The release of the Manchester Arena Inquiry's second report has been delayed until early November. Inquiry chairman Sir John Saunders' second dossier focusing on the response of the emergency services to the 2017 terror attack was expected later in the summer, but it has now been pushed back.
Bereaved families have been notified of the development, confirmed the inquiry's legal team. They blamed the delay on the sheer volume of correspondence involved and the scale of the report in total.
Parties warned they would be criticised in the report have also been given a chance to respond. In a statement today, the inquiry said: "As a result of the volume of correspondence - in particular the number of 'warnings of criticisms' and the very detailed responses - all of which must be considered; the publication of Volume Two of the Manchester Arena Inquiry report will now be in early November.
"The size of this report is substantial and both the Chairman and the team are confident that the revised date can be achieved. It remains the Chairman's intention to publish both the Volume Two and Three reports by the end of this year."
The third and final report, considering whether the security services and counter-terrorism police could, and should, have prevented the bombing, and the radicalisation of suicide bomber Salman Abedi, will follow.
Abedi, 22, detonated a device in a rucksack as crowds left an Ariana Grande concert at the venue on May 22, 2017. The attack claimed 22 lives - the youngest an eight-year-old girl, Saffie-Rose Roussos. Sixty-three people were seriously injured and 111 hospitalised.
The Arena atrocity was the deadliest terrorist attack in the UK since the 7/7 London bombings in 2005. There were 13 preliminary hearings before the inquiry began in September, 2020, and 194 days of oral evidence given in total. Over that period the inquiry, which came to a conclusion in February, has heard from 267 witnesses - and from as many as 24 expert witnesses.
Split into 14 chapters, the inquiry has examined all aspects of the terror attack in painstaking detail. Hearings began on September 7, 2020, and continued, remotely, through the Covid pandemic lockdown.
There have been apologies and admissions of failures - changes to policies and procedures and scrutiny of decisions made on the night. Stories of heroism have emerged - and all the families involved revealed the beautiful lives of their lost loved ones over the course of moving commemorative hearings.
Sir John published his first report into security arrangements at the Arena last summer.
In it he said Abedi should have been identified as a 'threat' and challenged. 'Disruptive intervention' should have been taken against him - and lives could have been saved as a result, Sir John found.
"Had that occurred, I consider it likely that Salman Abedi would still have detonated his device, but the loss of life and injury is highly likely to have been less," he said. The report was critical of SMG, the owners of the Arena, the stewarding company Showsec, and British Transport Police (BTP).
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