As Ian Glover's mother said in December it is very emotional for us even after all

As Ian Glover's mother said, in December, "it is very emotional for us even after all these years"; and such sadness is surely violated by the court's insistence that relationships which do not come within the judicially approved inner sanctum have to go through these evidential hoops. Of those killed at Hillsborough the overwhelming number were young - 77 of the 95 dead were in their teens and twenties Particular sensitivity is required in these circumstances. It is one thing for the courts to seek to limit the numbers of those receiving damages by hierarchising relationships on the basis of the court's "logical necessity" and "common knowledge" approach. It is surely the case that a more sympathetic approach could have been formulated in the time since the disaster.The McCarthy case represents a post-modern crisis for the law.

Deeply problematic concepts of the quality of love, families and the nature of relationships are made to seem given, natural and wholly agreed upon in a series of consensual arrangements. Adopting a discourse of authority and truth can appear insensitive in such circumstances; it also undermines the legitimacy of the law when the distance between the judicially imposed "truth" and the uncertainty of the "real" is so apparent. The judges' pronouncements cannot be disguised as universal principles. Who can say whether the quality of the relationship between a grandparent and grandchild is of a different order to that between a parent and child? The Hillsborough cases represent an unprecedented exposure of the point beyond which the so-called "traditional methods" and paradigms of "truth" fundamental to law are no longer credible.The work of judges has never been more challenging, but if they are to deliver popularly recognisable justice (and avoid mapping a hermetically sealed and idiosyncratic view of the world) they will have to be more sensitive to changing social circumstances. Judged by their Hillsborough deliberations, they have a lot to do to win over a doubting public. The question for us all is whether judges and the courts are best equipped to decide such dilemmas.

Arbitrating on the quality of love, on emotional ties between people, may be a task that is beyond the lawnAndrew Clarke and Dr Stella Swain are lecturers at the University of Western England, Bristol and are writing a book, 'Law and Culture', that deals with the issues discussed in this article.. The Government had committed itself to increasing funding on the NHS - yelled Mr Decibel, the Secretary of State for Health - "yerr on yerr on yerr on yerr on yerr!" Last time it was only yerr on yerr on yerr on yerr He adds one more "yerr" each time. Decibel's opposite number, Chris Smith, was not to be outdone. He spoke of the problems facing "patient after patient, hospital after hospital". If this escalation continues there will be parliamentary time only for one health question ("patient, after patient, hospital after hospital, ward after ward, nurse after nurse" etc) and one answer ("yerr on yerr, on yerr, on yerr, on yerr" ad infinitum). Or will one of them flinch, and walk off huffily, saying that they won't play this silly game anymore because, somewhere along the line, they've grown up? I doubt it. Meanwhile Labour's collection of serious health women were looking concerned. They began the session gathered together, giving support to the two sisters (Tessa Jowell and Anne Coffey) who sit on the front bench.

But their sorority was put in danger with the arrival of male colleague, Tam Dalyell. Mr Dalyell, alone of MPs, is allowed to supplement the upholstery of the Commons, and trails a tatty green cushion behind him for that purpose. This cushion he deploys as a retrospective reservation card, plonking it down where fellow MPs are already sitting - an early warning that his bottom is about to follow. (Once upon a time, a colleague tells me, Tam used to have a rubber ring, but I presume that its regular inflation and deflation reminded him too painfully of when Labour was in power.) The women watched as the dreaded cushion came closer, hovered ominously above an anxious Bridget Prentice - and moved on. Phew!Now safe from the predatory pillow, one of Labour's leading ladies, Ms Jowell - in uniform of bob and box-jacket - asked something earnest about cancer patients having to wait for operations. This led the junior minister, the Hon Tom Sackville, to go ballistic with ear-splitting Dorrellian violence.