reason why there were these legal representatives kicking about the inquest was that they, the school had a legal representative there, a QC no less, the bus company had a legal representative there, a barrister, and the lorry driver’s employer had a legal representative there. And during the inquest, which is not to attribute blame but rather to find out the facts, there’s all this ducking and diving going on, and basically the humiliation and extra hurt of each of these legal representatives basically saying, Ah it was Lauren’s fault. It was Lauren’s fault. She was looking the wrong way

Did you have any legal representative there?

We had a solicitor there just, but when the legal, when our legal representatives, when our solicitor saw who was representing their side, they actually became quite intimidated because they said, Oh if we’d known a QC was going to be here I would have brought a barrister for our side And so they actually felt very intimidated, but it was very, the way the inquest worked was you’re in very, very tight constraints, as to what, well as you know, as the bereaved person, what I as the father of the deceased was able to ask, was able to get information on, and so all the questions about, why did the lorry driver not see her before he hit her? Why did the bus driver let her off there? Why did the teacher take no interest? All those questions, they couldn’t really be fully addressed at the inquest.

Were you prepared for the inquest in any way? Did anybody tell you what was going to happen?

Well, informally I had some conversation with the lady from the Coroner’s office, on the phone. And they give you, you know, a handout a, a pamphlet about what happens at the Coroner’s court, but I don’t think I was prepared for it being so similar to you know, a High Court where someone would be tried for murder or something. And it was remarkably similar because I had cause to bear witness for the prosecution in a murder case previously, and it was remarkably similar, except.

So how did you, how did you feel about that?

I felt that when it comes to the law, those who implement the law and those who examine the law and test the law are fairly insensitive about people’s feelings and emotions, but I guess that’s just the nature of life. And certainly when it comes to application of the law, and the civil case, it’s not about truth or justice anymore; it’s about the letter of the law.

Did you have to seek special help for your son, because he lost his sister?

No he’s very strong. Oh he’s a great boy as well, he’s academically very good as well, and a lovely personality. Lovely person, a very loving person, and he’s been very strong. Now he bottles things up and that, that’s one of his ways of dealing with it is just to bottle things up, so, it’s very hard to get him to talk about the loss of his sister. And there’s some things that I’ve done with him that I wouldn’t have otherwise have done, like I took him on a special one week holiday, run by Care for the Family, and that I wouldn’t have otherwise have been taking him on, and very soon after the accident a benevolent fund that’s associated with my employer, you know, the Fire Service Benevolent Fund, provided a holiday to get us away from the, you know, the immediate aftermath of losing her.

That’s good.

And that was to Devon, and in ways it was a, it was miserable holiday, the benevolent fund was trying to all they could to make it better, but it was only, I mean they were trying to fix what couldn’t be fixed. And so it was a horrible time, but it probably would’ve been even worse if we’d been just at the house.