Daughter of murdered MP Sir David Amess demands public inquiry five years on

Katie Amess says she cannot move on without answers over her father's killing. An independent review is under way but she wants a full statutory public inquiry.

Five years on, Katie Amess still fighting for answers over her father's murder

The daughter of slain Southend MP Sir David Amess says she is unable to move forward with her life until a full public inquiry is held into his death, hellorayo.co.uk reports.

Katie Amess has been campaigning for a statutory inquiry since her father was stabbed to death at the Belfairs Methodist Church in Leigh-on-Sea on 15 October 2021 — five years ago this week.

Sir David was hosting a constituency surgery when he was killed by Ali Harbi Ali, who was arrested at the scene and is now serving a whole life sentence.

Katie told hellorayo.co.uk that the grief has not diminished with time: "The pain doesn't go away, I still feel just as dumbfounded as I was the moment that I found out. You just have to live with that trauma forever."

She rejected suggestions that five years is sufficient time to have recovered: "People might think, 'well it's five years now you have to just get on with it', but you can't knowing that that happened to your loved one."

Her central concern is that Ali Harbi Ali had been known to the Government's counter-extremism Prevent programme prior to the attack. "Why did they have somebody who they were monitoring, that was a potential terrorist, why did they let him go?" she said.

The Home Secretary has appointed Sir Robert Buckland KC to conduct an independent review, tasked with exploring what he described as "missed opportunities that could have prevented" the murder. Katie said she hopes the review yields answers, but she continues to press for a full public inquiry — a mechanism that would legally compel witnesses to respond to questions.

She said previous paper-based reviews had fallen short: "All of these other paper reviews, people refused to speak to them, people forgot what happened, meetings between counter terrorism and the investigators, the notes were missing. Nobody has to give any answers, nobody has to speak."

Katie argued that public inquiries have been granted in comparable cases of government failure and questioned why successive administrations have resisted one in her father's case. "I don't know why both governments haven't wanted to do an inquiry," she said.

She added that the burden of leading the campaign was itself a source of pain: "I shouldn't have to be leading a campaign into this. I should be trying to get on with my healing now and trying to live the rest of my life."

A Home Office spokesperson said Sir David's murder was "an awful tragedy" and that the department continues to work closely with the Parliamentary Security Department to support MPs. "The Home Secretary has also commissioned a further review of lessons from Sir David's murder to identify improvements to security arrangements for MPs working in their constituencies," the spokesperson added.

Source: The Sun